I have had a very long journey in life of sexual abuse. I can remember it like was yesterday, even though the very first time was 35 years ago. My innocence was stolen from me at the age of five. I went through life thinking that I wasn’t good enough for anyone, until one day I was about to turn 18 and become an adult. I was on my own fighting to live and was released from the foster care system. I didn’t know what I was going to do, but I knew that I was just as good as the next person, maybe even better!

I set out in life never letting another person degrade me or abuse me the way those terrible people did over and over again. I vowed from then on that I would never be afraid to tell my story. I went to college and worked very hard to educate myself for my two children. I am so excited to inspire other survivors to stand up and speak out. Saprea has given me a renewed faith in myself inside and out and has allowed me to love myself all over again!

-Charity, Survivor

I can’t remember a time when violence and trauma weren’t part of my life. To me, dysfunction was normal.

I wanted out, so I left home at age 14 and dropped out of school the first week of ninth grade. By age 15 I was emancipated and married, and at 16 I was pregnant with my son James. I was in an unhealthy relationship, but I thought that was what love was. It was more of an ownership than a healthy relationship.

I left my husband before my son was born. I felt lost and alone. My stepdad said I couldn’t come back home. I don’t blame my mom for not standing up to him—she didn’t know how to get out of that relationship. (Eventually she did, and she’s been married to an amazing man for 15 years.)

I was drifting—sleeping on couches, getting government assistance and visiting food pantries. There were so many resources I didn’t take advantage of. I pushed good men away and went to the ones who wanted to have ownership of me.

I began self-medicating with alcohol—the one thing that loved me no matter what. I got several DWIs. Looking back, now I can see the patterns. I had no healthy relationships. I thought I was not deserving of healthy relationships. What resonates now is how broken I really was.

At some point, I recognized that I was raising three men—my sons James, Tyler, and Dylan, and I couldn’t give my perpetrators power over me anymore. I went to counseling. I had to give up alcohol. I knew if I kept going down that road I would be murdered or in prison or not emotionally there for my kids.

I had to learn to love myself again. That was the game changer.

I set a goal—to get my high school diploma before my oldest son graduated in 2014—and I achieved it. That was my turning point. It was such a good feeling because I had always been told I wasn’t good enough or smart enough. I thrived from there. I went to college and got a lot of support from my professors that I didn’t get from my home life. I set simple goals—not big ones—but I was going in the right direction. It made me realize my self-worth.

I went to the Saprea Retreat. I was scared—I didn’t want to relive my past—but those four days changed my perspective on myself. Sometimes it takes people treating you well for you to remember who you are and what you deserve. I realized I was associating everything with the trauma I was exposed to, but with grounding and mindfulness I don’t have to live that way anymore.

I am forever grateful that I was giving the chance to reclaim my life.

I didn’t date for a year. I just focused on myself and learned to love myself. I didn’t think I had the right to have boundaries, but now I have healthy boundaries. I realized that if I deprive myself of a loving and healthy relationship, I’m just letting my perpetrators have all the power. I deserve love and respect and I know that’s possible.

Everything I’ve been through has made me a better person. I’ve lived it, so I know what it’s like to be in a dark place. I can empower others while giving them hope.

-Drea, Survivor

My name is Trisha and I am a survivor of childhood sibling sexual abuse. I was 12 when my older brother molested me for a year. I didn’t have a stable household as a child so there was nothing I could do or say to make it stop. I was the forgotten child.

In 2015, I had been told by my parents that my brother was being looked into for a molestation of little girl in another state and there was a no-contact ordered against him and the little girl. My parents said that the little girl was lying. My heart dropped into my stomach… I couldn’t come out yet. To hear my parents say they don’t believe the little girl I felt they wouldn’t believe me either.

I ended up coming out that same year because my parents were bullying me so bad I got mad enough and just yelled it out to my dad over the phone. I was believed, but I was told to not talk about it. My parents went to a therapist and the therapist was going to call the police and he let my parents talk him out of it and put the phone down.

I endured bullying from my parents over the next two years as I refused to talk to my brother or see him and my parents told me to quit trying to break our family apart. It tore me apart as I tried several times to bring the conversation up and got shot down or my parents started getting angry at me telling me it’s my fault I didn’t say anything as a child.

At 27 years old I made that call to the police 15 years after my brother molested me and I chose to fully end the toxic relationship that I did have with my parents. I was asked to give detail and I had never done that and I just bawled over the phone to the officer. He was so nice and caring and listened to me and I thank him to this day for that. I then got assigned a detective to work my case. When I went in for my video testimony I had never told my story and to tell it in detail word for word broke me. That wall I had built up for 15 years shattered right in front of me. My biggest fear was retaliation and it came true… after coming out and filing my report my brother started to threaten me and make false police calls against me so I had to get an attorney to serve him and my parents cease and desist letters.

Currently I am waiting for the full investigation to be completed and for my case to be presented to a judge and prosecutors to try and criminally charge my brother. I feel like I am carrying the weight of the world on my shoulders and feel I am carrying a little girl’s story as well and fighting not just for me, but for her too. I have been diagnosed with Complex PTSD and suffer from anxiety.

My journey is to be continued… and I want other survivors to know that you can finally stand up for yourself and make yourself heard. I hope to one day get sponsored and travel and tell my story to other survivors and be an advocate on this very silent horrible epidemic that is occurring.

-Trisha, Survivor

For me, I felt so alone. Maybe I knew other people who had been abused, but I would tell myself that it wasn’t the same. They were better than me, they could talk about it better than I could, they could carry on better than I could. I think at some point I just accepted the fact that it would never be okay for me, but I could push it in the back closet of my mind and lock it away, so it wouldn’t interfere with anyone else’s needs, because everyone but me deserved to be happy, right?

I was filled with shame because I took what I went through and didn’t deal with it. I feel that because I pushed it away that it led me into other abusive relationships. I was in situations that triggered me and I chose to be around people who would abuse me. I carried it around, felt like I was wearing some sort of scarlet letter, but instead it said: “I’M A VICTIM”

I was very unsure of the Saprea Retreat. Was this really going to help me? Maybe it was only for the better “victims.” When preparing to go it started to feel like the world was working against me, timing wasn’t making sense, I was feeling more anxious, and I kept telling myself I was doing so good that I didn’t even need to go to this retreat. Maybe someone else could use my place, someone that would benefit more than I could.

I am so grateful for the chance I had to go! The people there made me feel so important and so loved – something I hadn’t allowed myself to feel.

The retreat educated me on how my brain responds to trauma, how to help reframe my brain so that I can work on my healing journey. It also helped me learn about so many more things, things that I wouldn’t have even thought to try because I wouldn’t have connected them with being a survivor of childhood sexual trauma.

The hardest thing for me was admitting that what had happened to me was affecting me and recognizing that it affected me in many more ways than I wanted to accept. But you know what? I wasn’t alone.

I had other strong survivors surrounding me. I felt so understood and appreciated. I felt strong and powerful. I think the most important thing I learned after going to the retreat was that I have power and control in my life. I came home feeling hopeful, empowered, and strong.

What a change I have already seen in my life in the few short weeks since attending the retreat. I don’t think I could even put to words the gratitude I feel for being given this wonderful experience and all the wonderful tools that this experience helped me discover.

I am not a victim, I am a survivor. I am enough.

-Jessica, Survivor

I was seven when my abuse started, it carried on until I was fourteen. It doesn’t seem that long, but time was immeasurable while it was going on. I remember waking up from a nightmare one night and telling myself ‘If I can survive it while it’s happening, I can survive it when it’s over’ but I was so wrong. It was almost like I had lost all reason to feel the way I did, when it was happening I could point to the people who hurt me and say, ‘That’s the bad thing, that’s what’s causing me pain’ but after things ended I felt like I had no good reason to feel what I did so my guilt and self-blame just expanded.

I ended up talking to someone in my school and her duty of care was to pass it on to the safeguarding officer and eventually the police. I remember having the police turn up at my house in a van, I guess I went into panic mode and exactly what I was trained to do, I denied everything and told the police that I had made the whole thing up. I had my family, the police, the school and the person who I trusted the most to tell, believe that I had lied about it all.

I think that was the hardest thing I ever did, so I decided to tell the truth. Still not sure whether everyone believes me or not, but to be quite honest, that’s not important, what’s important is that things are moving forward. Something that this experience had taught me is that sexual abuse transcends race, religion, and social class, it’s something that can be the breaking or making of you.

-Alice, Survivor

Sexual abuse at such a young age created a seemingly irrevocable crack within me. This damage separated me from myself and left me unable to trust reality. Every area of my life was one thread away from slipping into oblivion. The ramifications of sexual abuse are unfortunately misunderstood by so many in our world. I was 28 when I heard about Saprea Retreat – two decades after my recurring trauma had stopped. In the most graceful way, the team at the Saprea Retreat brought me from a state of sheer inner panic to a place where I am able to start over in a more comfortable, unafraid, and present state of mind.

You are changing lives, you changed mine. Forever grateful. Forever thankful.

-Jean, Survivor

I went to the Saprea Retreat having never really talked about the abuse I went through. I kept it all in and hidden away from the world. I had thought that the abuse had never affected me or that I had “gotten over it.” The first day of the off-site group therapy one of the ladies in my group started talking about shame. Something in my head clicked and let it all out. All the years of pent up anger, sadness, shame, and guilt came roaring out of me like a lion. For the first time, I acknowledged my pain and did not hold back. That was my reckoning moment and I claimed it.

After the retreat, I went home a new person. I had finally acknowledged all parts of myself. I was finally free of all the secrets and lies. I finally knew who I was and where I was going. I was finally a survivor.

-Erica, Survivor

Daydreams, giggles, and chasing butterflies occupied most of my days until the catastrophic event that changed how I participated in life. One day I was little and the next day I was cast into the fires of adverse life experiences. I lived for years under the cloak of invisibility as I kept dark secrets for fear of losing the only thing I had control over my sexual abuse – how others would see me. That was until I bottomed out and landed in the pits of substance abuse fueled by self-loathing, depression, and anger. It wasn’t until I hit the darkest days in chaos that I was able to see the rays of light peeking out from behind the clouds of recovery.

After my spiritual bankruptcy, I found a way of living that targeted my myriad of reasons for consuming copious amounts of alcohol to drown out the voices of shame and regret. For the first time since my abuse started when I was six, I was asking for help and I was willing to do whatever it took to put the shattered pieces of my soul back together. I was desperate for change and to feel better in my own skin. I knew that life had more to offer and because of a wonderful group in recovery and a very knowledgeable trauma counselor who lovingly showed me how to become the woman I had always dreamed of becoming. After a lot of work and patience, I was able to hold my head high, love myself despite my flaws, and teach my daughters that no matter what happens in life there is always a solution if you have an ounce of faith to believe that more is possible.

It has been seven years since I got sober, but each day holds the opportunity for more growth. I found that if I stay connected to my source of love and healing that I can fully submit my recovery talents to helping others find their way through the very darkest of times. It is not always easy and some days my trauma can still throw me off balance, but I am willing to be open to whatever comes my way. The difference between then and now is that I have more faith due to my own life experiences in recovery.

Today, I am a writer, author, and advocate whose only desire is to openly share my truth so that anyone who needs soulful encouragement can find peace in knowing that there is always room for compassion and healing in recovery, but it must begin with you. A new life is yours if you have the courage to raise your hand, reach out and say, “please help me.” There are so many wonderful people who are ready to help you, guide you, and love you until you can learn to honestly love yourself. Trust me! If I can do it, so can you.

-Rebecca, Survivor

After having the opportunity to attend the Saprea Retreat I can now look at my reflection in the mirror.

I know I am not worthless.

I am beautiful.

I am loved.

I still see the disheveled shell that I once was, but there is a fire burning inside of me that is fighting to burst out and be seen.

The one thing that hit home for me more than anything else was having the chance to practice kintsugi. My bowl is a constant reminder that although I was broken, I am more beautiful now than I ever was. I just need to put the pieces back in place.

I no longer let people walk all over me or take advantage of me and I have a husband who has supported me through all that has happened since we met.

I put into practice everything I have learned on a daily basis and as a family we have become stronger because of it.

Thank you to everyone at Saprea for allowing me to experience the help I have needed for so long.

-Siobhan, Survivor

All my life, I thought I needed to explain my abuse to everyone I became close to. I thought they needed to know so they could better understand me. Maybe that was true for a while, but now I realize something: what happened does not define me and who I am today.

I decided to stop being a victim and start being a survivor. A survivor does not need constant sympathy. I choose to live proudly instead of shamefully. There is nothing shameful in the abuse we endured. The shame lies with the abuser, not us.

It was extremely difficult for me to forgive him. For years, I tried and failed until I realized… I am extending the forgiveness to free myself. Forgiveness does not mean you are okay with what happened; it means you choose not to allow it to weigh you down anymore. You are now free to let it go and be the beautiful, proud person you were always meant to be.

-Pammy, Survivor