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Friday Question: Educating Providers

By | 2015-08-21T16:03:00-04:00 August 21st, 2015|Categories: Questions|Tags: |

Beyond the most basic asexuality 101 stuff, what is the one thing you most want medical, therapeutic, and other kinds of care and support providers to understand? - What are you worried won't be included in education efforts, or expanded upon enough to be fully understood? - What are your worries with regard to survivors being put in the spotlight by the wider ace community? What can you do to feel more safe during these discussions? - Do you have any suggestions to add to a list of additional reading materials to give out to providers? - What are some ways that you can educate your own providers that might feel safe(r) for you?

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Violence Our Own Minds Play Out

By | 2018-04-09T02:55:14-04:00 August 18th, 2015|Categories: By & For Ace Survivors, Personal Narratives|Tags: , , , , , , , , |

Sometimes we visit violence upon ourselves, not just by intentionally harming ourselves or putting ourselves in dangerous situations, but by perverting things we enjoy or letting our mind run away with our feelings. It’s important to recognize the violence our own mind is playing out and address it, or else our mind wanders away.

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Friday Question: Mistakes and Flaws

By | 2015-08-13T20:02:27-04:00 August 14th, 2015|Categories: Questions|Tags: , , , , , , |

We all make mistakes, but due to the abuse many of us have suffered, we may tend to be overly harsh with ourselves when we do. We may feel that we are just "a bad person who deserves bad things," or dwell on times when we may have hurt someone even more than the person who we may have hurt does. How do you deal with your mistakes or flaws? - How do you feel when you realize you've made a mistake? - How do you feel when you think about a part of yourself that you'd consider a flaw? - Do you feel like your self-perception is really distorted by your trauma? - Are there any actions you can take that you have found can help you interrupt the cycle of self-blame or self-hatred? - What are some affirmations or validating words that you can use as a mantra to help you get through times when you feel really bad about your mistakes/flaws?

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An Ace Survivor’s Manifesto

By | 2018-04-09T02:40:20-04:00 August 13th, 2015|Categories: By & For Ace Survivors, Coping Strategies, Intersectional Issues, Self Care|Tags: , , , , , |

I am allowed to occupy space in the universe, regardless of how “difficult” or “complicated” or “messy” I may be. I am allowed to identify as a survivor or a victim or something else entirely. I am allowed to identify as asexual, even if I don’t know whether past experiences “caused” or “contributed to” my asexuality. I am allowed to use the words that work best for me. I am not required to defend my sexual orientation because of my status as a survivor. I am not required to defend my status as a survivor because of my sexual orientation.

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Friday Question: Toxic Communities

By | 2015-08-21T16:03:34-04:00 August 8th, 2015|Categories: Questions|Tags: , , |

How do you deal with a toxic atmosphere in your communities? - How does it affect you? Where do you feel it in your body? What emotions come up for you? - What sort of strategy to deal with it makes the most sense for you right now, in your current situation? Is it better for you to avoid the conflict right now, or tackle it head-on?

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When Sexual Abuse Comes in the Form of Words

By | 2018-04-10T00:09:55-04:00 July 28th, 2015|Categories: By & For Ace Survivors, Child Sexual Abuse, Coping Strategies, Personal Narratives, Self Care, Sexual Harassment, Verbal Abuse|Tags: , , , , , , , |

One aspect of CSA that I don't see discussed very often is sexually charged verbal abuse. My experience with this is as a CSA survivor specifically, but I could also see where it could potentially be an issue for adult survivors of sexual violence well. In my own experience, the sexualized verbal abuse I was subjected to has actually been one of the hardest aspects to recover from long term.

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It Gets Better: Chasing the ‘Before’

By | 2018-04-10T00:38:36-04:00 July 21st, 2015|Categories: Asexuality & Mental Health, By & For Ace Survivors, Personal Narratives|Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , |

Probably the worst part of it was how my grandparents urged me to go back to who I was 'before'. For me, there was no before. I didn't realize it then, but for many of the victims of repeated childhood sexual abuse, there is no 'before'. You know the one. Before the abuse. Before the pain. Before the brokenness. Now, when I think about who I was 'before', I realize that it wasn't as clear-cut as my grandparents and the psychologist made it out to be. Now, I realize that the 'before' they referred to was their own—namely, before they knew about the abuse. Today, I have a different 'before'. Before I decided to live for me. Before I forgave myself. Before I realized that my life is valid, no matter what.

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A Demisexual Survivor’s Experience

By | 2018-04-10T02:35:27-04:00 July 14th, 2015|Categories: By & For Ace Survivors, Personal Narratives|Tags: , , , , , |

I didn’t know I was demisexual for years. My experience of demisexuality is superficially similar to the experiences of many allosexuals, and I didn’t know that I wasn’t experiencing sexual attraction. I liked sex as much as the next person and I was kinky, too. Apart from taking longer than everyone else to find boys cute, I didn’t think anything was unusual.

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When there never was any “before”

By | 2018-04-10T00:43:20-04:00 July 9th, 2015|Categories: By & For Ace Survivors, Coping Strategies, Recovery, Self Care|Tags: , , , , , , |

Not every trauma survivour has had a life before the trauma/s. It can have happened/started in early childhood and/or there may be no memories of a life before or independent of trauma. Even for people where there was a “before”, recovery is not about going back to that state, especially not if the “before” was a long time ago, in childhood or in a completely different stage of life. We know it’s hard. Having to figure out everything new, what is a healthy coping mechanism and what’s not doing me good, how does a healthy relationship work/feel, what are my likes, interests, needs, skills, beliefs. What is my personality, who am I and what is really me and what is “just” due to trauma. This is hard to figure out and painful to even have to adress in the first place. But it’s possible.

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Art and Recovery

By | 2018-04-10T03:55:57-04:00 July 7th, 2015|Categories: Art Therapy, By & For Ace Survivors, Coping Strategies, Personal Narratives, Recovery, Resilience, Self Care, Sharing, Therapy|Tags: , , , , |

People seem to think that therapeutic art is always about expressing your pain and negative feelings. While drawing out images of exactly what the pain and terror of abuse feels like can be cathartic and hugely helpful, art that is about joy, comfort, beauty and color can act as a sort of refuge.

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