Healing Reflectors By Donna Jenson with Kate Humphrey

Healing Reflectors

By Donna Jenson

with Kate Humphrey

From time to time, to increase our sense of belonging and worth, I invite the survivors in our TTT writing circles to spend some time separating the Wreckers from the Mirrors. Wreckers are individuals who take potshots at your spirit and psyche – they say and do things that undermine your sense of worth and value. Mirrors are individuals who reflect back to you the truth of who you are; how valuable a human being you are to this world; how happy they are to know you and have you in their life.  They SEE the good in you and show it in their eyes, their tone of voice and things they say and do.

I suggest circle members could do several things in their writing:

1.     Make two lists: five Wreckers and five Mirrors in their life.

2.     Pick one from each list and write a dialogue between them. 

3.     Or focus solely on the Mirrors – writing down those things they say and do that have mirrored your value back to you.

4.     Or write about what it will take to stay even more connected to the Mirrors and to keep the Wreckers off your path and away from your soul.

When I offered this exercise one survivor agreed to let me share her writing with you. It’s a powerful piece. So often people who know survivors can get stymied about what to say and do when they learn that a friend or family member is a survivor. It’s also a wonderful shout-out to survivors, showing the very specific things to look for in a Mirror. And, for all of us, isn’t it wonderful to see all the things this one survivor is receiving.

What my mirrors say and do

By Kate Humphrey

What mirrors say:

You are breaking the cycle of trauma.

You are resilient.

This too shall pass.

You are strong - physically and mentally.

You are intelligent.

You are capable.

You are a protector and caregiver.

You are a leader.

You are loved, and you love so well.

You changed my life.

You were my lifeline.

You are worthy of love and respect.

You are brave, especially in the face of conflict.

You are silly - a ray of sunshine.

You empathize so well and work hard to remove

your ego to create healthy, calm conflict resolution.

Your gut is trustworthy.

You are too precious and special to have rapists in your life.

We will not marry someone that rapes us.

We will work together with open communication to vet people better.

Cut people from your life when they abuse you.

You did not fall apart; you were torn apart.

 What mirrors do:

They cry with me.

They squeeze me.

Hug me.

Physically come to me.

Feed me.

Cuddle me.

Sit with me.

Dance with me.

We can do hard things. We are goddamn cheetahs - wild and ready, free from captivity.

These powerful declarations and actions are medicine and spark healing every time they are received.

I’ll add two things to Kate’s mighty list. One thing my mirrors say whether it’s about a project I’m building or a day I pulled myself out from under the covers: “I’m so proud of you.” And one thing they do is show up!  

How about yours?

Thanks for reading,

Donna

Writing as a Path to Healing

Writing as a Path to Healing

By Donna Jenson

What does writing do for me? First thought? It sooths. Second thought? It can be one hell of a challenge to get started. The soothing comes from the articulation: the thoughts and questions swimming around inside me that get released. Writing can be a letting go of pain. Pain that is old and new all at the same time. Writing about the pain is like draining a wound and applying medicine.

Writing is a way of exposing my pain as an incest survivor to the light of the page. Sometimes I get the writing to flow by imagining I’m writing to someone. In this moment it’s a survivor who has just whispered something for the first time, to her best friend or her therapist or the next ocean wave rolling up to the shore she’s sitting on, “I was molested when I was a little girl.”

She says it and holds her breath, waiting, frozen, waiting, wondering. What’s the response going to be? A good friend will say, “I’m so sorry that happened to you.” A good therapist will say, “Would you like to tell me more?” And the good ocean will simply send along another wave – steady and present as always.

This survivor, mustering the courage to speak the truth that has been festering inside her body for however long – it could be decades - she now has a choice. Roll that ribbon of truth back to where it came from, stuff it somewhere and leave it be. It’s a long, wide ribbon of truth. She only let out the ragged front end of it in this first telling.

Now what does she do? Well, I say, start writing. Start with the story of this first telling. Maybe it was eons ago – it doesn’t matter. She will regain the details of that moment as her words pass out her shoulder, down her arm through her fingertips guiding the pen or keyboard.

I much prefer pen to keyboard for initial pieces of writing – the “getting it out” writing. It helps me feel the words as they pour out of me. Once finished, I read that writing out loud to myself. This reading aloud underscores the value of what has been written. Hearing your words makes them real. And sometimes the ears can see thing the eyes can’t. I might stop there – reading aloud might be enough. Then I type it out and store it in my computer. Each step of this process brings a new layer of revelation and confirmation.

I’ll let it lie. Let the truth steep in exposure, take in the light of day, the light from being revealed. Let it be for however long I want. Until the next time. ‘Next time’ being the moment when I want another stretch of ribbon to be unwound. That tightly wound ribbon is its own form of pain. To quote Maya Angelo: “There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.”

I’ve been journaling almost daily since 1977. Looking back from this vantage point I see I was doing the equivalent of bodybuilding for my voice and getting familiar with a pen in my hand. In the beginning as I was pumping words from inside me, down my arm and onto the page I didn’t know I was coaxing my voice out. And yet, for the first fourteen years of doing it, I never wrote about the incest.

I pull a journal off the shelf, it’s dated 1980. I open it randomly and read ten pages. There is no allusion to my experience of abuse except one. This entry follows a trip I’d made to visit my maternal grandfather in North Dakota.

“Grampa told me – as a baby I hardly ever cried because my father would go into a rage if I did. Another arrow to the heart.”

That’s it. No other exploration.

Two things happened after I’d been journaling those fourteen years - I read Trauma and Recovery by Judith Lewis Herman, M.D. and I moved from the bustle of Brooklyn to the peace of western Massachusetts.

I rode Herman’s book through some scary rapids of memory. And she taught me much of what I needed to learn – especially that none of the abuse was my fault.

There’s another survivor I’m imagining as I write this piece. They have long known and understood the depths of the harm they have lived through. And a voice inside them occasionally whispers, “Tell your story, write your story, expose, reveal, and proclaim what happened to you, what you survived to get where you are today.”

That survivor may listen, ever so briefly, to that inner voice and then shut it down, stow it somewhere deep inside and get on with doing the dishes or finishing their walk. To them I have an offer, a heartfelt suggestion. I often find it helpful to read someone else’s words to spark my pen into action. There soon will appear on this page a poem. Read it. Slowly. Make note of a phrase or line or word that grabs you.

After you’ve read it, take a long deep breath, maybe even two. Now, armed with that phrase or line that grabbed you – write it out and let the pen go wherever it wants –writing the first words that emerge. Don’t overthink – just go. For five minutes or ten, maybe even 25. When you feel finished set the pen down, stand up, stretch your arms to the ceiling and take a long deep breath.

Now pick up what you’ve just written and read it to yourself - out loud. Maybe even underline words or phrases of your own that jump out at you.

Ready? Here goes.

I follow my own prompt and here is what I write after reading that poem:

            Telling is Healing

                        but

                        first it’s painful.

            Not telling is painful too.

            So, you get to choose.

                        The pain in suffering

                                    or

                        the pain in healing.

 I take a deep breath, stretch my arms up high and more words flow:

I shall claim my right to say all I want to say about surviving. I shall not mute my opinion for fear of being judged. I shall claim my voice and let it sing out loud.

A dozen years ago I reached another plateau – moving from only writing for myself to writing with other survivors. I’ve written extensively about all that in my book and blog. No question – being part of a writing community offers its own high-octane medicine. To learn more about my writing circles for survivors click here.

So Much Telling – So Much Listening

Picture four virtual showcases, 35 brave survivors of childhood sexual abuse reading to 200 people --- a wonderful gathering of supportive witnesses. That’s what occurred the last weekend of January 2021at our event: Survivors’ Voices: Works of Resilience Written and Read by Survivors of Childhood Sexual Abuse. Read more about it here. Throughout this blog post are quotes from the audience and readers.

I can tell you what it looked like before we went live. We had readers who kept forgetting to breathe; two so proud of themselves they could hardly stand it, and everyone in between who felt like they were having a magical, pinch-me moment. Many talked about this new and remarkable experience of doing something within a community of survivors. Before healing starts, we tend to exist in anonymity and isolation. So, to be standing – square to square on Zoom - with a whole group of survivor siblings from across North America taking turns being cheered and cheering was, for many, both scary and astounding.

This compilation of pieces of prose and poetry are representations of stark, bold courage. Layers of courage. Make no mistake, the cement wall existing between telling the truth about our harm and the rest of the world has done a sad job of keeping silencing in place - not to mention the threat of loss and betrayal that awaits anyone brazen enough to breach that wall.

It took courage to pick up every pen and start writing. It took courage to send that writing to a jury of survivors and one ally to be scrutinized and judged. It took courage to say, “Yes, I’ll read," once the acceptance came through. It took courage to go to a workshop – listen to Coach Lucinda Kidder, Producing Artistic Director of Silverthorne Theater Company, challenge you even further for a performance. And still more courage to allow your face to be on camera, your voice amplified through a speaker, your heart laid out on display.

It’s quite remarkable when something is done, produced, and has multiple positive outcomes. This is so true for this project. There's the singular benefit of authors getting their work into the world. Then, there's the glorious benefit of survivors getting to meet, know, support, and be inspired by other survivors. That's the meat and potatoes of community building.

Another benefit, pure and simple, is education: Here's who we are, what we've experienced, and what we think and feel about it all. And in the doing, in the being here, is the proactive experience of healing some of the wounds. I believe with every fiber of my being that telling is healing.

Then there’s the benefit of healing for the audience. It's healing to witness healing in action. And last, but not least --- remember that cement wall I mentioned earlier? Well, all these voices and all this positive reception are like sledgehammers on that wall. I can almost see big chunks of it crumbling as they hit the ground. This is social change in action. The entire wall may not come down in my lifetime, but it's comin' down!

And the ripple effect started immediately after the Zoom readings. There were the many messages from the audience of gratitude and appreciation and also pieces of new writing they just had to create after seeing the showcase. Beautiful, heartfelt pieces. Yes, we've had an impact. At one rehearsal, a survivor reader, Jessica, said, "If what we do gets just one survivor to speak, it's all been worth it." That brought tears to my eyes. And, Jess, guess what? Your hope is being realized tenfold. We're riding a mighty wave of change and healing.

We’ve published a book that holds the readings, The Survivors’ Voices Anthology. Authors are arranged in the order of the showcases and each chapter opens with a collage created by our two brilliant tech moderators; Beth Seigling and Maggie Donovan.

Each collage shows images reflective of the readings in that showcase. They are displayed in the banner at the top of this page. To get a copy of the Survivors’ Voices Anthology, for $10.00, click here.

For many of our readers, this was the first time they spoke in public as survivors. Stop reading and take notice of that; re-read that last sentence. How brave would you have to be to speak openly about something you’d been forced to hide for years, decades, a lifetime?

Here are more responses to the Survivors’ Voices event:

Reader: This was powerful from start to finish. It was alive with love and support. The survivor team was absolutely flawless and human and did a special job for this special event. Thank you so much for having me be part of this.
Reader: Thank you for allowing me to be part of this experience. It was meaningful, the people organizing this were amazing and so helpful, I really felt like it was so significant for me, I felt very touched by the other readers, I felt very connected, I am so happy I took the risk to respond to the request for people to participate. It was truly the best decision I could have made, Karen J.

Reader: You held the most sacred and loving space [for my showcase], such grace and clarity and LOVE!!!!!!!! I’m so grateful. Rythea Lee

Reader: I was thinking in the beginning that it was just my reading on the day of the event that would be the growth that came out of this -- oh I was so wrong about that! The growth, the aha's and healing that have come from the whole process is blowing my mind! This feels like a chapter in my life where I move on!  Xx Jen Young

Audience: Wow.  I found my body shaking with the sheer power of you courageous readers using your voices to rise, like a phoenix from the ashes... It made me want to create or join communities speaking truth and using art to turn the dehumanizing actions we experienced into yet another part of our infinite humanity. Wow. THANK YOU!!!  ~Ana V 

Audience: I felt such a bonding with the speakers and the audience. The event was so powerful and healing -- truly transformational! Thank you- Jerri Harrell  
Audience: I was really blown away by this event... Incredibly powerful. Each reader made me feel so much love and admiration, and I related to so much. There is something incredibly magical about breaking silence, it changes EVERYTHING. And I mean for the world, not just the reader and the audience. We will all be changed from hearing these stories, and in the most beautiful and positive way. It always amazes me that hearing these painful truths is such a healing thing. Thank you, a million times, I am so grateful for this event. Next time I will invite everyone I can! -Ocean Edgar 

Audience: I attended 3 showcases. The whole thing felt like an act of LOVE. What a great way to raise the volume of survivors' voices. It was powerful and affirming. As a survivor myself, I felt a sense of belonging and validation. It left me feeling a desire to keep the momentum going, to have more conversations and speak more openly.

Audience: Everyone’s story helped make me feel that I’m not alone.  

Audience: This was a profound, deeply moving and inspiring afternoon. Thank you to each reader, for your bravery, insights and honesty.  I am honored to have been a witness - my heart is full.  With love and respect, Janet Goldblatt Holmes 

Audience. I attended with my 13-year-old daughter who had been sexually abused early in her life. We just cried together and sometimes laughed and I felt my daughter release something. When it was over she said, "I don't feel so alone now".

Reader: “Not only was I moved by everyone’s story it was another step forward in my own journey”. 

Thank you for reading,

Donna