So how can I support her? By adding my voice to hers and speaking out, knowing it won't change the past and won't heal my pain, but might, just maybe, give courage to others.
I am also a victim of sexual assault. It was decades ago when I was still a youngster. At the time, I believed it was my fault. Because I was surely a bad person, because I didn't deserve to be respected. And I believed that no one would believe me because I was a child. In later years I wondered how many others were subsequently assaulted by my attacker, and whether my voice would have stopped him. And I think, perhaps, many of us who have been assaulted wonder that same thing...until we see someone else come forward and be called names, denied investigation and receive death threats. And then we know our voices only make us unsafe, exposed and victimized again. When an adult is not received with kindness and understanding as she gives voice to her sexual assault experience, how can we expect our children and grandchildren to feel safe coming forward at the time these things occur? I think of what this week's news is telling my own children about the world, and I cringe. What if, WHAT IF one of our own children does not come forward after an assault because of how victims are treated in today's society? Enough, enough already.
11 Comments
Trina Tarlton
9/24/2018 08:32:39 am
This is your bravest blog so far! I am proud of you for putting your truth out in the universe. 💕
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jen
9/24/2018 08:38:05 am
Trina! Thank you, lady. It is nothing compared to what Ford is doing, but it is what I can do. xoxox
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Carl Stoveland
9/24/2018 09:05:24 am
I have written and erased my comment a few times never quite getting it right. There are big changes we need to make in this country and as people. It is my hope that the great national ugliness we have been in will one day be the cause of a revolution of kindness and good. I really like how closely linked your paintings are to the world and how you feel about things. I believe that is where the very best art comes from.
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jen
9/24/2018 09:35:26 am
Carl...thank you for commenting. This post was hard to write...also writing and deleting repeatedly. I love your words..."great national ugliness" and how perfectly it captures this situation. But a "revolution of kindness and good" sounds like a book title and a calling! Thank you for being a man who steps bravely into this topic. Because it is a HUMAN topic, not male or female.
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9/24/2018 09:09:37 am
Oh sweetpea—those sweet flexible legs, making a w of worthiness.
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jen
9/24/2018 09:38:26 am
Dotty...the legs...a W! You are so smart. :)
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9/24/2018 10:59:23 am
Bravo, Jen! Beautiful painting. My daughter works with groups of women that have had sexual and family abuse, using Yoga and talks. She does the yoga and a psychologist heads the talks. I also have a funny experience, almost sure it was sexual but its completely blocked out except for the place. Maybe better that way!
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jen
9/24/2018 11:57:59 am
Oh hooray for your daughter and the good work she is doing! That's wonderful. A great combination, yoga and talk! As for you, what a sweet thing to have blocked it all out. :) And yet, here is another one of us with these experiences...argh. Hugs and love to you!
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9/24/2018 02:48:27 pm
Bravo! I am proud of you Jen! Can I say that. Not even knowing you, newly introduced to your blog? Incidents from childhood, vague and dreamlike. Foggy like a dream, not real, like a dream. NOT dreamy. Incidents from teenhood. Three near rapes. Waiting in the car for hours, because I could not tell my Dad his drunk friend was coming on to me. I was fourteen.
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jen
9/24/2018 02:53:50 pm
Sheila! Thank you, dear one! Thank you for sharing your stories...I was 14 when mine happened as well. A family member. Who do you tell?
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