Traumatic Experiences Community Daily Check-in April 5, 2017
Child Abuse Awareness Month- YOU HAVE A VOICE!!!!
Good morning/afternoon or evening community
How are you all doing this morning? I hope everyone is doing as best as they can today! As you all know it is Child Abuse Awareness Month. So this is a perfect place to let each and everyone of us have a voice here.
So many of you here have had some shape or form of child abuse in your life. hugz
Over and over and over and.......................Who was there to save you? Who was there to stop that mean person doing those things to you? For many no one and I'm sorry for that. For some there was someone.
Child abuse is accross the globe and still going on now today. It is rising daily. (it is very hard for me to write on this today, but 1 know I can reach 1 person and help them know "they have a voice now")
So now it is today April 5 to most around the world- some the 6th or the 4th. Either way we are in todayToday most of us are not in the abuse we were back then. And for some you are hugzHow can we change this tho? How can we STOP the abuse accurring on us or to another child or person? How can we give less power to the abusers......????
1. Learn the facts and understand the risks. Realities - not trust - should influence your decisions regarding you or a child.
2. Minimize Opportunity - If you eliminate or reduce one-adult/one-child situations, you will dramatically lower the risk of sexual abuse for you or a child.
3. Talk About It - Children and yourself often keep abuse a secret, but barriers can be broken down by talking openly about it.
4. Stay Alert - Don't expect obvious signs when a child is being sexually abused. Signs are often there but you have to spot them.
5. Make a Plan - Learn where to go, who to call, and how to react.
6. Act on Suspicions. A child's wellbeing may depend on it. Even you if you feel unsafe act on it
7. Get involved If you are in a state of mind to do this join in programs that support awareness
Today I want this safe and welcoming place to be a place you have a voice. Use it-scream, cry, dance....Do whatever you need to. Please if you feel comfortable share whatever it is you need to with us all. Most of all. you are not your past. You are a "somebody" very important. You are unique
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@RumpleSteeleSkin
I think I may still go through emotional abuse with my family, and maybe that explains the return of my depression. But I don't really know. I go back and forth between whether I think I was abused or not, and by whom. I don't know if there's any way to really find out, or if I'd be able to handle it if I was.
@singercrystalspirit - I think many of us at times are unable or unsure to trust our own intuition about our abusive pasts and lingering abuse we may still suffer. I think that is also a form of losing our voice, our inner voice is affected by trauma too. Being out down constantly, I was raised not to trust my own judgment and be dependent on other people's ooinions. I don't know. But I hear you and hope you keep sharing even I'd you aren't sure what it is you're sharing all the time. One second at a time. :( <3
@wontsleepwontwake
Thank you :) I think I did endure abuse, but I think it was subtle and complex. (I was raised in a fundamentalist religion, and my mother still practices. My whole family does, but my mother is the most fundamentalist). (I think the abuse is built in to the religion if that makes sense). So it's really hard, because none of them meant to hurt me, and all of them have had very positive influences on my life in many ways ... it's just sticky and complicated.
@singercrystalspirit I get this! And it ties in a lot with my family too- makes it hard to wrap your head around.
@singercrystalspirit
*safe hugs* if you would like them.. Im sorry to hear this singer. You are worth so much more! You are strong and amazing and im here for you if you want or need 💗💗
@singercrystalspirit
HI Spirit good to see you hereI am very sorry to hear that your family abuses you emotionally-hugzthat is just not right. Spirit next time you have memories/flashbacks of abuse that you are wondering about-write it down ok. Sometimes doing this you see some patterns here and from who. You can see sometimes that persons same behaviors now. I do hope that soon you can have some answers to all this. Again hugs are here for you.
@RumpleSteeleSkin
It's good to see you too Ok that's a good idea, I will try
😞 There was no one there to save me. No one cared. I protected my younger sisters from as much harm as possible. I had no one. But im learning to find my voice now and even though they keep trying to take my voice from me im trying to remember that my voice is worth something. *safe hugs* to anyone who wants or needs them 💗💗 . Kindness, love and compassion can overpower the cruelness of this world!
@calmLake1999
Your voice is definitely worth something!! Speak out loud, scream it out, we hear you 💕
@calmLake1999
HI Calm good you are hereI am sorry to hear no one was there to help you in any wayhugglez. I can connect with you on protecting your younger sisters. I did as well and my brother way back then. YES your voice is worth alot!!! Please keep believing this. Keep speaking in whatever way you need to-they can't stop you forever hun. Thank you for sharing this here.
YOU HAVE A VOICE
@RumpleSteeleSkin
That's a really great post... Even if it's painful for all of us to face our past, it's important to share it and give others the chance to perhaps learn from it... I think the main main thing you did today with your post was giving us a voice and that's just the most important, to gain back your voice after an abuse, the most important and the hardest... I guess most of us feel abandoned and lonely, like our voice doesn't matter, cause it hasn't been heard in the past, but you are right, we aren't our past... And if it's possible to just help one person, to make one person feel a bit better, well that's worth every pain it causes to talk about the past...
I have no idea how to stop child abuse in general, I think there isn't anything like that, it always existed and it probably will always exist, but what we personally can do is watch the world with wide opened eyes, see it when somebody near us needs help, being open about our own past, cause every abused child has the feeling of being alone, of being the only person on earth going through this hell and sometimes just to say 'I hear you' can open a child's eyes...
For me it was one person who suddenly was there and took care of me, who told me, what your father is doing isn't right, you don't have to suffer. And he did something, he fought for me and my rights, he became my guardian, my legal guardian and suddenly I didn't have to live with my father anymore... And well, years later I did the same for my adopted son, he's been abused in a way I have no words for, I met him at a psychiatric clinic, he's been lost and devasteted, but somehow I gained his trust and I just couldn't let him go anymore... So sometimes it's one person who makes the difference and we can all be this one person....
Sorry for the long text.... I hope you're all well 😊
@courteousNorth5140
Hai North wonderful to see you todayI do believe in teaching,sharing and hopefully someone reaching that first step and getting some help. Yes a voice is so important. A voice is loud, special,meaning,feelings,and love. A voice is the personAnd to have 1 person be unable to use that is very sad and unfair...it really is. Like living under water with so much to say, but no one to hear it-idk. I feel I can't do 1 ounce of stopping abuse to a child. But as you said, we can watch and be aware of someone having these signs,sharing our own experiences, to be empathetic to a child and take time to connect with them. Being that 1 person who says "I HEAR YOU AND BELIEVE YOU" those things there I can help lower abuse. I am so happy that that man was there to rescue you and then become an important part of your life. Cause you were shown this your actions caught sight of another who needed to be rescued. This here is how you can stop the abused. this really made my heart smile to read
@RumpleSteeleSkin
Where's verbal abuse on that chart? (i like the chart by the way)
I suffered each of the abuses that you listed... *runs away now*
@Tenacity37
wow Tenacity been a long time but glad you are here. Idk where that one is at but I do know its part of abuse. Emotional abuse
@RumpleSteeleSkin
I was laying in the dentist chair, remembering all the experiments they did. Tried not to but everything the dentist did just triggered all the memories. I really don't understand how a child could be experimented on and someone not notice. Sure mum had great excuses why I wasn't allowed out to school but come on, did no one check she wasn't lying?
I'm so terrible at lying, the dentist kept asking if I was ok, I made a sound as if to say yes but she could tell by my eyes I wasn't. She said I know you hate this bit but I'm sorry I need to do it. My eyes were screaming no I hate all of it and I really really hate this bit 
.
Got me thinking about having a voice, I had tons of dental equipment in my mouth and all I could do was gesture and hope it was understood. I mean did we really have a voice back then? I know I was not allowed opinions, or choices and any I made were squished down until they didn't exist anymore. They took all of my 'no's' as they took everything else from me. Hard to find words now, I'm sure they are in there but they are muddled up like a laundry basket. Just there, where they were thrown in. Not even sure if they are even all mine.
@LifeIsMyCanvas - You're so brave for going to appointments even though they trigger so many awful things for you. We may have different experiences, but I also really, really, really hate the dentist and I think you've articulated a lot about why that is for me too. Even thinking about dentists is hard. :( Much love, canvas <3
@wontsleepwontwake
Thanks, like more than you can know for that. Someone told me being brave is being scared and doing it anyway so when you said that I think I actually believed it properly for the first time. I was definitely scared but I didn't run away. I hope that you are blessed with good dental health so you don't have to go. If not I hope you find a sweet dentist who will be kind and patient.
@LifeIsMyCanvas
My heart goes out to you canvas... for all that you have been through. And for being brave at the dentist too... so hard when it brings back memories from the past. No they didn't hear you, they shut you down. But now you do have a voice, somehere in that laundry basket, and I hear a whisper of it, as you share today. Hug. x
@RumpleSteeleSkin - No one intervened and saved me. A couple people had suspicions but didn't do anything to help. Someone once told me they would help but said I'd have to be honest with them about it first and I physically couldn't bring myself to tell them - I still wonder what might have been if I had had the courage to tell that person. I ran away from home a few times. A friend's parents took me in once for a brief time, but they said they legally couldn't help me otherwise. I finally made a long journey to the other side of the country when I was a legal adult. It wasn't okay but it is okay now, I think.
Trouble is, what does someone do if they suspect they know a child who is being abused? If one contacts the authorities, those authorities are going to tell the childs parents who may be facilitating the abuse and the child will be punished harsher for it. If one steals the child away, one is responsible for breaking up the childs family (in the childs mind) and one may get kidnapping charges. I legitimately do not know how to help someone if I found a child in my previous situation, and that terrifies me! Any ideas?
@RumpleSteeleSkin
I think I have always been a very opiniated person. Very strong and determened mind. I have always believed that I could do anything I set my mind to and it is true, I can.
I have an amazing singing voice, people love listening to me. I am a succesful leader and people gladly listen to me and do as I say. But I do not have a voice.
I have never been able to speak my mind. This is frustrating to me. I have a mind full of creative solutions for huge problems, like childabuse, and I desperately want to be able to speak these solutions into being. And I can't. My voice is locked up.
I recently started talking, and I am going to keep talking. I have been silenced long enough. My voice will be free
Tonight I feel empowered, tomorrow I might not. I need you and you need me, and together we can change the world.
@MaschaV
Hai Mascha great you came todayIt is good that you are a very strong opininated person, determined to set your goals for life. Oh wow a singer and a leader-very nice. I'm sorry to hear that you have no voice on some really good ideas on child abuse. But I know if you share them here we all listen. Some may read it and take an idea or two and see how we all can place it in our daily lives to cut down on child abuse.
" I am going to keep talking. I have been silenced long enough. My voice will be free"
I want you to keep saying this to yourself many times a day. As yes we all need each other in order to make a change!!!
I had no one that would protect me from being sexually abused. I was little and tried to tell. No one heard me so I stopped trying. I have shared more on here than with anyone except my therapists. I appreciate being able to have a voice on here.
@RedHawk6547
Yes we hear your voice and we are glad you are here with us. x
@RedHawk6547
HI Red good to see youI'm sorry that you were abused when little-that was wrong of that person to violate you like that. And not to be able to share these things and have people believe you is well....SHAME ON THEM!!!! I am so so happy to hear on 7cups you have shared so much. Keep doing this hun. Have a voice and please don't fear here. Wow so proud of you today
@RumpleSteeleSkin
I was abused emotionally and sexually as a child by my mother and now I live with my dad who takes good care of me and loves me and I never have to see my mother again. I want to make sure no child has to go through what I went through so thank you for making this, it
@CartoonDarling
HIya Darling good to see you hereoh dear Im so sorry your mom did those horrible things to you. hugglezBUT Iam very grateful your dad was your rescuer and loves you no matter what!! Yes to help just 1 child out of being abused is the start.
@RumpleSteeleSkin
Great post Rumple! a very important and significant topic. especially in April when we hope to raise awareness. As North says, sometines it takes just one person and we can all be that one person. x
@rozie
HI Rozie really good to see youYes that 1 person is all it takes to spread action on awareness. And it starts with you then me then her and him
