Sexual trauma in all its’s complexity often bears a resonating feeling of shame, guilt, disgust and deep sense of what feels like an inescapable disturbance.

When your body was once the crime scene, impossible to leave, to forget, the memories ever present…life in the aftermath becomes a game of survival; we learn new ways to cope and this manifests into anything from pretending we’re “okay” to denial it ever happened.

Willful ignorance is not bliss, it’s postponement.

By any means necessary, we find ourselves in a place of damage control. No one ever told us how to respond, we just figured it out. The bomb went off, the ear deafening ringing in the ears, an unbearable pain.

Whatever the time line, if it was 34 years ago or 30 days ago, it feels fresh and recent. The brain’s signal flares have gone off, it demands our attention, our energy. “Something’s wrong.” This warning will repeat until we are able to find healing, recovery and peace.

In the meantime anything and everything, no matter the cost, trying to cope manifests into self destructive ways. Over exercise, eating disorders, binge drinking, over medicating, anything to just drown out the scream of pain that never seems to shut up.

Shame is a secondary transference from one guilty party to the one who was violated. There was no apology, it wouldn’t have helped anyway. There was no real closure. Forced to live with what happened, to everyday wake up remembering where the handprints were like they were permanent scars.

No matter what route we pursue it seems that we are forsaken and forgotten. That we must have had some cosmic target painted on our back, to have been selected for the unfortunate devastation. The fracture to the mind and the crushing of the soul.

It’s a popular topic to focus on the inner child theory. However, some of us can’t remember who that kid was, given the awful trauma they endured. It may not even be healthy at that point to try to get in touch with that version of ourselves, depending upon the severity of what we endured. Being “in touch” with our inner child may be beneficial to some, that could be safely navigated and addressed but must be carefully approached at the proper time of healing. Recovery cannot be hurried, cannot be forced or rushed. Timing is everything.

Sexual assault brings nothing but death to that life we once had. It changed the fabric of our being, how we survived, as messy as it was, that life no longer exists. It is a reality to face that our childhood is worth reflection but not meant for reliving. It is being aware of all the ways that we were changed but also recognized its not that we were forced to be resilient, it’s that we are still here. Restoration doesn’t require pop culture methods to revive or resurrect something long since buried. We need not be grave diggers to the things we chose to leave behind. There is no one size fits all approach for healing. What may appear to work on social media and “buzzworthy” psych jargon doesn’t translate towards “the only way” to heal.

And no matter the past, we have the now. We aren’t back there anymore. That version of ourselves, what happened, we lived through the worst of it and now we can heal from it. Maybe all the ways that we tried to “deal with it” fell short. Maybe they temporarily brought relief. Maybe we just weren’t ready to deal with it. True healing is a present choice to organically deconstruct unhelpful mindsets and build a new foundation, tearing down any lies we came into agreement with. It is a choice, because we are ready for that change. Not out of pressure or condemnation, but realization. Our first step is autonomy and choice. When so much was pried out of our fingers, forced upon us; healing is personal. It is not adopting other theories or social norms. It is a deliberate endeavor to heal and do it in a healthy way.

There is a way to make peace with the past, to release the pain, to experience total recovery. There is a way out. There is a life without pain. A life without fear. A life of peace. A day without war.

We are more than our experiences. More than the trauma, more than victimization.

The good news it that no matter how deep the wounds, how permanent the feeling of pain, healing can make it as though it never was. The memories will remain, but the pain will fade. A strength that was always there, not forced out of a place of “have to” and lack; but the reality of what was survived, how it was overcome; how it didn’t cause permanent defeat. Did it cause damage, yes? But irreparable, no. The only past the point of no return, is the past.

Over the years, in process, in working with countless people; the hardest part was beginning, trusting me to accompany them on their journey. It was scary, the fear of sharing what happened. It was almost a sense of defeat, the choice to confess the atrocities, to admit and acknowledge what happened to them. Once the apprehension faded, once the comfort and safety had been established there was a state of being, a shift. Of being fully accepted by a non-judgmental source unphased by the content of the story but moved by unbiased compassion to help. If I could akin it to anything, the swells of the ocean which once threatened to be the undertow that would seemed to be the death of them; became their head above water, treading; eventually finding their footing and walking out of the tide to the shore. The ocean is still there, the memory of the waves. But they were able to be on solid ground for the first time in a long time, or ever. It wasn’t overnight. It wasn’t perfect, it was messy but it was freedom.

Survival has a place but how much more to be in a state of rest and recovery? To no longer define ourselves by the war we never asked for? But to realize it was never who we were to begin with?

No matter where you’re at, what you’ve experienced, you’re not a lost cause, beyond hope or damaged goods. You didn’t deserve what happened to you. You deserve to be healed, fully.

They say that change only happens when it is too painful to remain the same. But hasn’t pain been the only consistent thing in this day to day fight?

Don’t give up.

Healing is real.