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Survivorship Quotes

Browse 14 quotes about Survivorship.

Survivorship Quotes

“Even if our survival skills have become impediments we would like to let go of because they have ceased to serve us, we can still love ourselves with them. In appreciation of our survival, we can be awed at how our resources brought us through, even when these resources were things like indifference, a wall of rage, a cold heart…We learn to embrace ourselves as humans with faults and problems.”

HealingSurvivalEmpowermentRageRecoverySurvivorSelf AcceptanceChild Sexual AbuseAbuse SurvivorsSurvivorsHealing InsightsChild Sexual Abuse SurvivorSelf Acceptance QuotesSurvival SkillsSurvivorshipValuing Yourself
Author:Maureen Brady
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“Underlying the attack on psychotherapy, I believe, is a recognition of the potential power of any relationship of witnessing. The consulting room is a privileged space dedicated to memory. Within that space, survivors gain the freedom to know and tell their stories. Even the most private and confidential disclosure of past abuses increases the likelihood of eventual public disclosure. And public disclosure is something that perpetrators are determined to prevent. As in the case of more overtly political crimes, perpetrators will fight tenaciously to ensure that their abuses remain unseen, unacknowledged, and consigned to oblivion. The dialectic of trauma is playing itself out once again. It is worth remembering that this is not the first time in history that those who have listened closely to trauma survivors have been subject to challenge. Nor will it be the last. In the past few years, many clinicians have had to learn to deal with the same tactics of harassment and intimidation that grassroots advocates for women, children and other oppressed groups have long endured. We, the bystanders, have had to look within ourselves to find some small portion of the courage that victims of violence must muster every day. Some attacks have been downright silly; many have been quite ugly. Though frightening, these attacks are an implicit tribute to the power of the healing relationship. They remind us that creating a protected space where survivors can speak their truth is an act of liberation. They remind us that bearing witness, even within the confines of that sanctuary, is an act of solidarity. They remind us also that moral neutrality in the conflict between victim and perpetrator is not an option. Like all other bystanders, therapists are sometimes forced to take sides. Those who stand with the victim will inevitably have to face the perpetrator's unmasked fury. For many of us, there can be no greater honor. p.246 - 247 Judith Lewis Herman, M.D. February, 1997”

FearHealingPowerCourageHonorAbuseBraveryVictimRecoveryTherapySurvivorOppressedPsychotherapySurvivorsAbuse Of PowerVictimsVictimizationTrauma SurvivorsVictim BlamingAbused WomenFalse MemoryAttacksSurvivorship
Book:Trauma and Recovery: The Aftermath of Violence - From Domestic Abuse to Political Terror
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“Political prisoners describe: - extreme physical and emotional torture - distortion of language, truth, meaning and reality - sham killings - begin repeatedly taken to the point of death or threatened with death - being forced to witness abusive acts on others - being forced to make impossible "choices" - boundaries smashed i.e. by the use of forced nakedness, shame, embarrassment - hoaxes, 'set ups', testing and tricks - being forced to hurt others Ritual abuse survivors often describe much the same things.”

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Book:Who Dares Wins
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“In a nutshell, the process they [abusers in a ritual abuse group] use on survivors is designed to: break the will and personality of the person until they become as nothing... with no will of their own...no identity...then they... rebuild the person & shape their will in order to...try and make the person one of them...thus gaining power If abusers hold all the power, becoming one of them can, for some, be the only means of survival. However, this doesn't always work, instead survivors often find ways of regaining their own power and fighting back.”

ReligionFaithSecretHealingCrimeRecoveryTortureSecretsChild AbuseExploitationRapeDissociative Identity DisorderDissociationMind ControlSurvivorsRitual AbuseChildhood AbuseSatanic Ritual AbuseMental Health ProfessionalsSurvivorshipAbuse Sexual AbuseVoluntaryChildabuseChild Pornography
Book:Who Dares Wins
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“Some abusers organise themselves in groups to abuse children and other adults in a more formally ritualised way. Men and women in these groups can be abusers with both sexes involved in all aspects of the abuse. Children are often forced to abuse other children. Pornography and prostitution are sometimes part of the abuse as is the use of drugs, hypnotism and mind control. Some groups use complex rituals to terrify, silence and convince victims of the tremendous power of the abusers. the purpose is to gain and maintain power over the child in order to exploit. Some groups are so highly organised that they also have links internationally through trade in child-pornography, drugs and arms. Some abusers organise themselves around a religion or faith and the teaching and training of the children within this faith, often takes the form of severe and sustained torture and abuse. Whether or not the adults within this type of group believe that what they are doing is, in some way 'right' is immaterial to the child on the receiving end of the 'teachings' and abuse.”

ReligionFaithSecretHealingCrimeRecoveryTortureSecretsChild AbuseExploitationRapeDissociative Identity DisorderDissociationMind ControlSurvivorsRitual AbuseChildhood AbuseSatanic Ritual AbuseMental Health ProfessionalsSurvivorshipAbuse Sexual AbuseVoluntaryChildabuseChild Pornography
Book:Who Dares Wins
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“Those who support such survivors of abuse often find it difficult to hear the reality of those survivors' lives and experience and are often unsupported themselves. Rather than being supported, workers are often ridiculed, castigated or accused of being gullible or of giving the survivor false memories. Many workers work in isolation and a climate of hostility and are unable to talk about the work they do. Yes, despite all the odds, survivors of ritual abuse are beginning to speak out about their experiences, and some people, mainly in voluntary organisations, are beginning to listen to them and support them. [Published 2001]”

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Book:Who Dares Wins
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“Most people doing transformative justice work didn't get into it because we thought it would be a random, fun thing to do. We do it because we're survivors, or the people closest to us are. We care about survivors; we know what it's like to survive brutal shit, often alone. We want to change the world so this stuff never happens again.”

TraumaTransformative JusticeSurvivorship
Book:Beyond Survival: Strategies and Stories from the Transformative Justice Movement
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“One in four girls will experience sexual abuse by the time she is sixteen, and 48 percent of all rapes involve a young woman under the age of eighteen. It’s not surprising then, that in a society where sexual abuse of young women is rampant, many women never share their stories. They remain hidden and invisible.”

AbuseTraumaSexual AbuseRapeRape CultureVictimsTraumatic ExperiencesSurvivors Of AbuseChild RapeChildhood Sexual AbuseSurvivorshipSilent PainSexual Abuse Of A ChildInvisible PeopleRape StatisticsHidden ShameHidden VictimsInvisible Girls
Book:Invisible Girls: The Truth About Sexual Abuse
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