Leaving a high-control group—often referred to as a cult or high-demand group—is one of the most profound acts of courage a person can take. Once you’ve left your high control group, you still have a journey ahead of you. Joining a group like this can leave an emotional and mental footprint that will stay with you long after the time you spent in that group.
Recovery from cult abuse is a personal experience, whether you left a controlling group or are still struggling with the experience years later. It requires care, understanding, and time.
This blog outlines seven necessary steps that you could take to help you get started in the process of healing, reclaiming your identity, and unleashing your true self.
7 steps of Healing
1. Acknowledge What You’ve Been Through
The first step to healing is understanding that what happened to you is real—and that it was not your fault. The manipulation used by high-control groups often includes coercive behavior. They maintain control with trust or obedience by using fear and shame and spiritual or religious abuse in hopes of isolating you, withholding information, and demanding loyalty and compliance and denying you the chance to ask questions or process.
By naming your experience as cult abuse or psychological coercion, it can be validating. You do not owe anyone an explanation. As far as your healing process is concerned, if it hurts you, that is good enough.
2. Extend Yourself the Grace to Feel Everything
When you leave a group with a lot of demands on your time and attention, it is totally normal to have a flood of emotions (usually, a flood of emotions), including feelings such as grief, anger, sadness, confusion, and even guilt. You are grieving a version of the life you adopted and became intertwined with your identity, community, and belief system. Therefore, you should allow yourself to feel it with no judgement. If you try to suppress your feelings and emotions, then they will build and last much longer.
It doesn’t matter if you cry, scream, laugh, or go silent—whatever works is okay. Releasing emotions is part of healing trauma.
3. Rebuild Your Sense of Identity
High-control groups will often have a lesson for the group member to suppress their independence and characteristics in exchange for group conformity. When you leave, you may question, who am I without their influence and dictation? This is where the serious work for post-cult recovery starts.
- Take it slow. Begin digging into your preferences, interests, and beliefs. Ask yourself:
- What brings me happiness?
- What do I believe now that is not what I was told to believe?
- What types of people make me feel safe?
- Re-establishing your authentic self might take a while, but it is an essential first step for long-term healing.
4. Create New Boundaries
Boundaries can often be violated or ignored in cultic space. When recovering from trauma, learning to say no, set boundaries, and protect your emotional space is essential.
Begin by identifying what is safe for you. This could be limiting communication with former members, or restricting conversations you may deem a trigger, or allowing yourself to disengage from conversations that may be controlling or manipulative.
Boundaries are not only limitations for others; they also function to protect you.
5. Seek Out Safe, Supportive Relationships
Trust is often hard for survivors of cult-related abuse. And that’s warranted—betrayal done in the name of love, faith, or spirituality is serious. But it is possible to have meaningful relationships again. Look for people who:
- Respect your boundaries
- Don’t pressure you to “move on” quickly
- Sound like an echo chamber of listening without judgement
- Don’t try to “fix” you.
Whether it be a therapist, support group, or someone close to you, connecting with safe people is a huge part of your healing and recovery from cult-related abuse.
6. Educate Yourself About Spiritual and Psychological Abuse
Knowing the dynamics of manipulation and mind control can bring a lot of clarity. Once you figure out how “spiritual abuse” and “emotional coercion” work, you realize it wasn’t that you were weak or stupid enough to stay involved in the group. It was a system that was meant to keep you trapped.
Knowledge is power. It can also help you see the red flags moving forward and keep you from similar places.
7. Build Emotional Resilience
Healing doesn’t mean you will never again hurt. It means you gain the ability to cope with life’s challenges without crumbling. Recovery from cult abuse doesn’t mean returning to your old self. It means becoming stronger, wiser, and more aware of your values. Building emotional resilience takes time. You can develop it through self-care, therapy, community, and education. So don’t rush the process. Celebrate every small victory, even if it’s just getting out of bed on certain days.
Conclusion: Finding the Right Kind of Support
Leaving a high-control group and starting a journey toward wholeness is not straightforward. It is layered, complicated, and deeply personal. Your experience deserves support that understands.
Jennifer French represents that type of support—trauma-informed, compassionate, and framed from lived experience. Her work is specifically focused on helping people like you journey through the emotional landscape of post-cult recovery, without judgment and pressure.
When you choose someone who gets it, you cannot underestimate the difference it makes. No, you are not alone—and no, you don’t have to hurry. Healing takes time—and you are already on your way.