Statement for Report It Rally
From Angela Rose
Founder and Executive Director of PAVE: Promoting Awareness, Victim Empowerment
Thank you everyone for coming out today and standing in solidarity with concerned citizens all across this country and abroad. From New York to California to Canada, we are united today in this Report It Rally inspired by author/film-maker Angela Shelton. After surveying women in America in her book Finding Angela Shelton, she discovered that 70% of the women she interviewed had been victims of sexual or domestic violence and none of them had reported it, including herself. For the first time ever, we are bringing together victims in a show of strength, unity and voice to demand an end to sexual violence and improvements in the legal process to stop the systematic re-victimization that discourages reporting.
Sexual assault is the most underreported crime in the world. All too often victims do not report the crime to authorities for fear of not being believed, mistrust of the legal system, because they blame themselves for the crime or fear of retaliation. It’s time to address why this happens to sexual violence victims, while victims of other crimes, like robbery, don’t hesitate to seek justice. Victims of sexual violence deserve the equal protection of our laws. They deserve to be heard and validated. The Report IT Campaign is a first of its kind effort on behalf of all victims -- an initiative designed to give hope to all victims that we can end the silence surrounding sexual violence. Our loud, unified voice today will be the first step in a multi-year effort to inspire much needed reforms and better access to justice for all victims.
The report it campaign also features an anonymous online reporting system at www.reportitnow.org, which is gathering information and statistics on the incidence of sex crimes and will continue to gather data throughout 2008.
Allow me to share with you our Report IT 5 Step Action Plan:
1. We want you to spread the word - talk to your friends and family about the Report IT Campaign and encourage them to spread the word. Help to educate others about this important fight. Don’t stop talking about this campaign because today is only the beginning. Over the course of 2008 we will continue gathering data through our online Report IT form. We will re-convene on this same date next year - and then we will take our data and our voices to Washington DC in 2010.
2. We are today distributing sample "report cards" which we encourage you to send to every police department and district attorney's office in this state. These report cards seek mandatory and automatic disclosure of statistical information so that we can better assess where the problems lie. To fight the systematic re-victimization of victims, we need to know how many reports of sexual violence are made each year, how many reports are rejected for prosecution, how many cases go forward and what are the results. How many cases end in conviction, how many end in acquittal and how many are plea bargained down to menial charges. Prosecutors and police have to join us in this battle by releasing the truth about how the system fails victims of sex crimes.
3. Starting today we are committed to working together - to help organize families, advocates and concerned citizens who care about safe communities and fairness in our justice system. Working together we can inspire others to contribute their time, money and resources to help advocacy groups make this campaign a success. Groups such as PAVE: Promoting Awareness, Victim Empowerment, already exist in several states. Consider helping PAVE in this mission - or start a PAVE chapter in your community.
4. Sign up for our email alerts so that you can receive updated information and be ready to take action when necessary so that we can keep the momentum going. We are currently working on a training DVD with a chief of police that will soon be available across the county. Other training programs are planned. Stay connected so that all the latest program information will help you make this campaign a success in your community.
5. Finally -- Save the date for April 29, 2009, Angela Shelton day, when we will take to the streets again for the second year of this groundbreaking campaign.
The silencing of sexual assault victims has gone on for too long and the time has come to take a stand. Re-victimizing victims will not be tolerated. Thank you for coming out -- thank you for your time and your commitment to this important cause. It is up to us to be the voice for all who have been silenced by violence.
§ Together we will break the silence of sexual violence!
§ Together we will speak in one voice for all victims!
§ Together we can make our communities safe so that no person fears being victimized!
§ Together we will call for an end to the injustices!
Sunday, April 27, 2008
Report IT Statement
Monday, April 21, 2008
Detective speaks about Report It.
This is an amazing video that one of the members of the Army of Angels filmed. Her husband is a detective and he shares his views of sexual violence, how victims are treated, and how impactful the Report It Campaign is.
Are you reporting? Check out www.reportitnow.org
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
Life Imitates Art Imitates Life
I am a person that finds deep meaning and healing through music. I am excited this is one of the most-played and most popular singles in the Los Angeles market at the moment. The lead singer of this band wrote this song based on his friend's true story and all she has gone through. But as any friend of a survivor knows (any good friend!) you walk the difficult journey with them.
Take away this: It is never too late to turn your life around, to heal, to make the decision that what happened to you will not become THE definition of who you are. There is life beyond. PLEASE NO ONE END THEIR LIVES OVER THIS. And before you think I am insensitive and don't understand.... please... if only you knew how many times I have wanted to end my own. But I am glad I am here. :)
Tuesday, April 8, 2008
Finding the preditors in your area
For those of you wanting to know. This website was developed by John Walsh from America's Most Wanted. You can pull up your neighborhood, and click on the location dots for pictures, descriptions, and convictions.
www.FamilyWatchDog.us
Thursday, April 3, 2008
Thursday, March 27, 2008
Report IT story is out
Cheers,
bowen.alison@gmail.com
Cheers,
bowen.alison@gmail.com
Thursday, March 20, 2008
Watch Searching for Angela Shelton FREE for Sexual Assault Awareness Month!
Go to Angela Shelton TV and click on the tab "Searching" and you will see the limited edition version of the movie! Below it is the version that appeared on Lifetime TV that you can download for your classrooms.
Angela Shelton
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
Tonight in Seattle!
March 19th: Annual Rosie the Riveter Slam & Featured Performer Dorothy Lemoult
Open Mic, Featured Performer and the Annual Rosie the Riveter Slam:The 3rd Annual Rosie Slam is open to Women Only in honor of National Women’s History Month.
Email info@seattlepoetryslam.org for more info.
When screenwriter Angela Shelton set out to make a documentary country interviewing other women who shared her name, she was shocked to find that 70% had been victims of rape, childhood sexual assault and/or domestic violence. This surprising journey also led Angela to confront her own abusive past. The multi-award winning documentary that culminated has started a grassroots movement of survivors and humanitarian organizations around the world who are breaking the silence about the epidemic of abuse. Angela has appeared on the Oprah Winfrey show, 48 Hours Investigates and an exclusive version of “Searching for Angela Shelton” aired on Lifetime TV in April 2006.
As part of a call to action for a healing revolution, actor and director and playwright Dorothy Lemoult will lead an all female cast in bringing several of Angela Shelton’s monologues to life as our feature for the evening.
WEDNESDAY MARCH 19TH AT TOST in Seattle!
Come out and support one of the Angels!
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Ellen Bass's new book, The Human Line
Ellen Bass cowrote The Courage to Heal for anyone who does not know.
Hi Angela,
September 5-7, 2008
The Writer's Life
Esalen, Big Sur, CA.
For more information and to register, visit www.esalen.org or call 831-667-3005
December 7-12, 2008
Writing & Knowing: A Poetry Workshop
taught by Ellen Bass, Dorianne Laux, and Joe Millar
Esalen, Big Sur, CA
For more information and to register, visit www.esalen.org or call 831-667-3005
April 24-26, 2009
White Lotus Poetry Workshop
with Ellen Bass
Rowe Conference Center
22 Kings Hwy
Rowe, MA
for more information call 413-339-4954 or visit rowecenter.org
May 27-31, 2009
Truth & Beauty
A Poetry Workshop with Ellen Bass & Marie Howe
Mabel Dodge Luhan Inn in Taos, New Mexico
For more info, email
Tuesday, March 4, 2008
Spring Ren·ais·sance
Evergreen Jewels
Blossoming in Pink
Sheer Beauty
Spring comes to us with a purpose. We can choose to embrace her and propagate some serious growth. Ren·ais·sance, a renewal of life, vigor, interest, Ren·ais·sance, say it with me now!
One of the creative artsy modalities I use for healing is photography. I have taken pictures of abandoned buildings to demonstrate my feelings about abandonment, and to represent the horror of being raped in a motel. I take pictures-plethoras of pictures documenting my life, moods, my children's lives, my art, nature, our animals.
Ren·ais·sance originally means the activity, spirit, or time of the great revival of art, literature, and learning in Europe beginning in the 14th century and extending to the 17th century, marking the transition from the medieval to the modern world.
Renaissance, lit. "rebirth," usually in a spiritual sense, from renaître "be born again". An earlier term for it was revival of learning. My drift is to take this word and it's meaning and make it malleable to your own spirit. What do you hope to create this spring? What garden will you cultivate? This means inside yourself, and outside in your outer world. We can always be born again! It is so true. The earth does it all the time. We are made of her, and we can do it to. Just set your intention to grow, and be open to the newness of spring.
In the spirit of nouveau inspiration, of rebirth, of metamorphosis, let's take more pictures that we see meaning and feeling in. Keep a scrapbook of your pictures. Choose any theme you wish or none at all. Just intend to create visually a tangible way of seeing your inner world. I think to myself, "I feel -----". I then take a picture of something. Voila. You can give visual, give image to your inner world. The idea is to express what is inside of you, no matter what it is, and move it out of you in some kind of creative form. This is your art. This is how we can make our life an art. You are an artist in your own life.
My intention right now is to Breathe in spring, feel the energy of renewal, reawakening, rebirth, resurrection. Watch as the birds flit around gleefully, their long awaited reemergence into air. This is all healing, nature and art are elixirs for the soul. My porch is a sacred space. Out there I have beautiful copper wind chimes with colorful jewels that catch the sun's rays, the light flinging itself into my dining room daily. I have plants, a bonsai tree, sculptures, bird feeders, and soon a cozy rug. Deep orange gossamer curtains hang in front of the French doors leading to the porch. It is very important to create intentionally, space from which to exist. This is where we live, we can make it beautiful and sacred. We must make it so. Sometimes we can learn to care for ourselves inside by acting as if and demonstrating to ourselves how to do it outwardly, starting the home we occupy. I leaned some of my self care and self regard this way. I choose to occupy my lifespace a certain way, with sacred intention.
My entire home is a scared space actually. I have created this with my family over the last 8 years. Only things that engender a soul quickening get in my door! I do not allow clutter in my home. For me, life is always moving, therefore I am always polishing, tidying, letting the chi flow through my home, doing laundry with gratitude for the little bodies that wear the clothes. I am always going through things, so that clutter has no time to form. Clutter is a symbol of emotional cobwebs, and we have a choice about how we approach that. Our outer world can align with the inner world, and vice versa. What is within is reflected outside of us in our environment. Thus take pictures, and if you feel unsure of how you feel internally, pictures will help you see your internal state. And, it's fun!! Spring births life anew, and we follow her heARTful, blooming example.
It is a wonderful time to begin taking care of your physical self through motion if you do not. Pain gets stuck in our body. We have these little emotional crevices which get filled with pain. You gotta get moving to spill those pockets of stored up stuff. I set my intention to release, relax, and revitalize. It works. I run, lift weights, practice yoga, and do copious amounts of stretching. Walk your dog to start. Put on Fergie and dance. Chase your kids. Play hide and seek with your partner. Make love. make some more love! Jump rope. Skip to your local cafe. Walk to the grocery. Pick up litter. Go on a hike. Do something, and do it often. I feel triumphant after a good long workout. Most importantly, PRAISE YOURSELF when you do something heal-thy. If you are doing inner child work, buy stickers and give yourself one as a reward to chart your progress. Make a list of rewards you wish your mom and dad had given you for your accomplishments, and give them to yourself as you do even the smallest things well. Write yourself a letter that you wish your mother had written you. Mine have said things like, "You are beautiful. You can do anything. Let's go shopping for that prom dress. It is safe to be a girl. I will protect you. I love you so much. You inspire me. You were the most gorgeous baby I ever saw. When you were little, you were so magical. You are so smart. You are funny. Being a mother to you, staying home with you, was never a sacrifice, because I got so much out of it too, who wouldn't want to watch you, Sarah, blossom? I would never leave you. " Give this to yourself.
Music, choose some new music, listen deep. Find a new rhythm in life. This is part of rebirthing the self, our own personal renaissance. So, take pictures to externalize your personal experience, for me this is particularly of beauty and gratitude.
Above are a few pictures that exteriorize my interior state as of today.
Listening to:
Dave Matthews Live, When the World Ends("When the world ends, you and me will just be beginning..."), Warpaint, by The Black Crowes, Billie Holiday, Jack Johnson Sleep Through the Static, Thievery Corporation mixes.
Namaste, Sarah xxoo
Sunday, March 2, 2008
Parenting Advice For Survivors
Parenting is an incredible endeavor regardless of one's background. At best we come from loving homes where healthy mothers and fathers modeled healthy, fulfilling, loving lives. Healthy parents loved, held and nurtured us, and each other. We had parents who were deeply in love and this love was extended between them in an outward fashion. The love shared by our parents and the love they felt and extended to us as children was palpable and poignant. Issues were dealt with in a nonviolent way. Our healthy parents mirrored our innate gifts back to us.
This is frequently not the case, however, and as we become mothers and fathers we are left picking up the fragments of our spirits. If we were abused in any way as a child, there are many things we can do to heal and empower ourselves to parent from a healthier place. This piece will focus on PTSD and Parenting. Almost 70 percent of Americans will be exposed to trauma in their lifetime. Up to 20 percent will go on to develop PTSD. A conservative estimate of 1 out of 10 women will develop PTSD at some time in their lives. PTSD symptoms sometimes develop within the first three months after trauma, but may not appear until months or years have passed. Symptoms can continue for years following the trauma, or, in some cases, symptoms may lie dormant and emerge later in life. This is often the case with victims of childhood abuse. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, and Post Incest Syndrome are a normal emotional and psychological reaction to a very abnormal traumatic experience. Calling it a "disorder" is a little misleading if you ask me, but semantics are semantics.
Pledging to become a conscious and aware parent and human being is a lifelong commitment, a sort of marriage to life itself. Many ages and stages developmentally speaking can present special challenges for a mother or father who was abused. Often, the normal stages our children go through are trauma-triggers, igniting those long buried feelings in us. Because of the possible congruency with our own abuse at those very same stages at those times, if we are largely unconscious and unskilled at handling our reactions, we can very well break down. Unprocessed trauma wreaks havoc on a parent living with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, Anxiety issues, Panic Disorder, or any of the other myriad of survivor-related fallout. The greatest suffering befalls one's children. The last thing on earth most of us want for our children is for them to ever have to feel the way we had to. I never want my children to experience the devastation of not having anyone to turn to, or the physical sensation of loss and annihilation that abandonment gives the child left behind.
When we can consciously observe our emotions and our reactions, we can begin to change. Before losing our temper over any of the stresses of parenthood, try picturing oyur child going through what you did. Nine times out of ten that is a serious jolt that pushes us squarely back into the present moment. Empathy is the first tool. What we can't feel in ourselves, we can not fully feel in another. The Buddha said that if our compassion does not include ourselves, it is incomplete. This is a basic truth.
If you are a survivor and you are reading this, I applaud your desire to continue to heal yourself by reading this. Your children and grandchildren will thank you as well. Post traumatic Stress Disorder, or PTSD, is a psychiatric disorder that can occur following the experience or witnessing of life-threatening events such as military combat, natural disasters, terrorist incidents, serious accidents, or violent personal assaults like rape and incest, including emotional incest.
Taking inventory is essential in my opinion. Sometimes we have to weed out any remaining people and family members who do not have our healing interests at heart. It is important to cast a circle of loving friends and family of choice who will support you and your parenting on your journey. In 2004 I did just that. I had to make the very difficult decision of breaking all ties with the paternal side of my family. Illusions had to go and be released so that new pathways could be laid down. I had to give up the illusion that I had any power to change them, make them understand or make them accountable. It was painful and essential. A survivor has to indivuate and blaze her/his own trail eventually if we are to break loose from the cycle of abuse and prevent infecting our children. The Courage to Heal, by Laura Davis and Ellen Bass was monumental in my growth to the point of being empowered enough to say NO MORE to those who refused to protect me.
Self care is so important. I run and lift weights, and I practice pilates. Exercise regularly, see a therapist that you feel you can trust, practice yoga, and mediation. Moving the body can unlock years of petrified emotion. Make music a daily way to bring about catharsis or just relax you. Survivors with PTSD may be very jumpy, easily startled, paranoid, irritable, rageful, and suffer from a plethora of psychosomatic body symptoms. It is important to remember that all of these "bad" feelings are a language, our minds and bodies are speaking to us in a language, the language of pain. Our job is to listen and compassionately help ourselves to heal. Survivors can be constantly on guard and may find it difficult to concentrate. Sometimes persons with PTSD will have panic attacks. It suffices to say all of this is incredibly challenging when we are trying parent.
When feeling overwhelmed by young children, remember that excessive anger and rage are symptoms of your old pain being made new again by the child in front of you. Excessive distace is common as well, even to the point of allowing youe denial to endanger your own children by not listening to your gut. Like adults who experience trauma, children and adolescents who have been abused cope by using a variety of psychological mechanisms. One of the most effective ways people cope with overwhelming trauma is called "dissociation." Dissociation is a complex mental process during which there is a change in a person's consciousness which disturbs the normally connected functions of identity, memory, thoughts, feelings and experiences. Grounding ourselves is paramount: prayer, massage, warm blankets, a cup of chamomile tea, prayer beads or malas, stones like labradorite or crystals, petting an animal, drawing, reading, stretching, or going outside and connecting with the elements are all ways to come back down to earth.
It is a proven fact that fetal cells can live in a mother's body for up to 27 years. I believe that is true of emotions as well. Read as many books on abuse healing as possible. Take your time but make the effort. No healing happens until we decide. People with PTSD work hard to avoid anything that might remind them of the traumatic experience, as avoidance is a hallmark of the disorder. This includes one's own healing, which will demand that we reenter the feelings, feeling them fully, heed the messages they carry, and then do the enormous work of releasing them. This is very difficult to do as many of our habituated patterns of relating to ourselves, others, and the world once served us and helped us survive.
One of my greatest motivators is my own children, including the little girl that I was. Being proactive is the best way to keep children safe. Acknowledging the dark people and forces in our world who abuse children is only possible to the degree in which we can be accountable for what may have happened to us. Denial ensues partly because when we are vulnerable and being violated, we as children have to suspend the belief that this is actually happening to us. The psyche helps us out that way, otherwise we would go insane with the horror, fear, grief, and terror. People with PTSD frequently feel as if the trauma is happening again, as well as a sense of a nameless terrible dread. Traumatic memory material is not stored in the same fashion in our brains. That's why so many of the trauma memories are so scattered. They are literally fragmented. Flashbacks, often in a very fragmented way, occur as well and are very intrusive, and we relive the experience via this reaction. The person may have intrusive pictures in his/her head about the trauma, have recurrent nightmares or may even experience hallucinations about the trauma. However, some of us experience some pictures or movie reel type images, but some of us have body memories. We feel things in our bodies on a very cellular level. This is perfectly logical given that exposure to such profound trauma, such as incest and rape, alters the wiring of our neural pathways. Our hormones go haywire. The task is to retrain the brain. Retraining the brain and healing the heart are the order of the day.
For me personally, in the past I sometimes felt paranoid and thought I was seeing my abuser under my covers. Out in public every man I saw would look like him. When this happens, and it does still occur around certain triggers, like holidays, I place my hand over my heart and remind myself I am here, existing right now, and that little girl I was needs to be picked up and carried with me into the present.
Aromatherapy is helpful to ease stress and flashbacks. Painting one's feelings is something I highly recommend. Channeling suffering through the medium of art is alchemical and transformative. So many of our feelings seem so difficult to verbalize or express because we can not necessarily see them. But they are not intangible at all, and putting them on canvas, a poem, a journal, or in a collage serves to remind me of that. I can look at my very tangible creation and see that my truth is real. As I continue my path to integration-full acceptance of all dissociated aspects of myself- I feel more whole and less fragmented. When dissociated aspects of one's self become known, accepted and integrated into normal awareness, the fear and terror we had to bury and numb ourselves from during violation is amplified. It becomes more real. Grief and mourning is often the result. Better to deal with things as best you can lest it deal with you in some other unsavory manifestation, like relationship and intimacy issues, addictions to drugs, sex, even Jesus. What the mind may try to forget the body will remember.
My message is this: Feel the fear and do it anyway. Remember the worst is over even when it does not feel like it. When we were little and being hurt, we had to dissociate, pulling our spirits inward as a turtle does when in danger. It is safe to come out of the shell now. But do this with great compassion for the child you once were. The most painful realization I have had concerning my abuser, who was my father, is that he never saw me. He saw an object, a doll, a puppet for his use and abuse. He was never able to SEE me or access his empathy for the little child I was. His narcissism was too impenetrable. I have had to grieve this: I was never even real to my own father. BUT! My children have different childhoods, I do see them, I feel them, they exist for their own purposes. I am just blessed as can be to have them tucked under my mother wings for a time before they are ready to fly. Parenting: the longest process of unfolding and letting go.
Visualize yourself as a small child, go to that child and lift her/him up into your adult arms. I have done this while hugging a big teddy bear or a pet. At one point I could not look at pictures of myself as a child let alone visualize a little me and go to her. I now walk right in to my flashbacks, love guns blazing and walk right up to that child I was (and in some ways still am, and proud of it!)in mid-violation and rescue her. I have started to enter the most intense memory of being raped as a ten year old. If I'm going to be bombarded anyway, I am going to go into that memory in all my Mother Bear glory and take that little girl away. My therapist and I came up with a side-pouch for me to tuck little me into for safe harbor. I truly believe that profound pain can contain profound beauty. There are no easy short cuts, only your individual unique path. Those are some of my personal experiences and ideas, I hope that it helps anyone who needs it.
Resources: http://www.hopeforhealing.org
Read: Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder Sourcebook by Glenn R. Schiraldi
The Courage to Heal, by Laura Davis and Ellen Bass