(released again this year)
I am not sure if you are aware that April is “National Sexual Assault Awareness month.” Quite a mouth full I know.. This month is devoted to raising awareness, educating the public, and supporting the victims.
I would like to know if you have seen any promotions for National Sexual Assault Awareness month on your news stations. My inclination is that you have not. I have not either. I became aware of this national month by accident, it was attached to another article I was reading.
Sexual assault, molestation, and incest are topics that most people shy away from. Many do not want to talk about these kinds of heartbreaking stories. The horror that goes along with these acts are difficult for many to bear. I challenge you to image how the victims feel.
Sexual assault and molestation are deviant crimes against so many. If you look at the statistics, it is a worldwide epidemic. Crimes against young girls, boys, women and man are happening every hour of everyday, somewhere in this country, and in other countries.
The only way that people will become more comfortable, and I am not sure that is the right word, maybe I should say more open to addressing these types of topics, is if we actually talk about them. If we bring these stories out into the open. If we talk to each other. If we talk to victims. We need to get the information out. We need to get the stories out, and we need to follow through and get the perpetrators punished.
https://www.joyfulheartfoundation.org/
There is a wonderful foundation called the “ Joyful Heart Foundation” that was started by Mariska Hargitay from the hit television show, Law and Order Special Victims unit. In one blurb about her said that the actress said:
“The actress founded the Joyful Heart Foundation in 2004 to help “heal, educate, and empower” survivors of sexual assault. “People don’t want to look at sexual assault, domestic violence, and child abuse that are so pervasive in our society, and I felt like I needed to do something about it,” she says.”
Mariska and her spouse have been advocates and educators for many years promoting awareness on these difficult topics. The ‘Joyful Heart Foundation” is a great resource for those who want to get involved.
This site list important hotlines, offers educational information, and suggestions of how others can get involved and help. Please take a look at their website. There are so many victims out there who need our love and support. Image if this was your daughter, sister, mother, or friend.
I was the victim of incest many years ago, I really haven’t talked about it, this is new. I will admit that those events have haunted me for 62 years. Just because the trauma is over does not mean that the nightmares stop. They do not. Just because someone tells you it is over, does not mean that everything is OK. It does not mean that each person that has been traumatized in this way does not continue to have waves of panic and sadness wash over them.
I will tell you that most, if not all of the statistics you see about sexual trauma, molestation, and incest are big fat lies. Why would I say that? I say that because MOST cases of incest, rape, and molestation go unreported. The numbers you see do not even scratch the surface of the number of crimes that are really happening.
I was a child of incest. I told no one. When the story came out at a family gathering no one talked to me about what happened. The events got buried, but the memories and emotions of that trauma have lived inside of me all my life.
After years of being haunted by those memories I have written a book to quell the ghost, and to encourage others to tell their stories. We must talk about what has happened to us, and we need to talk about what is happening now to others. As a society, we must find a way to stop the monsters.
My book is out on Amazon. I wrote my book because I needed to tell my story. I wanted to encourage others to share theirs. And I want to encourage everyone to help the victims of sexual assault, rape, incest and molestation find some peace, as I know that they are haunted by the trauma that has been inflicted upon them. Below is a little section out of my book. I would love to share my book with as many victims as I could possibly reach as they need to know that they are not alone. And as I always say, have a great day today, YOU AND I DESERVE IT.
Incest and rape are not things we usually chose to remember. Often these memories come uninvited into our conscious minds, poking and prodding, pulling and tearing away the scab that keeps them from us.
Sometimes our memories float to the forefront of our mind like clouds in the sky. Some good, some bad. Some pretty, some ugly.
Mine have slithered out of their hiding places to assault my well being at many inopportune moments, bringing forth a flood of tears.
At other times, the memories of my father’s molestation burst forth like little volcanic eruptions, opening that place where they lay dormant.
I have had the scent of body powder suddenly fill my senses. Body powder was a tool my father used when he began his little bathroom games.
I do not ask to remember. I do not want to see into the past for that is where the child in me has kept things hidden for so long.
But I will confess that these memories, these real events need to be told because of the harm they did to the child, and for the way they have haunted the woman. It is time to tell my story. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0936CRZDX
And it is time for all of you to tell your stories as well. https://www.joyfulheartfoundation.org/
