"I've found that there is always some beauty left--in nature, sunshine, freedom, in yourself; these can all help you. Look at these things, then you find yourself again, and God, and then you regain your balance. And whoever is happy will make others happy too. He who has courage and faith will never perish in misery."
"The joy of experiencing life far outweighs the pain of the fear."
"No one with a future is without a past."
"Well, I tell you I am no longer that passive, weak creature that has spun evil from evil till the web is vast and thick while I remain its stultified victim!"
"I'm broken, but I'm laughing. It's the sound of falling glass"
"Look to the east" she said, "for always while the light dies in the west, there is the promise of rebirth from the east."
"We are the keepers and writers of our own destiny, weaving it like a web by our thoughts, feelings, and actions."
"You are on the path exactly where you are meant to be right now. . .and from here you can only go forward shaping your life story into a magnificent tale of triumph of healing, of courage, beautiy, wisdom, power, dignity, and love. . ."
"But there's something to be said for hitting bottom: as with swimming, it may be the only way to propel oneself up again."
"Perhaps all the dragons of our lives are princesses who are only waiting to see us once beautiful and brave."
"If you bring what is within you, without, then what you bring out will save you. If you do not bring what is within you, without, then what you do not bring out will destroy you."
"Sweetie, just be where you are."
Quote from a gift of a friend of mine who is, unbeknownst to him, a treasure to all he touches.
Those last two quotes may very well be the statements that saved me. Like a lot of people who have to go through a crisis of healing, I went through a stage of obsessing about abuse, my own and that of others. When this subsided (it was almost as if I had to burn it out of me by going into overload), I went through a period of telling myself that it didn't matter at all. I am now to the point of realizing that, it can't be denied. Because if I deny it or deny that it has mattered in my life, then I give permission for the cycles to continue. And that is something I cannot allow myself to do.
Furthermore, if what happened to me doesn't matter, then *I* don't matter; for, while I would have to be out of my MIND to say that I would willingly go through it all again, I cannot deny that it helped shape who I am. Everything I've gone through, good or bad, I have learned something from. And that something has become a part of me and a part of how I form my life view. Without this knowledge, I would not be me. So, I have to allow myself to be where I am. And this, right now, is where I am.
It is not my intention with this section to go into all the nasty little details of everything that has ever happened to me. It is not my intention to accuse anyone or refuse to take responsibility for myself. Rather, it is my intention to speak out and identify myself, not as a victim, but as a survivor.
The distinction is important; words carry heavy meaning and imagery. To me, the word 'victim' implies powerlessness; it calls up the image of someone who has no say in what happens in his or her life; someone who will give up because he or she has no choice. However, the word survivor implies that someone has moved through a situation, scarred perhaps, but a survivor. The person wins, not the situation.
This is not a whine, and it is not an excuse for mistakes made in my life. I cannot change the past; what happened, has happened, and I must learn from it and move on. I can, however, change the future; it is not set in stone and is being created right now, by our current actions and beliefs. My purpose, rather, in writing this is to let others know that they are not alone, because one of the most horrible feelings when it comes to dealing with any kind of trauma is that you are alone. And since Western society seems to ostracize people who have been victimized, those who survive will often isolate themselves on purpose to avoid the stigma. It becomes a dark, dirty secret that you hold, and it will eat at you. It seems that everywhere you go anymore there are people making snide comments about people who talk about being abused. You'll hear people tell you to let go of the past, to let it go. You'll hear survivors talked about as though we were all whiners who are looking for someone to blame for the condition of our lives.
I don't deny that such people exist. These people are not survivors. They are still victims, and they are victimizing themselves. They get comfortable in the victim role. But to classify all survivors as such is wrong. To suggest that abuse shouldn't be talked about is wrong. This is tantamount to pretending it doesn't exist. To pretend it doesn't exist means it's not there at all, right? It means we don't have to do anything for the men, women, and children who are being abused daily because, well, it doesn't exist.
Silence is the abuser's best friend. If you don't hear about it, you can't do anything about it. I've had my fill of silence; I'm tired of pretending that abuse doesn't happen. Abuse and violence should not be normal. It may be frequent. It may even be accepted by our society. Western society seems resigned to having abuse and violence; we seem all too willing to turn our heads. When it comes to the things I have seen in my life, I won't go about talking about it incessantly; yet if the subject comes up in conversation, or if someone asks me, I will not deny it. I did nothing wrong when it comes to the incidents I have survived; I have nothing to be ashamed of. It took me a long time to get to this point; a lot of time, a lot of therapy, and a lot of medication (though thank the gods that the only thing I'm on now, aside from some herbal supplements, is my high blood pressure medicine), and even a hospitalization.
It has been a long hard journey in my young life, but I'm finally to the point where I can let go of the anger and instead use what I have learned to move forward, and maybe even help others through their journeys as well. I don't claim to be all healed and perfectly healthy. I do have my moments of self-doubt. I have my bouts of depression still. But they are not nearly as long, or as deep, as they were in the past. These bouts are periodic, now, instead of constant. I am learning to trust myself and the path that I am on.
Trusting oneself does not come easy, if what I see in myself and in the people I talk to holds true. Somehow, somewhere society began teaching us that we are sinful, evil creatures not even deserving of God's notice. (By 'we' I mean society as a whole; especially women, I think, but that is another topic altogether.) And just how is a sinful, evil creature going to trust his or her judgement? Yet we wonder why so many people go into therapy.
I must caution here that therapists are not gods, and their words and advice are not the end-all/be-all. There are good counselors and bad counselors; they are humans just like the rest of us. We must learn to trust our own judgement about our therapists just as we would any other person we come across.
I ignored the warning signs about one of the first counselors I ever had, thinking that my misgivings and utter feeling of dread before each appointment were merely because I was working on issues that I didn't really want to deal with. I talked myself into trusting a therapist that wasn't trustworthy (and I soon learned I wasn't alone as I talked to other people who had seen the same individual.) The result was more than a year of lies and breaking of confidentiality, on his part. This counselor, whom I trusted against initial misgivings at a period of crisis in my life did not believe I had been raped. His reasoning? I was in the accused rapist's apartment when it happened. It didn't, therefore, count as rape. Perhaps I would not have been so angry about this statement (after all, the man is entitled to his opinion, as much as I might disagree with it.) had he not first encouraged me to talk about it and had given me such responses as "I'm *so* sorry this happened to you." He pretended to believe me, and then told one of my doctors that he didn't believe me. Never mind that I had sustained so much internal damage that walking was for me quite painful for at least three days after it happened. Never mind that I was so swollen internally that the woman giving the rape exam had trouble completing the exam. It wasn't rape: the fact that I was in his apartment ruled that out. After a rape, often the first response for the victim/survivor is to deny that it happened or to get into a "if I had done this," or "maybe I should have" mindset. And if a *counselor* is telling you that it didn't happen or it doesn't count, it makes it that much worse. After all, they're an authority, right? They have the power to validate or invalidate your experience with barely a word. It's a sad but true reality.
To add insult to injury, this same therapist also spoke to people with whom he did not have my permission to speak about the issues that were raised during my therapy sessions. He also informed some members of my school's administration that I wasn't following through with my treatment program; this was well after my hospitalization, when it was known that I was seeing the doctor I had seen in the hospital, and not him (and he therefore didn't know what my treatment program was to know if I was or was not following it.) The lesson learned from this? Always listen to your intuitions and 'vibes'. Not listening to them can get you hurt. Second guessing serves no purpose, and it will not change the situation.
I have come through many things in my life; I grew up in an alcoholic home. I have survived physical, emotional, and sexual abuse. I have survived rape. As one friend of mine puts it, "Arlene, you're damned hard to kill." I have come through it all, with the help of some wonderful friends, and I have finally come to the point where I have accepted it all as a part of my life and have realized that it doesn't have to control me. I still deal with the depression, and the other disorders that come of living the life I have led. (My official diagnosis was clinical depression, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (with dissociative disorder falling under this umbrella), and mild obsessive-compulsive disorder.) I still have flashbacks occasionally, though they are fortunately rare and comparatively mild in the past two years or so. Sometimes I will even have a nightmare. Yet it doesn't control me anymore, and I now realize that I'm not a bad person because of a few bad things happening to me. You can hurt without shame. You can heal without shame. I am slowly but surely finding my peace. I still get gentle reminders from loved ones not to put myself down so much; I'm still get reminders that I need to relax and treat myself better. But I work on it; one day at a time I work on it. And I try to use my experiences to help others know that they are not alone.
If you are at a point in your life where you need to ask for help, but don't know where to begin, or if you simply want to find out about what resources are available, you may find a jumping point from my page of phone numbers and resource links for survivors. Or, you may want to visit Escaping Hades, a search engine of resources specific to abuse and recovery.
SPECIAL NOTE: I am making an attempt to put together a list of sites that deal with the needs of male survivors. If you have a suggestion of a site I should check out and add to my site, please let me know.
May you be blessed with healing and love.
From here you may also find your way to:
You may also mail me
