Mind Matters: A psychologist’s trauma

Posted by Dr. Kayta Gajdos on October 27, 2018

I was probably a first-grader standing in line waiting to be dismissed from school at the end of the day when I muttered to myself, “I could hit that sister in the head for giving us so much homework.”

The tattletale in front of me ran up to the teacher and blurted out, “Sister, Sister, Kathy wants to cut your head off!”

With that, Sister whipped me out of line and roughly pulled me to the principal, who was also the eighth-grade teacher. Sister Prudentia exuded sanctimony while simultaneously eliciting fear among most students. Her penetrating blue eyes were fierce and cold, all the scarier because she was a “bride of Christ” who proudly proclaimed her piety. Indeed, she was quite the Pharisee.

Small child that I was, I had looked up to her as saintly. On this day, however, I was frightened, shaking and crying, as my teacher thrust me before Prudentia’s wicked glare. As I sobbed, trying so hard to catch my breath, this nun-turned-witch took a knife from her drawer and put it to my throat. Now, I really couldn’t breathe. I choked back tears as she demanded I stop crying and asked in a most cruel tone, “How would you like it to have your head cut off?” Would I die? I was doomed. Darkness descended. This was a religious person telling me I am bad: Her black habit was my shroud.

I don’t remember how long this interrogation and torture lasted, but I do know that I was frightened into silence. I walked home too ashamed to tell my mother. Yes, I walked home alone. We lived across the street from the church and school in a row house with my mother’s store in front.

Saying not a word, I suffered this brutal abuse of my six-year-old self, burdened with shame. The nightmares began. I must have woken up screaming every night until my mother somehow discovered what had happened. How she managed to find out was never clear to me. My guess is that an eighth-grader witnessed the scene and reported it to my older brother. When my mother heard the story, she sat me down and asked me to recount my rendition of events.

What she did then saved my life because she believed me. She must have held me and made me feel safe again, but even more than that, I remember her practically sprinting to the convent herself, livid with rage. I don’t know what she told Prudentia, but I do know that after my mother confronted her, she never threatened me again. Ever after, she put on her piety persona, sweetly sanctimonious. However, my innocence never returned and the wound has always remained.

Many years after I became a psychologist, I decided to learn how to do Jungian sand tray work to use with my clients. I did not want to undertake this new tool without experiencing it myself first. So, I went to a Jungian analyst who could supervise my sand play.

Sand play work entails boxes of sand in which the person creates a scene from miniatures—figurines and such. In my first session with this analyst, I spied a nun miniature on her shelves of sundries. I was shocked at how I took that tiny doll and jammed it into the sand upside down and with great force.

Sixty years after the incident of early childhood, I still carried a dormant volcano of emotion. I thought I had worked on this trauma over and over, and yet there it was — clearly still carried within.

After discussing the trauma with the analyst, I set out to confront Sister Prudentia about the abuse she had inflicted upon me. I contacted the superior of her order and found out that, yes, she was still alive. I explained in detail what she had done. The Mother Superior said she would talk to Sister Prudentia about the matter and contact me. The outcome was what I fully expected.

Sister Prudentia told her superior, “I would never do such a thing to a child.” All I could say to her superior was that I knew she would deny what she did as almost all abusers do. “Remember, Sister Superior, I am a psychologist now. I know this happened and I also know from professional experience that she would deny it.” My innocence is lost, but my memory is not.

Neuroscientists and trauma specialists in the fields of psychology and psychiatry understand how the body remembers such trauma.

I was fortunate that at least my mother believed me. In my practice over the years, I have seen many people who have been severely traumatized by abuse in their childhoods. To make matters even worse, they were not believed by their families or the grownups in authority.

In fact, it was often a family member or person in authority who was the perpetrator. Other family members either denied the abuse ever happened or blamed the victim for it.

With the plethora of research in neuroscience and trauma over the past forty years or so, would that denial and blaming the victim become passé. That day may come, but it is not here yet.

About Kayta Gajdos

Dr. Kathleen Curzie Gajdos ("Kayta") is a licensed psychologist (Pennsylvania and Delaware) who has worked with individuals, couples, and families with a spectrum of problems. She has experience and training in the fields of alcohol and drug addictions, hypnosis, family therapy, Jungian theory, Gestalt therapy, EMDR, and bereavement. Dr. Gajdos developed a private practice in the Pittsburgh area, and was affiliated with the Family Therapy Institute of Western Psychiatric Institute and Clinic, having written numerous articles for the Family Therapy Newsletter there. She has published in the American Psychological Association Bulletin, the Family Psychologist, and in the Swedenborgian publications, Chrysalis and The Messenger. Dr. Gajdos has taught at the college level, most recently for West Chester University and Wilmington College, and has served as field faculty for Vermont College of Norwich University the Union Institute's Center for Distance Learning, Cincinnati, Ohio. She has also served as consulting psychologist to the Irene Stacy Community MH/MR Center in Western Pennsylvania where she supervised psychologists in training. Currently active in disaster relief, Dr. Gajdos serves with the American Red Cross and participated in Hurricane Katrina relief efforts as a member of teams from the Department of Health and Human Services' Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.Now living in Chadds Ford, in the Brandywine Valley of eastern Pennsylvania, Dr. Gajdos combines her private practice working with individuals, couples and families, with leading workshops on such topics as grief and healing, the impact of multigenerational grief and trauma shame, the shadow and self, Women Who Run with the Wolves, motherless daughters, and mediation and relaxation. Each year at Temenos Retreat Center in West Chester, PA she leads a griefs of birthing ritual for those who have suffered losses of procreation (abortions, miscarriages, infertility, etc.); she also holds yearly A Day of Re-Collection at Temenos.Dr. Gajdos holds Master's degrees in both philosophy and clinical psychology and received her Ph.D. in counseling at the University of Pittsburgh. Among her professional affiliations, she includes having been a founding member and board member of the C.G. Jung Educational Center of Pittsburgh, as well as being listed in Who's Who of American Women. Currently, she is a member of the American Psychological Association, The Pennsylvania Psychological Association, the Delaware Psychological Association, the American Family Therapy Academy, The Association for Death Education and Counseling, and the Delaware County Mental Health and Mental Retardation Board. Woven into her professional career are Dr. Gajdos' pursuits of dancing, singing, and writing poetry.