Her own abuse led nun to counsel other victims

She knew something was wrong when she started to hyperventilate.

It was 1986, and Sister Carol Davis, OP, had been thinking about contacting her biological father. She was a grown woman, a Dominican sister with a flourishing ministry in counseling and leading retreats.

Her parents were long divorced, and she had a different last name from her biological father's. But every time she thought about looking him up, she felt terrified and faint.

Memories

Then the flashbacks started, and Sister Carol thought she was losing her sanity: She was remembering repeated sexual abuse at his hands during her childhood.

"A flashback, for a survivor, is like being back in that war zone: reliving it in a visceral, emotional way, as if it's happening in the present," she told The Evangelist. "Readers who've experienced this will recognize it."

Sister Carol began seeing a therapist at the diocesan Consultation Center in Albany to work through her realization that she had been abused. She also joined a therapy group for abuse survivors, and told close friends, family and coworkers so they would understand the days when she was struggling emotionally.

After three years of counseling, Sister Carol decided she had to warn relatives with small children about what her biological father had done -- to let them know that, if he had not gotten treatment, they should not leave their children alone with him.

Nightmare

The nun also decided to tell her biological father that she planned to talk with relatives. The resulting phone call to him, she said, was "nightmarish."

Sister Carol realized he might deny the abuse, but she had not expected that his comments would validate it. Without her mentioning where the abuse had taken place, he talked about those specific places in her childhood home; he also threatened to ruin her mother's reputation if she told anyone her story.

"I reeled from the emotion of hearing his voice, but I kept saying, 'I remember. I remember. I remember,'" she stated.

Extended family members who spoke with Sister Carol also confirmed what she remembered. "Every time you came back from visiting [your biological father], you were sick," said an uncle. "We thought it was bad food; your mother was upset."

Reality

Sister Carol's recollections occurred before the controversial issue of "recovered memories" hit the media, but she pointed out that her experience was validated by others. Some such memories can be real, she noted, just as some can be false.

"Most people don't want to say, 'I was sexually abused,'" she added. "It's not a badge of honor. If somebody really believes that something happened to them, then you work in a healing way with them."

In therapy, Sister Carol continued to struggle with the long-term effects of the abuse: for instance, she was a workaholic who wouldn't take a break until she became ill. Abuse, she said, also "affects one's sense of self: 'Can I trust my feelings, what I think, what I know? Can I trust other people? Do I want to live?'"

God's role

Regarding the latter, she said that most abuse survivors "have a sense of a foreshortened life," thinking they will probably die young. They may feel alienated from God or, conversely, feel God is the only one they can trust.

Sister Carol recalled raging at God during the most painful time in her recovery.

"How could you create a world where innocent children can be violated in this way?" she demanded -- until, one day, she collapsed into a rocking chair in anger and felt that she had collapsed "into the arms of God."

From then on, she said, her relationship with God deepened. She felt that a divine presence was with her, recognizing and receiving her pain.

Helping others

Ironically, even before Sister Carol had shared her story with anyone, people began to approach her, spontaneously talking about their experiences of sexual abuse.

Since she was in a healing ministry, she agreed to listen and help them through their pain as best she could -- and then found herself sharing her own "experience, strength and hope."

"I couldn't not do it," she struggled to explain. "Once I knew I would have the inner strength to do it, I had to. It's a call; I would feel like I was abandoning the survivors if I didn't do it. People need healing companionship."

Surviving

At first, Sister Carol told herself she would not talk about her abuse with the retreat groups she led; then that boundary changed to talking about it, but not writing it down.

Eventually, she decided that "I didn't do anything wrong: I am a survivor, and I thrive now."

Her story became a large part of her ministry. She started weekend retreats for sexual abuse survivors at the Dominican Pastoral Counseling Center in Niskayuna (on the grounds of the Dominican Retreat and Conference Center) and travels around the country leading similar retreats. She is also a Credentialed Alcoholism and Substance Abuse Counselor (CASAC), seeing patients on an individual basis, including those who have experienced abuse.

"I spend thousands of hours with survivors," she told The Evangelist. "I have heard some of the worst things people can do. I can do this because when I see a person claim their truth and begin to heal, I receive joy from that person."

Pain and healing

Sometimes, Sister Carol noted, she has to go to the chapel at the Dominican Retreat Center and ask God to take her patients' pain, because it's too much for her to handle.

But she perseveres in her work because "there are survivors of sexual abuse in every walk of life, and some of them never told anybody" until attending a retreat where it was safe to share their stories.

"Some people never share publicly, and why should they? But because of my journey, I think people need to know what is possible," Sister Carol stated. "Somebody has to say some of this, so it can be out there. Somebody has to speak up, because how are people going to find their way?"

(Some people question Sister Carol about whether her religious vocation has any connection to her abuse. She said that if everyone who experienced abuse joined the convent, they "would be overloaded! I can say from personal experience that a convent is not a place to hide." Her retreats for survivors include prayer services, opportunities to share, time for reflection and sharing resources with others who have had similar experiences. Participation in any part of the retreats is optional. "It's not a big downer," Sister Carol said of the abuse retreat. Participants may come to begin the process of healing or to share the healing they have already found, since "far too many out there are isolated.")

How to reach Sister Carol

Sister Carol leads a monthly group discussing dreams, an ongoing spiritual direction group called "Soul Friends," and various retreats at the Dominican Retreat and Conference Center in Niskayuna.

A weekend retreat for women who have survived incest and sexual abuse will be held March 23-25, 2007; call the center at 393-4169.

To contact Sister Carol directly, call her confidential voice mail at 393-5517 or email her at [email protected].

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