Most of us, well, we’ve been through some garbage in our lives - and we’ve given power to a lot of people who simply don’t deserve it.
April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month. We here at Band Back Together are shining the spotlight on ALL survivors. Depression, Abuse, Trauma.
It’s time to take back the power. Tell us how YOU have taken the power back in your life!
April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month.
As a survivor, April is the month I join with others to spread awareness and education. I firmly believe that not only do we need to teach our girls to be strong and show them the signs to recognize an unhealthy relationship, but we also need to raise our young men to treat everyone with respect. If we can do this, we can raise young people that have healthy relationships and who respect each other.
Last year, I wrote about my intimate partner rape. I also wrote about learning to be a survivor. These two stories are important pieces of me. Even more important is this story of how to survive.
Source: bandbacktogether.com
<a href="http://bandbacktogether.com/post/3792//"><img src="http://static.bandbacktogether.com/media/images/2013/02/Dose_Of_Happy_Monday.jpg"></a>
April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month and we here at Band Back Together are celebrating survivors who are taking back the power in their lives.
Source: bandbacktogether.com
Most of us, well, we’ve been through some garbage in our lives - and we’ve given power to a lot of people who simply don’t deserve it.
April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month. We here at Band Back Together are shining the spotlight on ALL survivors. Depression, Abuse, Trauma.
It’s time to take back the power. Tell us how YOU have taken the power back in your life!
Society talks a lot about empowerment. Let’s empower the women, let’s empower the minorities, let’s empower the dogs, empower the trees, empower the third world, empower the whales, empower the children, empower the differently abled. There’s nothing wrong with any of that; these are all very noble pursuits. These are all things that need to be done.
Source: bandbacktogether.com
Sexual abuse during childhood can have devastating effects that last through adulthood.
This is her story of strength.
People ask me (my mom asks me), “Why do you write about your life online, especially all of that stuff about sexual abuse in your childhood?”
Sometimes that last part is said in a whisper, as if they aren’t sure what will happen if they say it loudly.
I explain that writing was a big part of healing for me.
Source: bandbacktogether.com
Such a simple word with such a variety of implications, not a one of them simple.
This month, the Band is focusing upon recovery - from anything. Part of getting through the traumas, the addictions, the mental illnesses is to focus on the light at the end of the proverbial tunnel and focus upon new coping mechanisms, new ways of life, and recovery.
So, The Band, how are YOU recovering? What are you recovering from? How are some ways you cope while recovering?
It is hard to for me to believe how broken I was this time last year. Completely broken. I was at the bottom and I didn’t see a way out. I had the suicide loop playing in my head constantly. I almost did it. Twice.
Source: bandbacktogether.com
Since my six-year-old son Jack was diagnosed with Leukemia in January, there have been both sweeping changes and little changes in our life. Some are harder to describe than others - some more subtle while others are glaring. Sometimes aspects of his personality that were there before might come out in a more noticeable way, or they might be more hidden, protected. Jack is still himself, of course, but the version of him we are living with now isn’t as steady or balanced. I often wonder how much of him is changing permanently because of this experience.
I’m not sure I can still describe him as a “happy-go-lucky” kid, for instance, which would have aptly described him last year.
Now his mood can change on a dime, and he is VERY sensitive. He is quick to cry, quick to anger, and quick to feel defeated. No amount of good-natured teasing is allowed. A simple behavior correction or disagreeing statement will send him running to his bedroom with a shout of, “I’m going away from you now!” If he gets angry, he’ll growl and even hit himself in the head.
Source: bandbacktogether.com
As the saying goes, hindsight is 20/20. Do you have life lessons that would have helped you through a difficult time? Share those with The Band as you write a letter to your younger self.
Hey There, 17-year-old me.
I don’t know if it’s any consolation, but you’re not lying. You’re not looking for attention, and you’re not being over-dramatic. It took more than ten years, but someone finally told me what you tried to tell people so many times.
You have a mental illness. The easiest way to explain it is that your brain is just wired wrong.
Don’t be scared, though.
You know that guy you were dating? The one you broke up with to go back to an emotionally abusive relationship? He’s not giving up on you. Even though it’s going to take you 14 years to find each other again, it’s going to work out.
One of the most damaging emotions we can hold onto is anger. Most of the time, we are angry at the right person for the right thing - we often feel (correctly) justified in our anger.
Anger, though, can turn to malignancies, and sometimes, the best answer to unresolved anger - especially when we find it ruling our lives, is to let it go. To learn to forgive (but not forget.)
This month, we are working on our path toward forgiveness.
Remember, forgiveness does not mean we absolve another for their role in hurting us, trying to break us, shaping our lives with their words and deeds.
So, The Band, who do you want to forgive? Who will you never forgive? Who have you forgiven?
I like to say that I chose to forgive you.
I hate what you did to me and I won’t ever forget it.
I don’t even want to be in a room with you - the thought makes my stomach turn. But I can’t let your drama and blame games drag me down.
You probably wouldn’t even really remember what it is you did that I carried with me for so long. That’s just you.
No regrets, right?
You manipulated and controlled me every day for years. You fucked with my head. You came close to committing suicide while I was sleeping one night, and blamed my actions for it - even though we’d discussed those actions ahead of time.
Source: bandbacktogether.com
Here at The Band, we believe in kicking stigmas to the curb, flinging glitter, and shining a light into the dark. And now?
Your bandmate needs a sounding board.
It’s time to Ask The Band!
Fellow cancer survivors, does it get better? Does it get easier? Will this fear always be here?
Last year, during my radiation treatments, my mother told my great aunt that I would never be the same. I was furiously angry when I learned of this. I swore up and down that I wouldn’t let cancer break me. Now? I’m not so sure it hasn’t.
Source: bandbacktogether.com
I’ve been debating sharing this part of my story for a long time. I see other members of The Band writing about this topic, and it inspires me: it lets me know I’m not alone.
I have support, I have a voice, I’m With The Band.
I am a survivor of childhood sexual abuse.
I cringe at those words.
My story starts at a very young age. I remember what happened, but I can’t pinpoint how old I was - around five maybe?
I know it was the first of many, many, many times that he did things to me. I know that I had no freaking clue what was going on - only that I hated it.
Source: bandbacktogether.com
I doubt that the gentleman who said that to me knew what he was actually saying about my life.
It happened in Walmart a couple of days ago. I was standing in a line that wasn’t moving because the cashier was too busy conversing (with her hands) with the customer she should have been checking out.
The next line over was moving, slowly but surely.
I’ve noticed that whichever line I am standing in just happens to be the slowest in the store; yet it never fails that if I move to another line, it instantly becomes the slowest moving line in the store. So, I stayed my happy ass right where it was, thinking murderous thoughts about this cashier who wasn’t doing her job.
Source: bandbacktogether.com
Sometimes, in the very darkest of hours, there is light to be found.
This is his story of survival from a deadly tornado:
Until May 21st, 2011, I thought I wasn’t afraid to die. What happened May 22nd, 2011 shook thatbelief to the core.
I live in Joplin, Missouri. My little slice of heaven. You’ve probably heard what my hometown has been through in the last year.
May 22nd, 2011, brought one of the deadliest tornadoes in American history through Joplin. In the days that followed the tornado, 161 people were found dead.
161 PEOPLE.
Obviously, I wasn’t one of those people.
Working that afternoon, I never expected my life would be turned upside down. I punched the proverbial clock, did my job, and figured I’d punch it again at the end of the day and go home.
At the end that day, though, there was no clock left to punch.
Source: bandbacktogether.com
In June, Band Back Together’s Bringing Back the Happy World Tour Topic is “I Overcame.”
We’ve all worked awfully hard to get through our pasts. It’s time to let our awesome flag fly, pat each other on the back and get all Eye of the Motherfucking Tiger!
We got dealt a shit hand and it doesn’t matter because we BEAT it. So, The Band, it’s time to share your story - your triumphs - with us.
What have YOU overcome?
One day, when I was feeling particularly brave and incredibly stupid, I told my abuser that I was going to tell on him.
I was so tired of it all – the beatings and the rapesand the mind control.
I was tired of being told that I was a worthless piece of garbage, that I deserved to be treated like shit, and that no one would ever love me. I hated the person I’d become: this quivering mess who was too scared to go to sleep and too scared to stay awake.
So I told him that it had to stop, and if it didn’t, I was going to tell the police.
He picked me up and threw me against the wall like a rag-doll. When I came crashing to the ground, he kicked me.
Over
and over
and over.
There was not a part of my body that was spared. I started fading in and out of consciousness, trying desperately to stay awake.
I was afraid that if I blacked out, I would die.
Source: bandbacktogether.com
