By Kathleen Hoy Foley

I was conceived in rape.  I’m not complaining about this.  It’s simply a natural fact of my life.  Rape—that reduction of lust, testosterone, and savagery numb to female despair— is a phantom agony I have always borne on behalf of my mother.  The blunted grief of sexual butchery ruptured a lone nucleus and saturated each budding cell, settling its terror into my forming bones like decayed dust.  My mother’s female slaughter lies petrified within me; a sorrow recoiled in the tangles of neurons and viscera; a seething, headless ghost wanting to be heard but only able to speak by way of riddle. 

Just as I recall where I was standing when the Challenger exploded and fell to earth, I remember the exact moment of clarity when all the clues my mother had dropped at my feet over her lifetime finally coalesced and made sense.  At long last I saw.  At long last I understood.  My mother had endured the worst violence a woman could endure.  The worst violence a woman could endure.  Only a teenager, she’d suffered the violence of rape and was then forced to endure the catastrophic injury of being impregnated.  The seething dark riddle had resolved itself.  It had spoken.  It had been heard.  It had been understood.  The riddle had thrown its secret truth at me like a fistful of rotten tomatoes.  It had hit its target and nearly dropped me to my knees.  I was of rapist blood!

I would like to say that I was thinking about my mother at that moment of clarity.  I wasn’t.  I stood frozen in dread of my now alien self.  Terrified at what might lie dormant within me.  Was there a twisted monster biding its time?  Was I secretly deranged?  Covertly demented?  I was begat in depraved, arrogant violence.  What did this tell about me personally? 

Well, actually nothing.  This unmasked rapist was simply the latest predator to add to the catalogue of abusers and miscreants infecting my family; the incident one more to include on the long list of violent abuses; my mother another disregarded, shadow victim.  I too had been impregnated by rape, the horror of it ignored.  Being conceived in rape did not define me.  But sexual violence had.  As it did my mother.  Abuse and rape crippled my mother’s life.  It crippled much of mine.

The political and religious hysteria in this country over an individual claiming all rights to her personal reproductive health speaks to the arrogance of the ignorant.  Only self-serving individuals of the most paltry ethics and those lacking intelligent comprehension would force a rape victim, or anyone suffering an unwanted pregnancy, to give birth.  My mother carried the pregnancy to term because she was forced to—no other viable option existed.  Had medical care been available to her, my mother would have aborted.  Out of profound respect for my mother as a human being and a victim of a violent crime, I celebrate the fire of this truth of termination.  I support and champion the woman spirit alive and kicking under the suffocating consequences of sexual brutality.  I rejoice in that indestructible vital force of feminine spirit beneath the broken—now dead—body that was subjected to physical injustices and coerced into submitting to fanatical laws and oppressive doctrines that hijacked her soul and forbid her personal, bodily rights.  My moment of clarity was my mother’s voice rising out of the seething riddle.

Dr. Katharine Morrison, of Buffalo Womenservices, Buffalo, NY, http://www.buffalowomenservices.com/ is reframing reproductive care as a continuum.  In her center she provides full-spectrum reproductive health care spanning from birth to abortion.  This intelligent, rational, and compassionate approach seeks to accept and incorporate all the aspects of reproduction without judgment and punishment.  According to the New York Times, http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/15/opinion/sunday/abortion-and-birth-together.html?_r=0  3 in 10 women will have an abortion in their lives; 8 out of 10 will give birth.  About 61 percent of women who have an abortion already have at least one child.   

Unwanted impregnation is a brutal, agonizing, personal ordeal.  To treat it in any other way is appalling and inhumane.  The “hysterical ignorant” who insist on penalizing girls and women for suffering reproductive nightmares, who attempt to sell the ordeal as a godsend, are guilty of emotional brutality, of violating a woman’s sacrosanct right of authority over her own body and spirit.        

I speak out about being conceived in rape to validate the sexual violence my mother suffered—validation she was denied.  I speak out about being conceived in rape to validate my mother’s spiritual, physical and emotional agony at being impregnated against her will.  I speak out about being conceived in rape because abuse and rape defined my mother’s entire life.  I speak out about being conceived in rape because my mother never had a voice.  Now she does.

Tweets before suicide point to teen's sexual abuse

I thought it best to post this article out of Texas in its original form. The article was By Mike Tolson on June 18, 2014.  It illustrates how our criminal justice system is failing victims of sexual assault.

My blog entry, from May 1, 2014, reports on how another law enforcement agency failed a victimresponds to sexual assault.


Ashley Billasano kept the pain locked inside her for years, allowing only a handful of people closest to her to have a glimpse. On Monday, the 18-year-old Rosenberg high school student let it all out in a torrent of messages on Twitter - the sexual abuse that she said ruined what should have been some of the best years of her life, her inability to see justice done on her behalf. Then she killed herself.

Friends say the suffering and depressed Billasano decided to make her death count for something even as her life became unbearable. Her burst of 144 tweets, which took place over six hours and ended shortly before she took her life through suffocation, recounted the sexual abuse at the hands of a family member and other adults, and the frustration that arose when authorities failed to bring charges.

"This wasn't random," said Ashly Escamilla, her classmate and closest friend. "She planned this for a reason. She made a decision that this was what she was going to do to get attention if she was not going to get justice."

Her closest friend

Billasano, known as Billy to her good friends, always had a sense of theater. It was why she and Escamilla would sometimes dress up as Batman and Robin for a late-night taco run. And it was why she was supposed to be in the upcoming musical production Hairspray put on by the drama classes at B.F. Terry High School.

Now Escamilla is without the friend she said was closer than a sister, the special and caring person she instantly befriended last year in what she later described as a magical moment. Billasano had moved to Rosenberg to live with her mother after the allegations of abuse became known to the family. In no time at all, the two girls were, in their words, like "peas and carrots." Shortly before she died, Billasano gave the "other" Ashly two of her glow-in-the-dark stars to put on the ceiling of her room. The stars were to remind Escamilla of their friendship before she went to sleep at night.

"She wanted justice from the very beginning," Escamilla said. "She said police and CPS acted like it was nothing. She said it was like they did not want to believe her. So, to go on living when someone hurt her, and no one ever did anything about it - wouldn't that drive you insane? To feel ignored by people who were supposed to help you. That was crazy. She had support from me and my boyfriend and her mom, but she did not have justice. She needed to get her point across and to make it known that she was wronged."

A spokesman for Texas Child Protective Services said privacy concerns keep the agency from commenting about whether an investigation followed Billasano's allegations. The Williamson County District Attorney's office, which reportedly had presented information to a grand jury, did not return a Chronicle phone call. Billasano was living in Round Rock at the time.

Billasano's mother, Tiffany Ruiz Leskinen, said her daughter confided the story of abuse to a teacher, who notified the police department in Pflugerville, where her school was located. The investigation led nowhere, Leskinen said.

"The detective told her that she had trouble believing her," her mother said. "Here is someone who has been abused and is forced to be silent for so long. Then the one person you go to looking for help says they might not believe you. The CPS caseworker was a rookie right out of college. She did not know anything and kept saying she had check with her supervisor."

Leaving a record

Escamilla said she learned of Billasano's pain not long after they became friends. When it became clear that no prosecutions would stem from her complaint that she had been abused by a family member beginning at age 14 and then by an assortment of men, she took a turn for the worse, her friend said.

"She suffered depression. Her moodswings would vary. She could be happy and in another moment she'd be sad. Finally, it all built up inside and her inner demons were too much to handle. She had to deal with all these negative feelings about herself," Escamilla said.

The use of Twitter was no mere gimmick, she said, but a way to make a public statement, to leave a record. Billasano chose that vehicle instead of, say, Facebook because she knew friends would notice her Facebook posts and would suspect that something was amiss, Escamilla said, adding that few of their peers use Twitter.

Previous attempt

Billasano was found lifeless on the floor of her bedroom. It was her second effort at suicide. The first came about a month ago, Escamilla said.

After that attempt, her friend was constantly by her side, even living with her for a week. But down inside, Escamilla and her boyfriend, Luke Bosworth, feared that something bad was bound to happen.

"She would always try and push it away from herself," said Bosworth, who also was a close friend. "But she had nightmares. She wanted to keep it secret. When she told me it was a very emotional experience. We knew how much it was bothering her. She had gone to a psychologist a few times before, but it really wasn't helping."

Billasano's tweets described the sexual abuse she endured and emotional toll that it took on her. In several consecutive messages she mentions how she locked herself in a bathroom following the first experience and hurt herself with a razor. In another, she recalled a phone call she received in which she was told there would be no indictments because of a lack of evidence.

"That's when I changed," she tweeted. "I didn't care anymore. And the people I was meeting gave me no reason to."

'But I won't be around'

Before signing off, Billasano addressed anyone paying attention to her messages.

"That's the story of how I came to be who I am," she wrote. "Well, the condensed version. I'd love to hear what you have to say. But I won't be around."

Suicide prevention specialists say that young people are especially prone to thoughts of killing themselves.

"There are over 100 attempts for every completed suicide in young people, especially young girls," said Paula Clayton, medical director for the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. "In the elderly, it's only four for every suicide. When you are distressed, you are much more likely to be desperate and hopeless and out of control. And young people are much more impulsive."

By Kathleen Hoy Foley

Let’s be clear, the signing of the law to unseal closed adoptions records by Governor Chris Christie—an act of covert violence against all women—would not have been passed were it not championed by The Girls of the New Jersey State Legislature.  Who are The Girls?  I’m so glad you asked.  The Girls are the very ones you knew in high school and college who spent quality time putting on makeup, flirting with cute professors, drooling over sweaty rock stars, and punishing less worthy girls with gossip, exclusion, and eye rolls.  We all know The Girls.  Every one of them excels at covert abuse: What? Me?  I didn’t do anything.

Oh, speaking of sweaty rock stars…  Maybe I am the only one who remembers cringing at Senator Diane Allen’s animated public display of LOOK AT ME! LOOK AT ME! fawning over Run DMC during a committee hearing about sealed adoption records a while back.  Of course, Mr. DMC is a rap star, not a rock star, but he does sweat and gyrate professionally which evidently qualified him for Senator Allen’s fawning.  Senator Allen was herself a media personality of some note before wrinkles and sturdy shoes took over.  That’s when the real power brokers—the he-men—stepped in and gave her the boot.  After her stint as a television beauty and before her entry into the pseudo-powerful The Girls’ clique, Ms. Allen was just another aging woman trending toward stout.  Then with her big election win, Ms. Allen became an aging woman trending toward stout clutching political privileges that presented her with many fine opportunities, including the chance to degrade herself by flaunting her goods (big breasts are always in demand) at a sweaty celebrity in a public forum.  Which is…which is…I don’t know…sad?  Desperate?  Embarrassing especially because of the sturdy shoes?  Fill in any description that fits. 

Senator Diane Allen and all The Girls of the New Jersey State Legislature serve at the behest of the he-men in the He-Men Only Power Club.  The Girls know this.  It’s just that The Girls don’t want you to know it.  Because once you know it, their outward show of power is seriously diminished, since basically The Girls are just puppets dressed up in power suits.  How do I know this?  Because no powerful woman of voice would ever condone—much less promote—the abuse of another woman.  No powerful woman of voice would willfully expose another woman to governmental abuse, sanctioned physical and emotional indignities, or deprive any woman of her human rights to her own body and her personal privacy.  But The Girls of the New Jersey State Legislature did just that.  Without the support of girl senators and girl assemblywomen, Governor Chris Christie’s bill to punish women by publicly exposing us for suffering a confidential, catastrophic pregnancy would have been burned in a garbage can like a dirty bra long before it reached the governor’s he-man desk.   

It’s a pathetic, open secret that The Girls in the New Jersey State Legislature exist to obey and serve the he-men.  So long as they comply, their power suits are relatively safe.  If a he-man declares that a woman’s highest purpose is joyful procreation, The Girls shall agree.  If a he-man dusts off a framed picture of his long-suffering mother and weeps over the tale of his mom crawling across the Rockies with two broken legs while caring for the eighteen kids she gladly birthed three at a time in a covered wagon in-between fighting off masked marauders with a rifle that kept misfiring, The Girls better have a long-suffering pioneer woman tale of their own to recite to the accompaniment of misty eyes.

Of course The Girls are well compensated for their blind loyalty to he-men who sell fantasies of wagon trains, motherhood, and lemonade—which, by the way, can be created out of the contents of a burdened uterus when necessary, just ask one of The Girls.  For their silent obedience…oh, excuse me…I mean selfless dedication to he-men, The Girls are permitted not only to flaunt power suits, but are granted a certain degree of immunity for personal failings and dire missteps for which less worthy women would be immediately drawn and quartered.  Such as: unwanted pregnancies (but…The Girls must never tell and if outed, sob hysterically and beg forgiveness from the he-men).  Politically inconvenient partners (but…The Girls must keep them hidden).  Bigotry (but…The Girls must destroy all who could verify a loud trash mouth).  And drunken partying at conventions that result in a viral YouTube debacle (but…The Girls must deny, deny, deny just like the he-men: What? Me?  I didn’t do anything).

Unfortunately, the he-man lip service of immunity does not extend to protecting The Girls from being cast out in an underhanded political maneuver; being called upon to take the fall for a he-man; or covertly being deemed a liability for her too many failings, which include gray hair, sagging breasts, and varicose veins.  Whereby, The Girl becomes just another voiceless, aging woman in support hose trending toward stout. 

Divested of her power suit, Diane Allen is just another old fat woman in sturdy shoes drooling over a sweaty he-man who wouldn’t look at her twice if she wasn’t seated on the dais with her political status announced by an engraved nameplate.  Unless she’s married to Santa Claus and has a knack for entertaining sweaty elves, a drooling old fat woman has no power in our society.  None.  Zilch.  Zero.  Sorry about that, Diane. 

But hold on!  There is another option!  Diane and all The Girls could stop drooling and actually cultivate genuine woman courage and authentic personal power.  A he-man would call it growing a set of balls.  However, I won’t be that crass.  Oh wait…yes, I will.  Grow some balls, girls.  There’s going to come a time when you’ll need them.  One day you’ll look around and the sweaty he-men won’t be anywhere to be found.  In fact, no he-man will even take your calls.  Welcome to the club you thought you thought you could escape.  Sorry about that, Diane.

By Philip Foley

Maya Angelou, was one of the most renowned and influential voices of our time. Hailed as a global renaissance woman, Dr. Angelou was a celebrated poet, memoirist, novelist, educator, dramatist, producer, actress, historian, filmmaker, and civil rights activist.

Maya Angelou died on May 28, 2014. http://mayaangelou.com/bio/ 

As a young girl she was raped by her mother's boyfriend. Then, as vengeance for the sexual assault, Angelou's uncles killed the boyfriend. So traumatized by the experience, Angelou stopped talking. She spent years as a virtual mute.

Maya Angelou reclaimed her voice and the world was a better place for it. Her work I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Know_Why_the_Caged_Bird_Sings   explore subjects such as identity, rape, racism, and literacy. 

Many of the aging and elderly women of New Jersey are going to be re-traumatized by the recent action of Governor Chris Christie.  His authorization to open once sealed confidential birth records will test their courage to fight for themselves and use their voice to express their outrage for what he has done. The other option is to allow this bullying legislation to force them into silence for the remainder of their lives.

Women In Hiding Press supports and encourages every woman victimized by abuse to break the crippling tradition of silence and to take command of her story and transform it into personal power.

Women In Hiding Press celebrates every woman who has the courage to find her voice. When victims of sexual trauma come forward and identify what was done to them, name what was done to them, they educate other victims on how they can effectively manage  the trauma that was vested upon them. Their combined voices provide a deeper understanding of the devastating lifelong impact of sexual violence. Additionally, their voices provide context that others can use to support  trauma victims in their journey to a full and meaningful life.

You beautiful you, through the power of your victim voice, will help fill the void left by the loss of Maya Angelou who overcame her trauma induced silence to speak. How fortunate for us that she did.