“She wanted me to share with you that she is a survivor of the worst crimes someone can commit against a woman,” Lively said in her speech. “I’ve watched her conceal her raw and undeserved shame my entire life, so, as her daughter, being asked to share this today is monumental. If we name it, we change it.”
When do women get to speak their truth?
Blake Lively bravely spoke of the reality of what many, if not most women experience, surviving abuses which many women do not survive mentally, emotionally, physically and spiritually. I have personally experienced the very point she was making, both in my personal and professional working life. She was not wrong.
She spoke at times with her brave mother sitting beside her squeezing her hand, and proud of her daughter who not only spoke of the stark truth of what many women endure but encouraged all women to shine a light on the life altering cruelty of it.
At the brave attempts of women to stand up for themselves, men scoff and ridicule, as if they assume to have the upper hand. When that does not work, complete denial is what women have come to know. Jobs are lost and relationships break in this strangle hold of past power.
It seems as if some men think they are giving a gratuitous hand up into the working world. What kind of work are men thinking of? This is defamation of character.
In my case, I paid a dear price, a total oblation of who and what I am, beginning in my teenage years, and during my metanoia into adulthood. Feeling the pain and injustice of life first-hand has made me be a better holistic health counselor and minister, allowing me the courage and fortitude to reach out in the ministry of my blog, www.lindahourihan.wordpress.com, that has reached more than 125,600 views in all 203 countries, territories, and protectorates worldwide. My blog got to all of the beautiful islands all over the world because of the friends I made on my first cruise.
The price I paid for choosing to get pregnant and married at 16-years old did not happen without gossip, slander, public humiliation, and the stripping of the honors I had earned in my life. Victims often get blamed for the moral failings of others, repeating the fake news scenario of placing blame on all women because Eve supposedly enticed Adam to eat the forbidden fruit bringing death to all humanity.
lindahourihanhhcp.com
This book is part of the trilogy that won the 2024 INTERNATIONAL IMPACT BOOK AWARD. The following excerpts are from this book:
It is hauntingly familiar to every other woman getting advances she did not ask for, like the raping of women by the fallen angels in Genesis 6:1 assumed to be the fault of the woman. This is the reason why some women in various religions still wear head coverings, to hide their beauty, to not tempt the fallen angels nor human men beyond their lack of self-control. Evidently to this warped way of thinking, this also is the fault of the woman, not the man, who is not able to control himself.
Part of the ridicule I experienced happened at more than one incident of my life prior to my certification as a holistic health counselor and practitioner. Everyone in life reaches this point where your life’s mission, dharma, and karma either makes or breaks you.
At fifteen years old, I got my learner’s permit. The first and last time I ever got to drive the family car, was to drive home from the Registry of Motor Vehicles in Milford. Later that night after I got home, my adopted father very inappropriately backed me up against the kitchen sink as I got myself a glass of water to drink.
“If you ever want to drive the car again you need to give me some special lovin’,” he said in his thick southern drawl while pressing himself against me.
“Then I will never drive the car again,” I said.
“No, you won’t,” he added and walked away.
I froze at the sink, grabbing the counter in shock, fear, and simultaneous anger. My knees were shaking. My mother was asleep.
The next day after my father had gone to work, I told my mother exactly what had happened.
“Are you sure you didn’t just misread the situation?” my mother asked.
“No, Mom, there was no question.”
“Ok, I will handle it.”
Handle it she did. She spoke to my father when he got home that day. I was told he denied everything. I was not physically harmed, but I knew I was no longer safe in that house. From that moment on, any time I was in the same room with him, I looked directly into his eyes. We both knew he lied. …
Standing up to men making unfair advances on me was a life lesson that repeated more than once in my life until I learned how to stand up for myself. Soon after my teenage wedding, a male friend of a friend was sitting on the top step to the new apartment we were going to rent. My new husband was at work.
“I will let you walk by me if you give me a kiss,” he said.
Rage instantly ignited me, singeing every single fiber of my being. That man stayed on that step for the entire day. I never went back until the next day when he was gone. …
The next day the male guidance counselor stopped me in the hall before I went into class.
“I know you have the grades to be on the National Honor Society and you have been on the Student Advisory Board meeting with the School Committee bringing student concerns to them, but we will not be able to put you on the National Honor Society because you are married. And you will have to step down from the Student Advisory Board,” he told me.
“But the entire school voted me in to be on the Student Advisory Board and I’ve already met with the school committee about the student body’s concerns,” I protested.
“Yes, but you have to step down now,” I heard him say. My head was beginning to hurt.
“I just stayed up until 2 a.m., after I got home from school and from my job, to make cookies for our class bake sale to prove that I can do it all,” I said. I could not believe what I was hearing.
“None of that matters anymore. We cannot put you on the National Honor Society because we have standards.” …
… The high school algebra teacher, with a hateful glare in her eyes, met me at the door to her room one day shortly after the guidance counselor’s talk with me in the hall.
“You’ll never make it,” she told me in disgust, her nose up in the air, and what seemed like lightning coming from her down-turned eyes as I entered the room. I thought she was just bitter because she was divorced.
I decided that if the school did not believe in me, that I would stop trying to do anything academically also. Until then, I always carried full curriculum college courses, taking extra courses where I could fit them in. I checked what I needed to graduate. I had more credits than I needed. Even though I was an A and B student, I decided to pass the rest of my classes with Cs and take Fs in what I didn’t need. I dropped extra courses like the new data processing course I had been enjoying learning binary code. …
My job at that time after school was in the credit department of a nearby store. I would open accounts for the shoppers who wanted to open lines of store credit and take payments for people who came to the counter to pay their accounts. I also found myself teaching the new male credit department boss about the store’s process for opening accounts and taking payments, and how the front desk of the store’s credit department ran.
I made friends with his wife and spent the year visiting her and their new baby on days when I was not in school. It was nice to have a friend who was also newly married.
One day a new store trainee came to the store. As he and I were leaving one day at the closing of the store, he put his hands on my shoulder and was laughing playfully as he was getting way too close and brushing up against me on the way out, “all in good fun” of course. Flashes of my adopted-father’s unasked for advances raged within me.
The actions of this male trainee bothered me so much all the way home that I mentioned it to my husband. The next day we met with the store manager to file a complaint. That trainee was let go to another store.
I thought I handled the matter professionally, until the Christmas Party, which was held in the credit department in the back of the store. The store manager pulled me to him, hugging me in a huge, tight bear hug I could not get out of, and laughing in front of all who were in attendance. Everyone thought this was such great fun. I was furious but did nothing due to the shock and horror I was feeling. This was my boss’s boss. …
***
How many women have been silent about the atrocities that have occurred to them?
Now is the time to heal. I advise not going into FOG, Fear, Obilgation, and Guilt.
Your past does not define you, no matter what has happened to you. Today is a new beginning. It is time for truth to be told. If you need to get out of harmful situations, here are some organizations, websites, and phone numbers that may help you:
You are born with free will and are meant to live your life in freedom. You are not on this Earth to be under anyone else’s religious, political, physical, and mental/emotional control. It is one thing if you agree to give away your personal power to any other person, club, employment, or group which you think might be good for you.
It is quite another thing to have your personal power threatened and usurped by supposedly well-meaning religious, political, or social groups purposefully hiding information and controlling you by telling you what is best for you, as if you do not know what is good for you without threats to your mind, body, and Spirit.
ESCAPE FROM THESE ABUSERS AS SOON AS HUMANLY POSSIBLE.
The universal hand symbol to let others know that you are in trouble from abuse or abduction is for you to make a fist with the fingers covering the thumb. People who know this symbol are urged to help this victim however humanly possible.
ABUSE HOTLINES:
988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline – 988, call or text, online chat – https://988lifeline.org
The Trevor Project – 866-488-7386, text START to 678678, online chat, www.thetrevorproject.org
Trans Lifeline – 877-565-8860 – https://translifeline.org
Veterans Crisis Line – 988 then Press 1, TTY 711 then 988, text838255, online chat – www.veteranscrisisline.net
National Human Trafficking Hotline – 888-373-7888, text 233733, online chat
Crisis Text Line – text HOME to 741741, online chat, WhatsApp – www.crisistextline.org
National Domestic Violence Hotline – 800-787-3224, text START to 88788, online chat – http://www.thehotline.org
National Organization of Parents of Murdered Children, Inc. – 888-818-POMC – www.pomc.org
National Runaway Safeline – 800-RUNAWAY, www.1800runaway.org, online chat
National Elder Fraud Hotline – 833-FRAUD-11 – www.justice.gov/stopelderfraud
Courage First Athlete Helpline – 888-279-1026 – www.athletehelpline.org
Cyber Civil Rights Initiative Image Abuse Helpline – 844-878-2274 – www.cybercivilrights.org –
Pathways For Change (formerly known as Rape Crisis Center) – 800-870-5905 English – 800-223-5001 Spanish – bworthington@centralmasspfc.org – 588 Main St. Worcester, MA 01608 – AND 285 Nichols Rd, Fitchburg, MA 01420
National Sexual Assault Hotline aka Rape Abuse Incest National Network (RAINN) – 800-656-4673 (HOPE) – http://www.rainn.org
La Linea de Ayuda Nacional de Abuso Sexual – 800-656-HOPE, online chat, www.rainn.org/es
Safe Helpline – 877- 995-5247, online chat – https://safehelpline.org
National Sexual Violence Resource Center – http://www.nsvrc.org
Childhelp National Child Abuse Hotline – 800-422-4453 – http://www.childhelphotline.org
US Department of Health and Human Services – 800-994-9662 – http://www.womenshealth.gov/relationships-and-safety/get-help
Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting Survivor Support – 877-7510880 – https://sahiyo.org/resources/fgc-survivor-support-line.html
Love is respected (dating abuse) – 866-331-9474, text LOVERS to 22522, online chat – https://www.loveisrespect.org
Mothers Against Drunk Driving – 877-MADD-HELP – https://madd.org
StrongHearts Native Helpline – 844-7NATIVE, text, online chat – www.strongheartshelpline.org
INFORMATION AND REFERRALS FOR VICTIMS OF CRIME:
Bureau of Indian Affairs, Indian Country Child Abuse Hotline – 800-633-5155
Federal Trade Commission Identity Theft – www.identitytheft.gov
Federal Trade Commission ReportFraud.gov – www.reportfraudftc.gov
National Center For Missing & Exploited Children – 800-THE-LOST – www. missing kids.org
National Center For School Crisis and Bereavement – 877-536- 2722 – www.schoolcrisiscenter.org
National Crime Victim Bar Association: Finding an Attorney – https://victimbar.org/finding-an-attorney
National Crime Victim Law Institute Victim Resources Database – https://ncvli.org/victim-resources-database
OVC Directory of Crime Victim Services – https://ovc.ojp.gov/directory-crime-victim-services/search
Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration Helpline – 800-662-HELP – TTY 800-487-4889 – www.samhsa.gov/find-help/national-helpline
Tribal Resource Tool – www.tribalresourcetool.org
U.S. Department of Justice Elder Abuse Initiative – www.justice.gov/elderjustice
VictimConnect Resource Center – 855-a-victim, call or text, online chat – www.victimconnect.org
WomensLaw.org Email Hotline – https://hotline.womenslaw.org
God Bless Everyone Everywhere