-
Update on my Sexual Assault
Many, many thanks to all of you who have been so kind to pray for me, reach out with notes and gifts, and just generally remember me as I have spent the past year walking through all of the criminal, civil, and personal (body/soul) issues associated with the sexual assault I experienced returning from one of my women’s events last fall. The criminal investigation has ended and the civil case has settled, so those things are done. And now the real work begins—the heart stuff. Oh, the heart stuff. It is so hard to come back from an assault, but I am trying. And I am getting a lot of help along the…
-
The Civil Lawsuit Related to my Sexual Assault has SETTLED!
Before I turn off my laptop for the day, I wanted to let you know that the civil lawsuit related to my sexual assault has SETTLED (!!). Of course the lawyers are still going back and forth with exact wording in the release documents, but our family simply could not be more grateful to God for his provision of wise and compassionate legal representation, and medical / biblical counseling helps as well. Plus, of course, the faithful, constant, prayerful love of our real friends has really carried us through. We are so grateful! And SO happy that I don’t have to make testimony in open court / survive depositions /…
-
How NOT to Respond to a Friend Who Tells You She Has Been Assaulted
I am always honored to write for the PCA Women’s Blog, enCourage, and this post was hard–but no exception: When Your Friend Is Raped or Beaten We have a strict word count–so this article doesn’t have all of the biblical citations and encouraging quotes that I wanted to share. We also have a very limited length for a title–and this one was hard to do. What I really wanted to call it was: “Oh My Stars! Have You Ever Had Your Friend Tell You Something SO Hard and SO Painful for Her that You Were Momentarily Frozen??!! You know … you want to wrap your arms around her, but you’re not sure physical touch…
-
#MeToo Recent Survivors of Assault? It Gets Better.
Even on a normal day, I am not very active on social media, so “viral” things usually pass right by me, unnoticed. On Mondays, however? I am even LESS likely to notice something “out there” in the land of memes and hashtags, etc. because my Mondays are spent with a classroom full of teenagers discussing the topics that I assume you all know are easily the most favorites for teens: Philosophy of Theology, Epistemology, Worldview, and Apologetics. (If you think I’m kidding about how much teenagers love these topics, you are mistaken. Teenagers are natural philosophers! But back to my goal with this article …) Today I could not help but notice all of the…
-
Turning and Facing the Specifics of My Assault. (A brief primer on trauma recovery and anniversary dates …)
Last Spring, when my trauma counselor first gave me a homework assignment that included me figuring out the exact date of my sexual assault last fall, I instinctively recoiled and said, “No way!” I was in counseling to get over this terrible thing that happened to me. I didn’t want to focus on it. But, of course, my very wise and experienced counselor knew far more than I did about how God has created by our bodies and souls, and specifically how the physiological and emotional responses to trauma often intermix and follow certain patterns. For example, many trauma survivors experience increasing distress around anniversary dates and other exposures to specific numbers tied…
- Child Protection / Abuse in the Church, Hope in Suffering, Surviving a Childhood of Neglect and Abuse, Trauma Recovery
On Being Assaulted
If you have ever read my “Child Protection First / Abuse in the Church” posts, then you know that I have strong convictions about our duties to keep our children as safe as possible. Some of this is based on the sad reality of my childhood (“I Do Not Have One Childhood Memory Apart from P*rnography”). Some of this is based on the fact that when I oversaw all of the Christian conciliation cases and church/organizational conflicts at Peacemaker Ministries, I learned that far, far too many churches are far, far too trusting when it comes to nursery workers and youth volunteers (“Are you still closing your eyes to the real risk of child…
- Avoiding Inadvertent Retraumatization, Child Protection / Abuse in the Church, Surviving a Childhood of Neglect and Abuse, Trauma Recovery
When Your Friend is Raped or Beaten
[A repost from enCourage] The very week that the #MeToo campaign began to dominate my social media relationships, a woman in my community told me that she was being physically hurt by a family member. Of course I immediately did everything I could to help her. But I also remember thinking at the time: Would most women in the church know how to wisely respond to a friend who is being physically and/or sexually assaulted? Having worked as a Christian mediator for over twenty years, and having taught thousands of women at conferences and retreats during that time, I have many examples of responses that make things worse, and of…
-
New ASL (Sign Language)-Interpreted Videos + Some Hard News from Our Family …
Dear friends, Thank you for all of the kind and encouraging words you have shared with me over the years—and for the brave and vulnerable words you shared with me, too. Did you know that I still have every single prayer card that you gave me at your events? Twenty years’ worth! Tens of thousands of cards. Millions of words. So much pain—and so much hope. I cherish each one and I continue to pray for you. Since I met so many of you when I served in the PCA, I feel it is important that I let you know that our family is no longer in the PCA.…
-
Christmas is a Vulnerable Time
Well! Today I left my house for the first time in two weeks. I was finally cleared by my surgeon to start Physical Therapy (yay!) and I am looking very forward to the hard work of rebuilding my strength and mobility. It was such a missing month for me—for all intents and purposes, I pretty much went “deep and dark”/”off the grid” re: contact with the outside world as I a) survived my surgery and the ensuing surgical complications; b) survived the one-year anniversary of my sexual assault; and c) cranked out my RTS (seminary) course that I thought I had until December 30 to finish but NOPE! November 30. Yeah. That was…
-
Church Youth Group: The second most likely place for childhood abuse (!!)
Well. It’s the time again. Let’s talk about where your children are most likely to be sexually abused. Today I read an article from a pediatrician citing church youth group as the second most common place that her patients are sexually abused. (And she sees 1-2 children per week who have been sexually abused!!) This makes me sick. This makes me angry. And this make me long to try to encourage you all, once again, to (please oh please!) stop pretending that children are not at risk in your church. I have been writing on this topic for years. I have been encouraging you, pleading with you, to become better informed by reading excellent, excellent resources…
