Resurrection After Rape Community Group
Discussion, question-and-answer, general social support, and journal processing for progress-oriented rape survivors. No crisis, no damaging or triggering conflicts--this is for individuals who want to contribute to collective, cooperative action toward the goal of making actual PROGRESS through rape trauma. Much of this work is based on the book "Resurrection After...
This isn't anything I'd like to start in the immediate future because I already have plenty of other things that need my attention and focus right now, but I've never been one to let grass grow under my feet.
I'm wondering about continuing publication, and I have several ideas to consider:
A revision of Resurrection after Rape. I'd like to remove some aspects of the book, and enhance others. When I wrote it, I focused a lot on a handful of very specific cases, with additional input from countless others. I'd like to reverse that focus, and instead amplify the group focus of the book. You know, make it less about Persons X, Y, and Z and more about the collective, equal efforts of a dozen people together. I'm enormously proud of the work and the input that people made to the first edition, whether it was in the form of a single paragraph or whether it was someone whose work was traced throughout the book from beginning to end.
A textbook edition of RAR. This would mean starting a whole new project, one aimed at graduate students in counseling/social work programs. There just aren't any current textbooks about treatment of sexual trauma; the best one I know was was written years ago (and costs $40 or more). I've been asked to travel around Oklahoma and conduct all-day trainings with crisis workers/counselors so that the "RAR Method" becomes the default treatment technique used here. But most therapists have NO training on sexual assault treatment, and make some very common errors. Or they proceed with good intentions but little clinical understanding. Why not write a book that trains student therapists, and market it to a textbook company?
A brief paperback book about "sexualized grieving." I coined the term because this is hardly ever mentioned in any literature, yet several times a week just here on DS the question is asked: "Why did I become promiscuous after my rape/sexual abuse?" There is so much shame and taboo about this, and not one single book I know of addresses it. If survivors could find a brief book that explained this, it might be very reassuring. It seems like a HUGE area of survivor's shame that is just waiting for an antidote. And a few DS members have already offered to help.
A book of religious inspiration for survivors, specifically targeted to the religious book market. You'll hardly ever catch me in a Mardel's bookstore, and I'm not likely to read a lot of Rick Warren, Max Lucado, or TD Jakes. But it also seems apparent that there just aren't many good books in religious bookstores that offer any support for survivors. I looked: there are a couple of recent ones. The others were written in 1990 and earlier. But the ones that o exist are autobiographical by survivors; there just aren't any that offer current research-based information with a dose of spirituality. It seems to be another HUGE omission in literature for survivors. Being a social worker and an ordained minister might help me write such a book.
Any thoughts or advice?
I'm wondering about continuing publication, and I have several ideas to consider:
A revision of Resurrection after Rape. I'd like to remove some aspects of the book, and enhance others. When I wrote it, I focused a lot on a handful of very specific cases, with additional input from countless others. I'd like to reverse that focus, and instead amplify the group focus of the book. You know, make it less about Persons X, Y, and Z and more about the collective, equal efforts of a dozen people together. I'm enormously proud of the work and the input that people made to the first edition, whether it was in the form of a single paragraph or whether it was someone whose work was traced throughout the book from beginning to end.
A textbook edition of RAR. This would mean starting a whole new project, one aimed at graduate students in counseling/social work programs. There just aren't any current textbooks about treatment of sexual trauma; the best one I know was was written years ago (and costs $40 or more). I've been asked to travel around Oklahoma and conduct all-day trainings with crisis workers/counselors so that the "RAR Method" becomes the default treatment technique used here. But most therapists have NO training on sexual assault treatment, and make some very common errors. Or they proceed with good intentions but little clinical understanding. Why not write a book that trains student therapists, and market it to a textbook company?
A brief paperback book about "sexualized grieving." I coined the term because this is hardly ever mentioned in any literature, yet several times a week just here on DS the question is asked: "Why did I become promiscuous after my rape/sexual abuse?" There is so much shame and taboo about this, and not one single book I know of addresses it. If survivors could find a brief book that explained this, it might be very reassuring. It seems like a HUGE area of survivor's shame that is just waiting for an antidote. And a few DS members have already offered to help.
A book of religious inspiration for survivors, specifically targeted to the religious book market. You'll hardly ever catch me in a Mardel's bookstore, and I'm not likely to read a lot of Rick Warren, Max Lucado, or TD Jakes. But it also seems apparent that there just aren't many good books in religious bookstores that offer any support for survivors. I looked: there are a couple of recent ones. The others were written in 1990 and earlier. But the ones that o exist are autobiographical by survivors; there just aren't any that offer current research-based information with a dose of spirituality. It seems to be another HUGE omission in literature for survivors. Being a social worker and an ordained minister might help me write such a book.
Any thoughts or advice?
And if you all wanted, you could give me copies to prepare for use in such a book. Think of it--our retreat could be the impetus for creating a whole new book for survivors, of a type which has never been attempted or published before!
The book I had considered writing, but would not know how to begin, would most assuredly address the spiritual struggle, the part of the pain that I [we] hide from my [our] 'church' friends, but feel deeply nonetheless. It would include the dark thoughts planted in me by my rapists, fertilized by a selfish, alcoholic father...and it would include the deep roots of faith planted in me by that man's mother, my grandmother. I would love to see the truth in writing Matt. I would love to see the dark, shameful, ugly truth on the page...and entwined between the paragraphs depicting the brutal honesty of feelings we all have experienced, I would love to see the absolute God-inspired facts that refute the ugliness, and hold us up to the Light. I know it is God who saved me that day, but, I have to be honest and admit I didn't always know that. I believed He was angry and had turned away from me that day. It is that kind of honesty that I'd like to see, not the preachey if-you're-happy-and-you-know-it, sing-song approach to faithfulness in the time of our distress, and following. I think this is a great idea Matt. You writing an inspirational book that addresses this kind of trauma, usually brushed under the rug...but, even the Bible has the story of Tamar...but, in that account, her despair - not addressed. Her shame - also, not addressed. Her innermost thoughts - not addressed. So, perhaps it is time to address those things, to validate them in Christian women who feel the additional shame of not finding the strength or inner ability to "let go and let God". Because, some of the things that our faith teaches us, also aids us in finding huge footholds for guilt within our spiritual walk. Perhaps, if there was a book that addressed these feelings, and addressed the way Christians should actually understand the struggles victims of violent sexual crimes feel, perhaps Church wouldn't be so difficult to continue when your heart and mind are at war.
Sorry......that was waaaayyyy too much, especially when I want to say that I like all your ideas. You plus writing equals good reading and appropriate handling of delicate issues. I would appreciate reading anything you put together.
I really, really love the idea about the letters to future survivors....I love those letters......WHAT IF YOU COULD COLLECT 365 LETTERS AND FIND SCRIPTURE OR QUOTES TO MATCH THEM WITH...AND YOU DID A DEVOTIONAL BOOK FOR SURVIVORS TO USE PERENIALLY...???
My struggle has been feeling that the foundation of my faith, which I had thought was a blessing.....actually feels more like a curse.
Parent's teaching their kids to believe in something...teaching them never thinking that what they are teaching them could cause such pain after difficult life experiences. Knowing that we were given a gift...being taught about the love of God with the best intentions; but finding yourself in a place in recovery that your just not able to embrace that and feel thankful for it.
Knowing it and having it embraced by your heart and mind is a process for me (one would think they could go hand in hand...but for me it hasn't)...and a book like this sounds like it would be a great tool to use in that process...
When we are victimized in brutally, sadistic and violent ways, and when sex is used as one of the weapons against us, we belong to a certain sect of victims. We hold a place very close to persons who are murdered, yet we continue to breathe. (I wanted to say, 'yet we live', but "live" isn't what I call much of what I have done). Books of all sorts DO recognize this type of victimization, but it is glossed over, barely legitimized, never validated in a way the person who experienced the trauma really felt. SO, when the actual act is minimized, made palatable for the spiritual "Lifeway" Bookstore readers, it renders our experience, our terror, our shame - invalid. In the same sense, the rote rhetorical recitation of scripture rings dull and lifeless to the victim whose life was shattered. The 12 year old who looked to God, screamed out for God, believed above all else IN God, but suffered in agony without her God, that girl finds no voice telling her He was most certainly there, yet her terror happened anyway, and why.
If THAT book could be written, if THAT book could make it past the puritanical editors desk, to the hands of one like me, THAT book would be devoured by a woman like me.
Can anyone else see worth in a book like that?
I found where God had been that day, after many years of searching and introspect, but, had I had a book like the one I describe available to me, my search would not have been so painfully long.
I agree that it would 'turn some people off'. However those people are the ones that would be helped by the above mentioned books....so their needs have been met. I am in a similiar struggle....as you described for yourself...the above mentioned books and their message worked for me for a time...but ceased to give me the comfort they once did when full disclosure of my rape experience hit me years later. Suddenly my needs changed....the facts of my rape didn't change, my faith foundation didn't change; but my final acceptance of it did. That acceptance is what I find to be so difficult because it doesn't fit with my faith foundation anymore...at least right now.
I'm frustrated with that fact because it was so hard to find peace within my faith...and suddenly it feels as though all my work to find the peace was for not....at least right now.
*****Books of all sorts DO recognize this type of victimization, but it is glossed over, barely legitimized, never validated in a way the person who experienced the trauma really felt. SO, when the actual act is minimized, made palatable for the spiritual "Lifeway" Bookstore readers, it renders our experience, our terror, our shame - invalid.****
Hmmm. I have to say Mockingbird.....the above statement it true for me. True because I was the one that 'glossed it over, barely legitimized it, never validated it in a way the person (me)who experienced the trauma really felt'. My excuse for doing this all those years ago was for my survival at the time. I had to 'minimize' it, I had to make it more 'palatable' for myself.....in the process I 'rendered my experience, my terror,my shame invalid'....I can't blame that on any book. It was done out of self preservation...
So Can I see worth in a book like the one you describe......YES! YES! YES! Although, (and I'm just being honest here)....it wouldn't be a book I would have TOUCHED back then.....but I am in the market for one now...so I feel is has alot of Worth! You bet!
I agree, this book would not have been one I would have picked up at 14 or 15 years old. My head was in a much different place, and no single book will reach all readers in their current phase of recovery, but, there is such a huge number of us who were raped years ago, who, for one reason or another - one trigger or another, have been visited by PTSD and are now forced to acknowledge the facts of our rapes we had only hoped would never see the light of day.
What about a book that addresses the typical phases of recovery....so many of us seem to write of our pain in phases....the "how I felt when it was happening"...to the "days following the rape", to "It's been years and it still isn't gone" phase....we seem to have so much in common. And, the biggest chapter of all, the "I worked so hard and thought I was way farther down the road than this! Where did I go wrong?" phase. You know, the Paul Harvey..."now, for the rest of the story" phase.