| Through the loving guidance of Susan Maree Jeavons, The Museum of Innocence, Communications Director. |
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| Sacred Circle of Healing |
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My name is Susan Maree Jeavons. Therese Daniels invited me to serve on the advisory board of The Museum of Innocence, and I have accepted that position. I look forward to working with Therese and the other dedicated members, to make this vision a reality.
To the survivors out there, I hope we can get to know each other. I am a poet, writer, mother of eight and grandmother of twenty. I am also an incest survivor, and the former Feature Writer for Child Abuse and Recovery at Suite 101.com. For over 6 years, I provided abuse survivors and their families with articles, poetry, a monthly newsletter, chats and links on every aspect of child abuse. I answered thousands of e-mails and participated in hundreds of discussions. During the course of those years, I met many men and women who had never spoken about what happened to them as children. As they shared their stories, I listened. What I heard, were people who were still afraid, people who still struggled with old demons, people who were desperate for validation, healing and liberation.
Throughout my life, I too struggled to come to terms with my abusive childhood. I even attempted suicide twice. That was over 20 years ago. For many years the past dictated my future. I allowed my pain, resentment, bitterness and rage to consume me, and consequently, missed out on what was important... I had survived. Not only had I survived, but I had discovered a wonderful gift had been given to me ~ the power to write poetry that would not only set me free, but poetry that touched many other people’s lives too. When I began sharing my poetry about child abuse, I had no idea that it would create the response that it did. I started receiving emails from people who said that my poetry said exactly what they had wanted to say, expressed how they had felt, and also the hope that they somehow held onto through it all.
When I was at Suite101, I interviewed many survivors. What I discovered was that we are connected in many ways. Many of us suffer from mental illness, addictions and low self-esteem, but we are also very creative and use our creativity to purge the poison from our souls. When we put the feelings onto paper, into music, or art, we release a lifetime of pain and struggling. In the process, we take back the power to control our own lives and ultimately, our healing.
Whether you share your own story through poetry, prose, art, music or dance, you will find that doing so, is very liberating. As survivors, we must tell our stories, and to do that, we must look beyond the surface into the depths of reality. Although that reality can be ugly and overwhelming at times, if we learn to express our feelings through poetry, art, or music, what was once obscure, can become clear. Sharing our stories can validate our pain, release our anxiety and affirm our transformation from victim to survivor. What once threatened our emotional well being, can work to free us from the past.
On that note, I’d like to share one of my own poems with you.
Breakthrough
I have crossed many bridges,
forged many trails.
I’ve conquered the enemy,
survived many gales.
Though the struggles weren’t easy
and the battles were long,
all the suffering and pain
are the reason I’m strong.
I have new paths to discover,
new people to meet,
and with new understanding,
I know I’ll succeed.
With God as my savior
and faith for a day,
I’ll never look back.
I’m not going that way.
I’ll never look back.
I’m not going that way.
© 1999-2007
Susan Maree Jeavons-All Rights Reserved
Once you have stepped into The Sacred Circle, shared your own story, and listened to others, there is no turning back. You have taken the first step on a long journey to find help, hope and healing.
Susan Maree Jeavons
We aspire to be your source for therapeutic treatment, consultation, support, and research. We are an online treatment resource for severe trauma and sexual abuse.
My Poems at this site:
Pandora’s Box-Prevent Abuse Now-The Secrecy of Child Sexual Abuse
A comprehensive site by Nancy Faulkner, Ph.D.
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| Spring Snow in The Sequoias |
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A Time To Heal by Susan Maree Jeavons
As a survivor and a poet, I find solace and hope in a simple, but beautiful Bible verse. According to this poetic passage, there is a season for everything:
"To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven. A time to be born, and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to pluck up that which is planted, a time to kill and a time to heal, a time to break down and a time to build up, a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance, a time to cast away stones and a time to gather, a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing, a time to get and a time to lose, a time to keep and a time to cast away, a time to rend and a time to sew, a time to keep silent and a time to speak, a time to love and a time to hate, a time of war and a time of peace." Ecclesiastics 3:1-8
Now if only life, and the struggles we face, could be as idyllic. Since for some, the seasons have been cruel, and the suffering long. However, if we listen to those words, each new day can bring hope.
As a child abuse survivor, I wept too long, mourned too deeply, hated too much and kept silent too long. It wasn’t until I chose to love myself enough to speak out, that I began to heal and find some sense of purpose for all my suffering.
Sue Monk Kidd, in her book When The Heart Waits, tell us about an exercise where everyone at a conference was given a sheet of colored construction paper, then asked to tear it into a shape that represented their lives. After they completed that, someone came around and collected the torn away, discarded scraps and placed them in a bowl, then set them upon an altar. Then it dawned on her what was happening. The bowl of scraps was a symbol of their collective wounds, the confetti of scars and torn places we would like to be rid of. She was startled at the realization that it's only when we gather our collective wounds, embrace them and place them on the altar, that we can begin the process of transforming them. She realized then, that pain could be sacred too.
A season for everything, pain and healing. So there is purpose for our pain, even if we can't understand it right now. I believe my pain has taught me compassion, patience, and humility, and that it gave me an inner strength that, although it has been tested a thousand times, sustains me.
Each of us must deal with our pain in our own time, our own season. Mourning the loss of innocence, the loss of our childhood, and healing our deep, emotional scars can be a long, drawn out process. It can even be a fractured process in which there are seasons of sadness, hate, and turmoil scattered in between. seasons of laughter, love and peace.
We have already had our seasons of loss, breaking down, weeping and mourning, our time of war, and our time of silence. Now we must find the courage to move forward, to accept what happened, to celebrate our survival and to begin to find our time of peace. Inner peace, the kind that comes with knowing that we were not to blame, the kind that comes with realizing how strong and courageous we really were.
Some of you may wonder if there will ever be a day that you don’t think of the past, don’t remember the betrayal and the pain you felt deep inside. I believe that there is purpose in remembering. If we do not remember and acknowledge what happened, we can’t begin to heal. When we remember, we can take steps to protect ourselves and others from being abused.
Remembering helps us to set boundaries. When we remember, we validate our experience, our pain, our ability to survive.
I’d like to add a line to those Bible verses, "A time to remember and a time to make new memories." Life is a learning process, one in which our strengths and weaknesses are tested. Survivors who are in the late stages of healing, can be the greatest teachers to those victims who are just beginning to heal. They can offer encouragement and hope, support and love. We are after all, connected by the experiences we share and the desire we have to change things in a world where abuse still exists. Telling our stories, and reaching out to other survivors, is the most important step in making our world, one in which someday, it will be a time to laugh, a time to dance and a time to accept and embrace that which has made us who we are today. Thus I welcome you to The Sacred Circle, where you, as a survivor, can come out of your cocoon of darkness, step into the light, begin to transform your own wounds into wisdom, and like a beautiful butterfly, learn to fly.
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| You can share your story in the "Enter the Sacred Circle of Healing" section! |
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