Stitched together

Religious trauma, particularly as experienced within Evangelical Christian Fundamentalist contexts, represents a form of chronic and often under-recognized psychological harm with wide-ranging impacts on identity, embodiment, and relational functioning. Women are uniquely affected by gendered doctrines such as complementarianism and purity culture, which can contribute to internalized shame, diminished agency, and disconnection from the body. Despite increasing recognition of these harms, there remains a lack of targeted, culturally responsive interventions that address the embodied and nonverbal dimensions of recovery.
This project proposes a trauma-informed, feminist-oriented fiber arts open studio group designed for adult women who have disaffiliated from Evangelical Christian Fundamentalism and are in later stages of trauma recovery. Drawing on literature in trauma informed care, feminist and existential therapy, art therapy, and community-based textile practices, the proposed model emphasizes participant autonomy, relational safety, and self-directed meaning-making. The open studio framework allows for flexible engagement with creative processes, supporting identity reconstruction, emotional expression, and reconnection with the body and others. By integrating fiber arts within a group art therapy context, this project offers a novel, practice-informed approach to addressing gaps in existing treatment models and contributes to the growing body of work on religious trauma.