Wrapping your hands around the ghost.
 
khf
  
My mother did not survive systematic sexual abuse. I did not survive systematic sexual abuse. Though our bodies presented as externally intact, functioning, we were—as all victims of sexual brutality are—forever altered in secret, energetic ways. And in places too dark, too unacceptable to articulate in this superficial, impatient society. So, we are termed “survivors.” A description as one dimensional as a cartoon cutout. And as lifeless as an abuse victim with that ten-mile stare enduring yet another flashback. A flashback triggered decades after the active abuse.
 
To be clear, systematic sexual abuse and its catastrophic consequences decapitated my life. Severed my sense of beauty. My joy in my plump, emerging feminine body. Severed my freedom to move gracefully like a delighted ballerina through familiar surroundings that had become treacherous.
 
The I—the girl I once knew before the abuse—was not the girl who survived. The girl that survived was someone different, unrecognizable…a ghost. Furtive. Broken. Scared. A folded girl. A girl, whose body was permanently altered. A girl whose body was stinging with shame so raw it felt like acid boiling beneath my skin.
 
When a victim of sexual brutality clutches onto survivorship as a path to wholeness, they automatically and energetically limit their evolution and restrict possibilities of deeply understanding the living impact of the imposed trauma.
 
Sexual abuse trauma changes a person forever. The person that was, will never return. The ghost that survives, that emerges after the war, must begin anew. Find ways to breathe. Eventually, if they are to thrive, victims of abuse must accept the reality that trauma must be perpetually managed. We have to learn to wrap our hands around the ghost. Wrangle it. Corral it. Shift away from it. Curse it. Learn from it. Pull out its truth. Build inner light. Develop strength. Enough strength to endure the flashbacks when they rush to us involuntarily.
 
It does not help me to congratulate myself that I am a survivor of sexual abuse. Because that’s not true. I didn’t survive. My body survived. But that’s not enough. I had to become my own superior force. That was a lot of work. And it still is.
 
Namaste.     

​If forgiveness actually worked,
It Would Be Obvious
 
By khf
 
Recently a victim of childhood sexual abuse revealed to me that she had “forgiven” the sexual brutalizer who also happened to be a close relative. And here is where the forgiveness protocol reveals itself as a universal lie.
 
She had taken ill, her body, mind and spirit weakened by fever and chills. In those moments of diminishment and vulnerability, the brutalizer’s shadow crawled in bed beside her dragging with him vivid, tormenting flashbacks of the violence he inflicted upon her all those years ago. Once again she was the helpless child—the brutalizer that she had “forgiven,” once more all powerful. The forgiveness doctrine exposed as no more than propaganda scribbled like graffiti across a derelict billboard. Meaningless words that offered no protection against the onslaught of her waking nightmares when she was in dire need.
 
Understanding trauma is to understand how energy works. Energy flows forward toward the horizon. That is always its purpose—to flow, to seek harmony.  Of course, energy can be blocked. Obstructed. Forced backward. Misused. But in its natural, uncorrupted state, energy flows freely into balance.
 
Energetic properties—undisputable spiritual characteristics of nature—eternally bind the principle of forgiveness to the resonance of truth. And that truth must be present, be absolute and self-evident within the individual. Forgiveness is resolution of harm, an evolution of consciousness. Forgiveness of abuse cannot be granted—that power does not lie with the victim of abuse or anyone else. The abuser must align with their own truth. Forgiveness, if it is to be, travels energetically from the victimizer to the victim. Not the other way around.
 
Forgiveness always requires action from the victimizer. It is the spiritual responsibility of the victimizer to acknowledge and accept liability for the abuse they perpetrated. The victimizer must embody deep contrition and demonstrate profound understanding of the consequences suffered by their victim. The victimizer must establish necessary behavior congruent with sincerity and compassion. And also must develop the courage and self-control to bear the entire burden of their abusive actions without further imposing their needs and will on their victim by begging for forgiveness. The likelihood of this occurring is slim to none.
 
No victim of violence is set free through the enforcement of the forgiveness myth. Force has no spiritual value, no evolutionary purpose. And yet, it is imposed on victims of violence as the path to freedom. If forgiveness actually worked, it would be obvious.
 
When you think of the person who so brutally violated you—when you say their name, when you hear their name—do you experience the wave and glow of peace surging throughout your body? All the way through to your mind and spirit? Does the radiance of freedom inspire your day?
 
I listened to her speaking about “forgiving” him of the violence against her little girl body. I listened as she recited the doctrine--the script—of forgiveness. I heard the tone of her voice, its volume. I listened to the words she chose to tell her story. I felt the abuser’s presence inside her middle aged body. It was painful. I wanted to cry.
 
When we, as victims of violence, dispense with the fantasy of forgiveness as the path to freedom, a brand new life opens up for us. A life brimming with possibilities. Personal empowerment. Creativity. And opportunities for profound understanding that draws our hearts toward the healing power of self love. We create our own freedom.

Saying the Words
by khf
 
Some years ago when I was writing my first book, Women In Hiding, and before I embraced my mediumship, I reached an impasse of such shame I was unsure if I could continue on. Because to continue absolutely meant I had to inch my way through a passage so dark, just the thought of it suffocated me with scalding dread.
 
The sexual predator, in a public act of sexual bravado and sinister, bragging mummers, claimed his authority over and possession of his prey, me—a frightened, traumatized young girl—his victim. It was an incident of such unspeakable public humiliation that the details instantly burrowed inside my body and took up permanent residence as raw, hemorrhaging shame.
 
I couldn’t do it. I just couldn’t say the words. They would have to remain buried safely out of sight, away from malicious prying eyes and the pointing fingers of strangers who were literally standing in line waiting for the opportunity to attack. It was all ugly.
 
I sat there with my fingers hovering above the keyboard and asked the air; the universe; the spooky little things that lived in the sky or heaven; the invisible impetus that encouraged this book in the first place: “Do you really want me to say this?” I expected a resounding rebuke. At the very least an accusatory silence where I would hang my head in more shame and go about living my life with the trailing depression that shaped it.
 
“If you don’t say the words, nothing will change,” was the immediate response.
 
So I said the words. Wrote in detail…agonizing detail. Words that possessed power. Blunt truth. Words that connected deeply to the incident, to its lasting legacy of personal trauma. Words that mined the pain. The disgrace. Surgical words. Words that cleaned the wound. Excised it of poison. Words that left an open wound that I did not think would ever, ever heal. Words that I wanted to take back and re-bury. Words I was terrified of. And here I had set them free. And I did not know what they would do. Though I was pretty sure that they would torture me.
 
Writing Woman In Hiding was not cathartic. I did not see how it could be. For years after writing it I wanted to go back into hiding. Return to the safety of a blanket over my head. Return to crying in private and smiling in public. Just like I’d always done since early childhood.
 
But what began as a futile effort to articulate the inexpressible became an act of courage on my own behalf. Gave foundation and structure to that which I had no understanding. The words—as tough and excruciating as they were—forged a path into a light that I did not know existed. I can only call it freedom.
 
If you don’t say the words, nothing will change. I said the words and everything changed. ​