Author: David Hanscom, MD

Library: Newbooks

Foreword: My Journey Out of Pain (by Mark Owens)

Wildlife biologist Mark Owens recounts his devastating 2006 horseback riding accident in Montana that shattered ribs and broke his spine. After two surgeries, years of escalating pain, and medication addiction, he was told his only option was a radical multi-day surgery. Seeking a second opinion from Dr. Hanscom, he learned his pain was likely neurophysiologic disorder (NPD). Skeptical but desperate, Owens tried expressive writing and experienced an 80% reduction in chronic pain within two days. Over a year later, he remains largely pain-free without analgesics.

Introduction

Dr. Hanscom describes his own fifteen-year descent into chronic pain beginning in the late 1980s, when panic attacks and sixteen NPD symptoms—including severe OCD—nearly destroyed his career, marriage, and will to live. In 2002, discovering expressive writing pulled him out of his tailspin within weeks, and all symptoms resolved over six months. He introduces the DOC (Define Your Own Care) program, a self-directed, systematic approach addressing sleep, anxiety, medications, anger, goal setting, and physical conditioning. He shares how requiring pre-surgical DOC engagement led to over fifty patients canceling surgeries because their pain disappeared.

Chapter 1: The Pathway into Chronic Pain

Hanscom explains that chronic pain is a maladaptive neuropathological disease state driven by the nervous system, not simply a structural problem. He introduces the “junction box”—the brain’s constant interpretation of sensory input as pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral—producing either reward chemicals or stress chemicals. Thoughts are sensory input; unconstructive repetitive thoughts flood the body with stress hormones, creating a sustained fight-or-flight state. Functional MRI research demonstrates that emotional and physical pain activate overlapping brain regions. He describes the “personal brain scanner”—the brain’s default negative scanning for danger—which generates endless irrational anxieties.

Chapter 2: The Source of Your Pain

Hanscom categorizes pain sources into three types: structural (identifiable on imaging, matching symptoms), non-structural (inflammation, overuse, soft-tissue issues invisible on imaging), and neurophysiologic disorder (NPD)—the nervous system generating its own pain signals. He argues that degenerative disc disease is widely misunderstood: multiple studies show little correlation between disc degeneration and low back pain. He presents the case of Joni, who had severe spinal degeneration yet zero back pain. Triggers function like a “light switch”: the brain flips the switch but sensation is felt distally. Hanscom shares his own NPD struggle with migraines, OCD, and panic attacks—sixteen of thirty-three NPD symptoms—before resolving them through self-discovered tools. Surgery is likened to dental work: effective only when a clear structural problem is identified.

Chapter 3: Imbedding Pain Pathways

Repeated pain impulses cause the brain to process them more efficiently, requiring less stimulus to elicit the same response. A 2004 fMRI study showed chronic pain patients had five brain areas activated versus one in healthy subjects. A 2013 study demonstrated that chronic low back pain had shifted to emotional brain centers—where the pain “driver” was completely different. Phantom limb pain illustrates how deeply memorized pain circuits persist even after the physical source is removed. Drawing on Dan Coyle’s The Talent Code, Hanscom explains that pain pathways become imbedded through repetition and myelination—faster than skill pathways because impulses fire like a “machine gun.” Three coping strategies reinforce circuits: suffering (complaining, arguing), suppressing (which creates rebound effects via Wegner’s “White Bears” experiment), and masking (addictions, distractions). All three prevent healing and deep, connected living.

Chapter 4: The Modifiers—Sleep and Anxiety

Adequate sleep (seven to eight hours) is an absolute requirement for chronic pain recovery. A major Israeli study showed insomnia induces chronic pain, not the reverse. Anxiety is not primarily psychological but a programming phenomenon where negative thoughts etch neurological circuits. Using David Burns’s cognitive distortions and William Glasser’s Choice Theory, Hanscom shows how “stories” become reality. He critiques marketing’s deliberate creation of anxiety, familial imprinting in the first twelve years of life, cultural programming through fear, and the myth of self-esteem. The chapter’s breakthrough: Hanscom discovered that diminishing anxiety matters more than alleviating pain. He developed “prehab”—having patients engage the DOC process before elective surgery—leading many to cancel surgery entirely. Herbert, wheelchair-bound from severe spinal stenosis, cancelled surgery the Friday before Monday’s operation and returned to hunting elk after expressive writing alone.

Chapter 5: The Ultimate Modifier—Anger

Anger is “anxiety with a chemical kick”—when attempts to meet basic needs fail, the body floods with adrenaline. The anger sequence flows: circumstance → blame → victimhood → frustration and anger. Chronic pain sufferers eventually hit “the Abyss”—losing control of pain, finances, activities, and hope. The desperate need for validation drives frustration, and patients become obsessive about missed diagnoses. People conceal victimhood through strong opinions, self-pity, suppression, or perfectionism. Hanscom confesses disguising anger was his most highly developed skill. The victim role offers hidden “benefits”—lowered expectations, entitlement, self-righteousness—but 30–50% of chronic illness patients drop out of treatment, preferring familiar suffering over change. Harry Harlow’s “Pit of Despair” experiments with primates demonstrated learned helplessness mirroring chronic pain patients’ depth of despair. Anger remains the greatest obstacle to a healthy, pain-free life.

Chapter 6: Processing Stress

Pain, anxiety, and anger form a “terrifying triad” that is neurologically linked—other life stresses increase pain because these circuits are intertwined. Hanscom shares compelling cases: a woman with a bone spur whose sciatica resolved within three months of working through situational losses without surgery; George, a banker whose pain vanished after processing his grief over his son’s death. Managing stress requires building energy reserves (sleep, exercise, social time) and plugging the drain—anxiety-driven anger. The bathtub metaphor: no matter how much water you pour in, an open drain prevents filling. “Toughing it out” and positive thinking are both variants of suppression that eventually collapse. The essence is separating yourself from your reaction to stressful events—awareness, separation, and reprogramming. Using Dr. Fred Luskin’s forgiveness exercise, Hanscom demonstrates that you can train your body to stop reacting physiologically to adversity.

Chapter 7: Awareness

Awareness is seeing the world as it actually is, not through preprogrammed perceptions. Hanscom reflects on fifty years of profound unawareness, building a persona while connected to his identity rather than his true self. At a Hyde School seminar, twelve of eighteen participants wrote “David, you don’t listen”—a painful but transformative moment. Four levels of awareness: environmental awareness (active meditation, shifting the nervous system), full environmental immersion (passion displaces pain circuits, as with Fred building motorcycles), emotional awareness (requiring vulnerability since anger blocks it), and judgment/storytelling (recognizing cognitive distortions and how they solidify into destructive stories). Hanscom provides a daily practice: notice reactivity, calm down through active meditation, recognize stories and projections, consider the other person’s perspective, then decide to enjoy the day. An awareness mantra anchors the process: “I am whole and powerful / I am loving and harmonious / I am forgiving and happy / I am peaceful.”

Chapter 8: Stimulating Your Brain to Change—Neuroplasticity

The brain is in continuous dynamic change through neuroplasticity. Chronic pain causes measurable brain shrinkage, but this reverses when pain resolves. Foundational programming in the first twelve years absorbs negative behaviors and labels that become identity. Facilitating neuroplasticity requires calming the chemical environment and stimulating new circuit structure—methods include meditation, mindfulness, CBT, expressive writing, sleep, and massage. Creating alternative pathways requires awareness, separation, and reprogramming. Hanscom illustrates with his son’s friend Holt winning a U.S. skiing championship through internal visualization (not positive thinking). The chapter also addresses thought suppression via Wegner’s research, introduces “separation” as the critical step, and discusses the power of play to reactivate dormant brain pathways and gratitude to change one’s narrative. Pavlov’s experiments and ballet dancers’ pain tolerance demonstrate that pain thresholds are programmable through repetition.

Chapter 9: Embarking on Your Journey

The DOC process is presented in four stages: laying the foundation, forgiveness and play, moving forward, and expanding consciousness. The central paradox: chronic pain becomes unresolvable by trying to resolve it, because attention to pain pathways reinforces them. Instead, the awareness-separation-reprogramming sequence replaces traditional problem-solving. Three flawed strategies are critiqued: positive thinking (a form of suppression), mind over matter (like a Chinese finger trap—pulling harder tightens the grip), and talking pain to death (complaining reinforces pathways and drives away social support, as demonstrated at an Omega workshop where banning pain discussion accelerated healing).

Chapter 10: Stage 1—Laying the Foundation

Five foundational steps: (1) Confirm your diagnosis and catalog symptoms, sleep quality, stress levels, and medications. (2) Expressive writing—writing freely and destroying the paper—supported by over two hundred research papers; handwriting over typing for its complex brain activation. The “unhooking from the train” metaphor illustrates how writing disconnects you from past thoughts. The three-column technique from Burns’s Feeling Good operationalizes awareness, separation, and reprogramming simultaneously. (3) Active meditation—relax, stabilize, focus on one sensation—in five to ten seconds. (4) Don’t share pain, as complaining reinforces pain circuits. (5) Prioritize sleep as the number-one rehabilitation factor.

Chapter 11: Stage 2—Forgiveness and Play

Anger is the antithesis of creativity (the “C”/see must come first in “creative” versus “reactive”). Six steps to reconnect with creativity: understand anger’s impact, acknowledge disguises, admit victimhood, choose not to be a victim, forgive, and play. Dr. Fred Luskin’s Forgive for Good framework provides strategies like “changing the channel” and taking 100% responsibility for your anger. Three failed approaches to forgiveness: positive thinking (suppressing rage), extreme belief systems (rigid thinking as disguised anger), and intellectual versus heartfelt forgiveness. The story of patient Alan illustrates how positive-thinking armor prevents healing. Play is the most powerful exit from the Abyss—re-engaging creatively with family, friends, and activities stimulates widespread brain circuits that make pain pathways dormant.

Chapter 12: Stage 3—Moving Forward

Maintain Stage 1 and 2 practices indefinitely rather than quitting when you feel better. Five steps for moving forward, with repetition as the key to reprogramming. Hanscom’s own daily routine of small commitments—expressive writing, active meditation, gym workouts—keeps NPD symptoms at bay; quitting writing predictably triggers relapse within weeks. The “power of commitment” is illustrated by his son Nick and friend Holt skiing an impossibly narrow chute at Snowbird. Practical guidance includes rebuilding family relationships (never engage while angry, listen without unsolicited advice, hold weekly meetings), organizational skills (David Allen’s Getting Things Done), and connecting with a life vision—the story of Ralph, who improved physically but retired early because he lacked a vision beyond pain.

Chapter 13: Stage 4—Expanding Your Consciousness

Five steps expand consciousness: (1) Pass Through the Ring of Fire—a three-circle model from compassion-focused therapy (outer ring = achieving, middle ring = threat, center = contentment). Hanscom’s personal story of living in the outer ring from age fifteen until severe OCD and anxiety collapsed his facade around 2002. (2) Step Into Your New Life—pursue authentic interests rather than chasing happiness as a permanent state. (3) Fail Well—resilience is a bamboo grove that bends and stands back up; pain pathways are permanent and flare-ups don’t mean despair. (4) Look Up—your spiritual journey means experiencing life from outside yourself, gaining a larger perspective. (5) Give Back—empathy naturally develops as you reconnect with your authentic self. Closing Epictetus quote: “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act.”

Chapter 14: Sleep

Restful sleep is the single most critical first step in resolving chronic pain. A step-by-step treatment ladder: sleep hygiene (consistent schedule, dark/cool room, no screens), bedtime stress management (expressive writing before bed), regular exercise, over-the-counter medications (melatonin, antihistamines), prescription sleep medications (Ambien, Remeron, amitriptyline), cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBT-I), addressing childhood trauma revealed through ACE scores (Hanscom’s own ACE score was 5), and formal sleep disorder evaluation for resistant cases like sleep apnea. Combining sleep medications with the full DOC program is essential.

Chapter 15: Medication and Chronic Pain

Medication is an adjunct to the DOC program, never the solution itself. Hanscom limits medications to four categories: narcotics (opioids), anti-anxiety drugs, sleep medications, and anti-seizure/membrane stabilizers. He excludes muscle relaxants as ineffective. While opioids can help immobilized patients start moving, he warns of tolerance, fuzzy thinking, constipation, addiction risk, and paradoxically increased pain sensitivity (opioid-induced hyperalgesia). Anti-inflammatories often outperform low-potency narcotics for direct pain relief. The overarching principle: minimize total medications, view them as temporary aids, and make medication-free living the ultimate goal.

Chapter 16: Effective Rehabilitation

Rehabilitation cannot succeed without first calming the nervous system; aggressive treatment on a fired-up system worsens pain. Effective physical therapy requires: thorough assessment, patient education (“back school,” understanding disc degeneration as normal aging), advanced manual therapy (joint mobilization and myofascial work), specific and progressive exercise, and a long-term home conditioning program. The whole kinetic chain—especially hip mobility—must be addressed. Diagnostic examples: IT band tendonitis mimicking sciatica, hip arthritis mistaken for lumbar radiculopathy. Long-term success requires gym-based weight training three to five hours per week. Soft tissue desensitization breaks the cycle of injury→anxiety→guarding→stiffness→more pain.

Chapter 17: Expanding Your Horizon

Gratitude requires conscious effort because the brain’s default mode fixates on danger. Hanscom recommends reading history to gain perspective (Viktor Frankl’s concentration camp insights; Stephen Greenblatt’s The Swerve on Dark Ages brutality). The “Journey of 1,000 Moons” metaphor—hand-painted gypsum moons representing ~1,000 lunar cycles in a 77-year lifespan—underscores life’s brevity. Self-discovery tools include the Hoffman Process (seven-day intensive workshop breaking entrenched neurological pathways), psychotherapy, self-help books (which can become substitutes for actual change), and structured seminars. Reconnecting with family and friends is critical—as different brain circuits reawaken and reward chemicals flood the body, thinking becomes clearer regardless of pain. The essence: move forward with your life with or without pain; waiting for pain to abate first means pain is running the show. “Welcome to your new life.”

Appendix A: Do You Really Need Surgery?

A scathing critique of unnecessary spine surgery. Devastating case studies: George lost bowel and bladder function; Teresa was fused from neck to pelvis after a simple bruise; Tom became partially paraplegic; Amanda endured four failed fusions in five years; Doug reached twenty-nine surgeries after a likely unnecessary initial fusion. Hanscom documents how financial incentives distort care: cortisone injections lack evidence; spine fusion success rates are below 30% at two years; electronic medical records profile physicians by profitability. His “prehab” protocol requires eight weeks of DOC engagement before any surgical decision. Over fifty patients with severe structural problems cancelled surgery because symptoms resolved during prehab—putting him “out of business.” Eugene Carragee’s Stanford study showed only 27% success for discogram-identified patients, below even the placebo response. The “disaster factor” of failed surgery must be fully understood: each failed procedure can cascade into worse outcomes.

Appendix B: Self-Inventory Template

A structured self-assessment framework covering core values, character strengths and flaws, skill levels, dreams, a five-year vision across all life areas, and an annual action plan. The template guides readers to take stock of their whole life, not just their pain, as part of the DOC process.

The Exvangelicals

by Sarah McCammon — Library: Newbooks

Introduction

McCammon opens with a vivid childhood memory of a church Easter pageant where a bloodied Jesus stumbles under the cross, terrifying her four-year-old self. This scene crystallizes the book’s central tension: evangelicalism’s presentation of profound truth alongside viscerally frightening claims. She introduces the “exvangelicals”—a loosely organized online movement of people deconstructing their conservative evangelical upbringings, catalyzed around 2016 by the term coined by Blake Chastain. McCammon, an NPR correspondent raised evangelical, narrates her 2016 campaign trail experiences and reflects on how the very teachings about loving enemies and seeking truth that she received from evangelicals ultimately led her away from them.

Chapter 1 — People Need the Lord

McCammon traces her earliest formation within evangelicalism, beginning with childhood prayers for her grandfather’s salvation and the weight of evangelistic obligation. She describes saying the Sinner’s Prayer at age two-and-a-half, terrifying visions of Hell and the Rapture, and the anguish of doubting whether she was truly saved. Artist Stephanie Stalvey’s #exvangelical comics parallel McCammon’s experience of viewing every non-Christian as either a potential convert or a spiritual threat. Ethicist David P. Gushee estimates twenty-five million adults raised evangelical have left the faith, describing this exodus as “conscientious objection” grounded in specific traumas—clergy sex abuse, anti-LGBTQ+ bigotry, hypocritical leaders—rather than mere generational rebellion.

Chapter 2 — A “Parallel Universe”

This chapter maps the curated infrastructure of conservative evangelical subculture that shaped McCammon’s generation. Born in 1981, she grew up inside a self-reinforcing media ecosystem—James Dobson’s Focus on the Family, Adventures in Odyssey, Christian textbooks from Bob Jones University and Abeka, creationist children’s books, and censored media. The chapter traces how this “parallel universe” was deliberately constructed after the cultural upheavals of the 1960s–70s, repackaging fundamentalism with modern gloss and political ambition. Televangelists like Jimmy Swaggart and Jim Bakker promised prosperity but delivered scandal, while Dobson provided a softer authority spanning parenting advice to political organizing. Statistics show white evangelicalism shrinking from 23% to 14% of Americans between 2006 and 2020 even as its political power persists.

Chapter 3 — An Exodus

McCammon examines the contemporary exodus from evangelicalism, focusing on high-profile departures catalyzed by Trumpism. Promise Enlow, daughter of self-described “prophet” Johnny Enlow, describes how her family’s embrace of Trump shattered her faith. McCammon frames Trump’s 81% support among white evangelicals not as a cause but as a “bright light suddenly flicked on in a dark house, exposing every crack in the foundation.” DC Talk’s Kevin Max and Abraham Piper (son of influential pastor John Piper) exemplify public figures using social media to critique evangelicalism publicly. Derek Webb describes the painful loss of community that accompanies deconstruction but celebrates that there is now “somewhere for all the orphans” to land—something unavailable a decade earlier.

Chapter 4 — Unraveling

McCammon turns to her own gradual departure, emphasizing it involved “many tiny threads being pulled one by one, rather than a single cataclysmic breach.” A pivotal semester as a Senate page at sixteen placed her among secular peers for the first time. A Muslim classmate named Sina directly asked whether she believed he was going to Hell, and she couldn’t affirm evangelical doctrine. Later, at her evangelical college, a Holocaust survivor named Felicia Brenner spoke to her class, and fellow students callously questioned why they should listen to someone who was Jewish—and therefore, in their theology, damned. These experiences exposed the moral rot at the heart of exclusive evangelical soteriology and made McCammon realize her unraveling was irreversible.

Chapter 5 — “Were You There?”

This chapter tackles evangelical anti-intellectualism and science denial. McCammon recalls a church presentation mocking evolution with a caricature of Carl Sagan—”MEEL-yuns and BEEL-yuns of years”—insisting only God witnessed creation. The chapter traces Young Earth creationism from its origins through Ken Ham’s Answers in Genesis, showing how it provided the ideological backbone for an alternative educational system. Former evangelicals share lasting damage: Sarah Treadwell was told scientists were “actively lying” and NASA was “wasting its time”; Rebekah Drumsta discovered she had no real science foundation beyond creationist apologetics. McCammon recounts her own college encounter with a biologist-theologian who showed fossil evidence of transitional forms, contradicting what she’d been taught, and closes by finding her old science paper that shoehorned botany into spiritual metaphor—now seeing such forced integration as “dead weight that stifles the growth of healthy branches.”

Chapter 6 — Alternative Facts

McCammon traces evangelicals’ vulnerability to misinformation and conspiracy theories back to an epistemology that privileges “biblical truth” over secular expertise. She links this mindset to Trump-era “alternative facts,” QAnon, and COVID conspiracies through personal narratives. Former pastor Doug Geiger describes realizing that the same interpretive framework he once used to reject evolution now made him susceptible to COVID denialism. Pastor Jared Stacy explains how evangelicalism’s “authority-driven epistemology” leaves people unable to evaluate competing truth claims once a trusted leader is discredited. The chapter shows how deconstruction from one form of misinformation often cascades into questioning the entire system of authority.

Chapter 7 — Whose “Character” Matters?

This chapter exposes the hypocrisy of evangelical leaders who condemned Clinton’s moral failures but embraced Trump, documenting how Dobson, Franklin Graham, Falwell Jr., and Tony Perkins rationalized Trump through biblical analogies and pragmatic arguments. Evangelical leaders argued that God used flawed biblical figures like David and Nebuchadnezzar, so Trump’s personal immorality was irrelevant to his divine appointment. Exvangelicals like Stephanie Stalvey and Chrissy Snidow saw this reversal as revealing evangelicalism’s true priority: political power over moral consistency. McCammon argues that the “character matters” standard was never sincerely held—it was selectively deployed against political opponents while being suspended for allies who delivered policy wins.

Chapter 8 — “Leave Loud”

This chapter centers Black Christians like Tyler Burns and Jemar Tisby who created the #LeaveLoud movement after Trump’s election and George Floyd’s murder. Burns describes growing up in a white evangelical church that taught him to internalize anti-Black messages—his mother once told him he couldn’t play a white Jesus in a church play because of his skin color. McCammon contrasts her own white obliviousness with the experience of Black evangelicals who were always told that discussing race was “divisive.” The chapter critiques superficial “racial reconciliation” efforts that ask people of color to share painful stories for white education without demanding genuine systemic change, and documents how white evangelical institutions have repeatedly chosen political power over racial justice.

Chapter 9 — Whom Does Jesus Love?

McCammon interweaves her family story—discovering her grandfather was gay—with classmate Daniel Doss’s experience growing up gay in evangelicalism. The chapter documents the harm of anti-LGBTQ+ theology through figures like Jeff Chu, David Gushee, and Chrissy Stroop. McCammon recounts how her family only learned of her grandfather’s sexuality after his death, reframing decades of distance from him in heartbreaking new light. Doss describes the devastating experience of hearing from his youth pastor that being gay was an “abomination” while simultaneously experiencing same-sex attraction he was told to suppress. The chapter traces how evangelical teachings on homosexuality created a culture of secrecy, self-loathing, and family rupture that continues to wound LGBTQ+ people and those who love them.

Chapter 10 — A Virtuous Woman

McCammon provides a personal account of evangelical purity culture’s harms: modesty rituals, sexual shame, fetishization of virginity, and impossible standards for both men and women. She describes the courtship model, “modesty codes” that policed girls’ clothing, and the emotional manipulation of “true love waits” campaigns. The chapter traces how these teachings warped sexuality—shaming desire before marriage while expecting it to magically function after vows. McCammon shares her own experiences of sexual repression within courtship and marriage, and documents how exvangelical women are now rejecting these frameworks, recognizing that purity culture’s promise of blissful marital sex was a form of control that left lasting damage.

Chapter 11 — Naked and Ashamed

McCammon explores the aftermath of purity culture on sexual relationships, arguing that evangelicalism’s emphasis on premarital abstinence created deep shame and dysfunction even within marriage. Through personal stories—Emily Petrini realizing she never had autonomy over her sexual choices, Jocelyn Howard discovering their queer identity only after years in the closet, and “Louise” not experiencing her first orgasm until her mid-thirties—McCammon illustrates how the fusion of sex and shame persisted long after wedding vows. The chapter culminates in McCammon’s own divorce: after following all the purity rules, she and her husband found that “we’re hurting because we followed the rules.” She ultimately finds healthier intimacy in her second marriage, noting the contrast between evangelical sex-negative messaging and her Jewish husband’s tradition of celebrating sexuality.

Chapter 12 — Be Fruitful and Multiply

This chapter examines how evangelicalism directed women toward motherhood and domesticity as their highest calling, using specific examples like Dobson’s Dare to Discipline advising girls that their “sex appeal” was “bargaining power” for securing a husband. McCammon recalls her own childhood book When I’m a Mommy and her mother’s embrace of Phyllis Schlafly’s vision of traditional gender roles. The chapter connects this ideological framework to the anti-abortion movement, tracing McCammon’s experience volunteering at a crisis pregnancy center as a sixteen-year-old—where she was trained to show women The Silent Scream and pressure them to continue pregnancies. Decades later, as an NPR reporter covering the overturning of Roe v. Wade, she meets a young mother in Louisiana who cannot endure another pregnancy—offering no answers, only questions, in a poignant reversal of her earlier role.

Chapter 13 — Suffer the Little Children

McCammon confronts the evangelical culture of corporal punishment rooted in literal interpretation of Proverbs, documenting how leaders like Dobson and the Pearls promoted spanking as divinely ordained discipline—in some cases leading to child deaths. She shares her own experience of being spanked with various implements throughout childhood, culminating in a traumatizing incident at age twelve when her parents held her down and struck her during a panic attack about going to Hell. She reveals she sent these details to Focus on the Family, who declined to comment. Emily Joy Allison describes being hit with a “sanded-down two-by-four with Bible verses written on it.” Trauma therapist Hillary McBride notes that nearly all her patients report lasting damage from Dobson-style discipline. The chapter traces how exvangelical parents like Rebekah Drumsta are breaking the cycle—her daughter’s question “Why did you hit me?” became a turning point.

Chapter 14 — Broken for You

This chapter tackles the concept of religious trauma through both clinical frameworks and vivid personal narratives. Bethany Johnson recounts her mother staging fake Raptures to test her readiness, and McCammon recalls her own childhood terror of being left behind, fueled by films like A Thief in the Night. McCammon’s brother Danny describes intrusive panic attacks about eternity that still plague him decades later. Therapists Andrew Kerbs, Laura Anderson, and Marlene Winell explain how religious trauma functions physiologically like other forms of PTSD, even though the clinical field has been slow to recognize it—partly because religion is assumed to be positive. The chapter also covers the Southern Baptist sex abuse scandal, financial trauma from prosperity-giving pressure, and the difficulty of finding therapists who take religious trauma seriously. McCammon and her brother both try ketamine therapy, acknowledging that healing is ongoing.

Chapter 15 — Into the Wilderness

McCammon explores the disorienting aftermath of leaving evangelicalism—the loneliness, identity loss, and social ostracism that exvangelicals face. Promise Enlow notes that evangelicalism “consumes everything,” making departure akin to losing an entire way of life. A 2022 survey found former evangelicals report loneliness at higher rates than those leaving other faiths. Focus on the Family’s email targeting estranged parents provoked D. L. Mayfield’s viral response: “your kids don’t want to talk to you because your love is conditional.” McCammon’s friend Daniel Doss navigates an invisible boundary as a gay man who never discusses his sexuality with his evangelical family. The chapter also captures the awkwardness of secular assimilation—Jocelyn Howard describes having to fake knowledge of pop culture references, feeling like “an alien sometimes.” Jeff Chu and Abraham Piper model different paths forward, with Chu co-leading Evolving Faith for spiritual wanderers and Piper warning against replacing one fundamentalism with another.

Chapter 16 — Wrestling Against Flesh and Blood

McCammon frames the exvangelical experience through the metaphor of spiritual warfare that evangelicals themselves deploy—depicting the movement as locked in battle against both secular culture and its own dissidents. She details the vicious response to Rachel Held Evans’s death, with evangelicals declaring she was in Hell, and recounts how leaders like Matt Chandler dismiss deconstruction as “sexy” rebellion rather than genuine pain. Sociologist Christian Smith’s research shows evangelicalism thrives on a sense of being embattled; Kristin Kobes Du Mez traces this militant identity through decades of culture-war rhetoric. Promise Enlow warns that evangelical communities are “tightening their circle” and interpreting others’ departure as persecution. The chapter also covers infighting among exvangelicals, including criticism of Joshua Harris’s monetized “Deconstruction Starter Pack,” and Nadia Bolz-Weber’s caution against replacing one fundamentalism with another.

Chapter 17 — Into All the World

The final chapter circles back to McCammon’s grandfather’s death and her evolving understanding of faith, love, and integrity. Sitting at his bedside—years after childhood prayers for his salvation—she simply rubs his feet and silently prays for peace. His request for no religion at his memorial, and a rediscovered letter expressing his philosophy (“I am quite willing to admit and live with the fact that I do not know all the answers”), crystallize her own stance. McCammon visits GracePointe Church in Nashville, where pastor Josh Scott creates space for exvangelicals to explore faith without dogma. She finds community alongside her Jewish husband, connecting with Kol Nidre’s themes of released vows. Exvangelicals like Jocelyn Howard and Mel Kulenski describe building new identities through hobbies, art, and chosen community rather than replacing one “hive mind” with another. The book closes with McCammon accepting that she doesn’t have to solve the riddle of the universe—that her task, as her grandfather wrote, is simply “to help our fellow man.”