Addiction, Grief Stories, Grieving Voices Guest, Grieving Voices Podcast, Sexual Trauma |
Brianne Davis | Secrets, Sex & Love Addiction
SHOW NOTES SUMMARY:
Actress, Podcaster, and Author, Brianne Davis shares, for the first time, about the loss of who she once was.
Brianne has come to terms, with the help of therapy and the 12-step program for sex and love addiction, to understand the depths and impact of being sexually abused as a child. And, how that experience, along with early exposure to what she believed love was impacted her well into adulthood.
She would find herself choosing a profession where she could blend into the roles of another person within a script, which was fitting since she was struggling in her own skin.
Follow along Brianne’s journey of awareness to wholeness as went through a 9-month men detox, and later as she wrote her book, Secret Life of a Hollywood Sex & Love Addict: A Novel.
Today, Brianne shares her full and complete heart that no longer looks to the outside world for validation and comfort, through supporting others who wish to share their secrets on her podcast, Secret Life.
Connect with Brianne: Website | Instagram
Resources:
Victoria Volk 00:56
Welcome to grieving voices. Today my guest is Brianne Davis and we are going to be talking about all things addiction. Yeah, not sexy like grief, like we were talking about before we have done but definitely topics that are worthy of discussion. So, thank you so much for being here to share your story.
Brianne Davis 01:22
Oh, thank you for having me. I’m really excited to be on with you today.
Victoria Volk 01:26
You come from Hollywood? So, let’s start there. What brings you to grieving voices to share your story?
Brianne Davis 01:33
Well, when I heard about your podcast, you know, being from Hollywood, it’s all like, you know, fantasy, like everything’s pretty and filtered and sexy and exciting. And then to come and talk about the grief. And I’ve had a lot of grief in my life. And I’ve had a lot of amazing things happen in my life. But the one thing I’ve grieved the most with, specially with my addiction and Hollywood being a sex and love addict, the last 11 years of recovery is the loss and the grief of my old self of my past life. And I haven’t really talked about that. That process of losing who you used to be and becoming a new person with anybody ever before. So that’s why I wanted to come on and speak with you today.
Victoria Volk 02:30
So how would you say that you identified yourself as all those years before versus today?
Brianne Davis 02:37
I think the easiest way to explain it if you don’t understand addiction as I was a shell of a person, that I was never fully home, I think I lost myself very young, at the age of six. When I had molestation and a trauma, I think a part of me disconnected from myself. And then when I hit about 12 years old, it was the first time I cheated on a boyfriend, and like kissed another guy and my entire body, like disconnected from myself. And I almost remember like floating outside of myself and going Oh, that is the best high in the world. It’s the secret. It’s like exciting. And that is what I think the final cut from my core self. So from 12 until 27 I was an active sex and love addict. And I was always playing a role. I was always looking for outside things to fix me and my addiction mainly was people.
Victoria Volk 03:51
Because you didn’t understand how to give yourself the love that you needed, right? I don’t want to put words in your mouth but,
Brianne Davis 03:58
Yeah,
Victoria Volk 03:59
I don’t want to put words in your mouth but,
Brianne Davis 04:01
No, that’s beautifully said. I mean, I think that’s what people don’t understand about this addiction or any addiction really underneath. You know the drugs, the alcohol, the shopping, the eating, the gambling, the sex, whatever it is whatever ism you decide to use, and I believe everyone has a little ism where they don’t want to feel their feelings. But it’s the same thing. It’s fear of abandonment, fear of intimacy, fear of not being enough, no self worth, like low self esteem, no self love. And I didn’t realize now 11 years later in my recovery, that this is the first time in my life that I truly love myself where I can look in the mirror and love who’s looking back at me. But I have to tell you until probably a decade when I got my 10 years, I still miss the old me like there was parts I still miss
Victoria Volk 05:00
I’m gonna say a phrase to you and I want to, I want to get a feeling for I want to see how you feel about it. Trauma is what happens and grief is what’s left.
Brianne Davis 05:09
Totally, totally. I mean, when trauma happens to you, a part of you is taken away. And you are constantly mourning what was taken away from you, without your consent or without, we have no control over this life. And we want to believe that we do and unfortunately, when you realize you have no control, or you’re trying to get it, you’re always reaching for something to control. And that leaves grief because, you know, that is what’s left.
Victoria Volk 05:42
So, what has been the most helpful to you in finding the awareness of where all of that stemming from where the addiction stemmed from?
Brianne Davis 05:53
Well, like it took a really long time, and I’ll just give a little backstory of my process of getting into the program. And going through that because I didn’t know 11 years ago, I just felt, and I say this a lot I just felt like I was broken. And that I didn’t have that gene that could fully be intimate or fully connect to another human being I just thought I was like I was just missing I never wanted to get married I never wanted to have kids. I just kind of wanted to be this Enigma like you never knew what you’re gonna get. And that to me was so enticing and that’s what I really missed that like Miss mystery of myself of the fake self. I like to call it the attic self and the real self so the attic self, there’s this mystery, there’s this untouchable, you can never cry, I have secrets, you can never quite know me. And when I got into the program, I there’s these 40 questions if you think you’re, you know, struggling with addiction, or especially sex and love addiction, you can go online, and there’s these self diagnose question questionnaire and slot and you can fill it out. And I got my number was out of control. It was 38 out of 40. And I walked into the rooms on a Wednesday night and deep in the valley of Los Angeles. And I was with probably like 30 to 40 other people completely different from me. And I was listening to them. And I just started crying. And I didn’t cry because I was sad, I cried because for the first time in my life, I wasn’t broken. And I wasn’t alone in my struggles. And that was the really process of me digging deep and seeing why I did the things I did. And this took eight, nine years of therapy going twice a week. On top of working the steps, the 12 steps which took me almost 10 years, nine years to complete. And really digging my therapist used to tell me you have to dig through this shit, like internally to get to your gold. So whenever I was crying or going through withdrawal, I just kept telling myself you’re digging through this shit to get to your gold. So that process of looking back at the trauma because I didn’t remember the molestation. I’m looking back at you know, not having the tools to see what a healthy relationship is looking back at all the masks I put on to be another person to to be a false me and then putting my career which I become another person looking at like, why did I pick this career, there’s so much rejection. There’s so much abandonment, you’re used pretty much what you look like on the outside your product. And my therapist told me you pick the worst career for your addiction. And so the first year of my sobriety, I didn’t work, I couldn’t walk into a room and be a person when I wasn’t even a person. And I had to go through nine months of terrible withdraw crawling on the floor crying, the grief of shedding that false skin I was wearing my entire life. And that was the worst pain I can I don’t wish it on anyone. And when I got through with it at nine months, I literally woke up nine months and it lifted like this with pain lifted this grief. And I had this one moment before that happened where I sat in my bed and tears were falling down my face and my mouth was open. And it was like a snake of grief was coming up and I couldn’t close my mouth. I was like just bawling. And I looked at the clock and 45 minutes had passed when I finally stopped crying. So after that grieving process and shedding the skin, then I had to learn how to function and this new person and now I have so much peace and serenity, and I don’t look outside of myself to fill me anymore.
Victoria Volk 10:06
So, it does fill you up nowadays.
Brianne Davis 10:10
Well, I mean, doing this being on people’s podcast, having my podcast secret life telling, letting other people tell their secrets, every time I do an interview, the connection between me and another person and being transparent and vulnerable and authentic and not having any secrets has given me so much joy that I I was such if you knew me before I was such a selfish egotistical seeking, it was all about me and what you could do for me, and now being of service and at about other people, especially when they come on my show. That that just literally, I just it’s the best feeling in the whole world. And then my son, of course, I’m I’m married, I’m married to the same man I was with before the program, we’ve just celebrated 16 years together. But he doesn’t fill me here’s what the amazing thing is, he doesn’t fill me he doesn’t give me my self worth. He complements me, we’re partners, he brings out the best in me, he raises me up. And I say this a lot. And some people get angry. And I’ve gotten some messages, especially from husbands. But I say if my husband left me today, I would be okay. I’d be sad, devastated. I would, you know, losing someone you love is devastating. But he doesn’t complete me.
Victoria Volk 11:34
There is so much in that, that I resonate with and relate to. I was molested to as a child, my life kind of, you know, I went stopped relationships and sex and grief recovery. We call them sturms, the short-term energy relieving behaviors and I resorted to alcohol and all these things. And I’m one-year sober last November and so gradually, yes. Congratulations to you as well. I feel like there’s so much similarity stories and here’s the thing, like, you don’t have to be in Hollywood, you can be in rural America, you can everybody puts their pants on the same way.
Brianne Davis 12:16
Yep, we all die. We all die in the ground. We’re all the same. We’re, you know, I agree.
Victoria Volk 12:23
Yeah. And we experience life in its ups and downs. And, you know, the sorrow and the joy. And one thing you said that I want to come back to also is that I tell my husband, and I love that you said that. And I almost knew what you were going to say because I’ve said the same thing to my husband. It’s like, I don’t need you. But I want you. Yeah, that’s the difference. Yeah. So, I love that you brought that up. And, and I feel like if there’s people out there that feel like they need ask yourself, why do you need whatever it is? Why do you need alcohol? Why do you need a relationship or a man or a female in your life, or you know, whatever it is. So, thank you for bringing that up.
Brianne Davis 13:12
Yeah, because you don’t need anybody. Once you start filling yourself with your own love. Like you honestly, this is the work that no one can take away from me. Any job I get person that comes in my life, you know, money, all of that can be stripped away. But I still have this core thing that I will go to the grave with an eye, it’s mine and no one else’s. And that is something I never had before. You know, if you gave me a job, it was everything. If a man was in my life, it was everything. If I got like, nice clothes, it was everything our car, you know, and it’s just this is something you can do for yourself. That’s just for you.
Victoria Volk 14:00
I almost think of it like you’re Mr. Rogers. Except Mr. Rogers, you know, he changed a sweater. It’s like you just put on a different sweater when you’re looking at the outside world to like, Well, what do I want to be today? Or who do I want to be today? And who’s around me? And who’s going to influence which jacket I put on? You know?
Brianne Davis 14:20
Yeah, that makes sense.
Victoria Volk 14:22
So yeah, it’s finding yourself who you were before everything happened?
Brianne Davis 14:28
Yeah.
Victoria Volk 14:29
And that’s the thing with addiction to Would you agree that it’s when people are struggling with addiction, it’s no one really asks, well, what happened to you?
Brianne Davis 14:41
Because I feel like if you do the work, you get to that but most of the time an addict acting out doesn’t even know why they’re doing the things you do. So, the first thing is you have to strip it away. Like for me This is just if you’re listening out there, this is just my experience, you can take it or leave it, throw it out, take it with a grain of salt. But for me, like I had to strip everything away, I got rid of all my guy friends, I wouldn’t talk text or email any man whatsoever. If a waiter walked up to me, I would not make eye contact because I realized I was raping their energy. Even just a stranger, even just a guy, friend, I would use them in some way to get fulfilled, even if nothing romantic was happening. So I really just took away all male attention, everything you could think of and just stripped it down and said, like, I can do that if I do this, I only have to do it once. And then you bring it back in your life after you look at the why after you dig deep and see, why is this pattern keep playing out in my life? Why do I keep doing the same thing over and over again with different people? But the first thing you have to do is get rid of your ism, or you’re never going to figure it out, you’re never going to fully grieve, you’re never going to go through that withdrawal. And I did an interview the other day, where this doctor, I’m not gonna mention names. He was talking about a lot of addicts go and like run triathlons or take up, you know, like hiking or extreme mountain climbing something extreme because you have to when you take something away like an addiction, you have to put something in its place. So you don’t have to fully feel your withdraw. This is what he said. And I was thinking No, dude, you I didn’t argue with him. It wasn’t my show. But I was thinking like, No, you need to go through withdrawal, because you’re just substituting so you have everything, to then see the Y to then grieve the Y, and then get on the other side of it and rebuild yourself.
Victoria Volk 17:00
100% agree, because actually, that’s one of the myths of grief, replace the loss.
Brianne Davis 17:06
Right, you can’t.
Victoria Volk 17:08
Oh, yeah. There’s many, many, many, many, many therapists out there that are not versed in grief, like grief itself, in all the ways that we learn as children and how that influences our behavior as adults. So, let me ask you this, when you were a child, and I know you said you didn’t recall the molestation until much later as an adult, is that correct?
Brianne Davis 17:32
Yeah.
Victoria Volk 17:33
But as a child, how, how was grief was grief something and you said you had a lot of other loss. So how was grief talked about when you were a child? Or was it at all?
Brianne Davis 17:45
No, no, it wasn’t at all. And I talked about it. I have a book coming out. It’s called secret life of a Hollywood sex and love addict. And I really go into the moment I realized the molestation and I all I remember from it was like laying back in leaves. Like, I was fall time and I’m from Georgia, so a lot of leaves and all that. And I remember looking up at the sky, and like just seeing like the leaves fall. And that’s all I can remember from that moment. And when that came out of me, when I realized it was my therapist, I just it was like a guttural reaction. I it was like a beast was coming out of me letting it go. And doing that, I realized how much grief I was holding from my childhood that I never had words to go to. Another secret and I’ve come out with it recently is that I am dyslexic and I have ADHD. And I talked about this moment with my mother when I was four years old, trying to learn the alphabet and doing flashcards. And this, I was looking at her trying to help me and she was bawling her eyes out. And I never understood why I thought something like I was stupid and she was frustrated with me or she didn’t you know, like I don’t as a child if someone’s just crying and not explaining and not saying Mama’s just worried about you Mama’s wanting to help you and I don’t know how, you know, like putting words to it, talking about her grief with you know, the difficulty of helping a child learn which as I have a three year old now I understand it now and doing the work on it. But that was never talked about and that I carried that just until recently until I started writing the book because I my husband was like you need to write you need to write and I’m like, I’m not a writer. I’m dyslexic, like, I have I have ADHD, like I I switch words sometimes and He was like, come on, nope, you don’t have to tell anybody. And the book came out of me. The first draft came out in 45 days. And it was like, and I talked about that moment, and I and I really dig deep. And I realized my Well, my parents didn’t have a great marriage. They never talked about it, you know, they fought a lot. I’m not, they would say these things. And nobody ever talked about why or apologize for fighting in front. So, there was so much grief and loss in my family that nobody ever talked about. And I’ve been carrying it my whole life.
Victoria Volk 20:35
We do, because it’s it’s a photographic emotional memory. And I don’t know if you’ve ever read trauma, the body keeps the score.
Brianne Davis 20:44
I have read bits and pieces of that. Yeah.
Victoria Volk 20:48
It’s a tough read. It’s hard to read.
Brianne Davis 20:49
Yeah
Victoria Volk 20:50
I haven’t gotten through it myself but,
Brianne Davis 20:52
oh my god, there’s so many of those books that you start to read. And they recommend, and you can literally get through a page of it. And then I want to like throw it against the wall.
Victoria Volk 21:01
It’s really difficult to read. First, thank you for sharing all of that. Is that a common and you’re not the first actress that I’ve heard that he was dyslexic and chose to be an actress? Is that something that is common and not really talked about? And that because with acting, you can kind of live? Right?
Brianne Davis 21:24
No, people think that you can bear you can know, any television. Any movies you do cannot live unless it’s specifically like a Judd Apatow movie. They allow adlib certain directors at it. But usually when things are greenlit like, especially television shows and comedies, it’s word for word you have to remember, literally, they’ll stop you and say you forgot they Ayane. So, when I started acting, I didn’t talk about being dyslexic. My team didn’t know I was dyslexic. So, I would get an audition and it would be the next day. And I’d be and it’s just so you guys know, an audition is like nine pages. It’s not just like one or two pages, it’s nine pages. And if you’re dyslexic like me, you usually have to memorize it, because acting like a person looking down at lines and looking back up. It’s really hard for me, so I like to memorize it. So I really, you know, it took a while but I got the muscle where I could pick it up quickly. And then you know, the next day, I’ll forget it. But not many actresses are an actor’s I know Tom Cruise’s. There’s not there’s just like a handful of us. But it’s still very embarrassing. I mean, if you look at my scripts, if there’s certain last names that aren’t normal last names, I have to have someone tell me how to say it. And then I phonetically write it a different way because my brain sees it differently. So on all my scripts and everything, everything is crossed out and, and spelled differently and stuff. And I used to be really embarrassed about it, especially if I’d go and work with a director and he would look at my sides and it looks like a child did it. But I’m to the point now where I’m like, I don’t care. As long as I do my job, then who really cares, but it took a long time to get there for me.
Victoria Volk 23:24
And how, where did the confidence come from within you to even pursue that then?
Brianne Davis 23:31
I came from a mother which she is like no holds bar, workaholic. She’s like almost fearless. She was the breadwinner of the house. So, the the mom I came from, if you can imagine she was like a New York City. ballbuster. And, you know, with all her flaws, one of the things she instilled in me is like determination. So, if someone told me no, I would like find a way to make it a yes. And I think that’s what I got from my mom the willingness to keep going against all odds.
Victoria Volk 24:13
It’s amazing, because look how it transformed your life. But how much? And how much of that though, does it? When you look back then is it does it feel like almost a double-edged sword because did Hollywood kind of perpetuate then this addiction as well?
Brianne Davis 24:32
Yeah, that’s a question I love. I mean, I came to Hollywood with the addiction already. I’m not going to say it. But I will say I think at a very young age, I watched a bunch of movies and things I was too young. My parents like to watch Shakespeare movies, things that were way out of my I shouldn’t watch like my first movie I remember seeing was Romeo and Juliet. And I saw Michael whites by It’s the 1976 or 67, there’s my dyslexia, I can’t remember what year it was filmed. But I saw Michael White’s butt out at like six years old. And I remember thinking, Oh my God, that’s a nice ass like that was my thought. And then the next moment, I remember his thinking, Oh, that’s what true love looks like you meet in two days, and you’re willing, both of you are willing to die for each other, like, somebody’s got to drink poison, somebody’s got to stab themselves for it to mean true love. So I connected true love with death, or someone’s willing to die. And then I SAS. And definitely Hollywood has amplified that. I mean, going and, and shooting shows like six or Lucifer are True Blood, especially if there’s a love scene. When you walk on set, you have to automatically assume the position that that’s my husband, that’s my boyfriend. That’s the person I’m interested in, in the script. And I’m not a method actor. But when I get on set, I transform into the person. And then as soon as they say, cut, I break out of it. And I think for me, doing that, I also wore that. That girl thing where it’s like, I’m one of the boys, I can hang with you guys and talk about inappropriate stuff. And I just let it roll off my back. And I’m a cool chick. And really, underneath, I’m a scared little girl that was taken advantage of as a young age, you know, grew into my looks at, you know, 11 older men started hitting on me, you know, I didn’t on this, this was just genetics, it doesn’t mean anything about me. But when you’re a young girl and going into Hollywood, and then you’re getting that attention, it definitely it can warp your sense of what is right and what is wrong, and what is appropriate. And what’s inappropriate. So, I feel like Hollywood amplified it. But here’s the good thing. I was never in the Hollywood scene, I didn’t go after a man that were rich and powerful, because I wanted to have the power and control, so I didn’t get sucked into the Hollywood world, which I’m really grateful for. But I definitely made a lot of damage in my wake. And I had to make a lot of amends and I’m still making living amends to people.
Victoria Volk 27:29
And I’m, I imagine that a lot of shame, period, a lot of shame.
Brianne Davis 27:34
Yeah, I mean, for a long time, but the beautiful thing about walking through that grief, walking through that pain is then the shame is lifted, because that that’s not who I actually am. That’s something I did and I’m not proud of and I take there’s something about taking ownership of it and say I did wrong. And I promise never to do that again. And actually, walking that path, the shame, like lifts, and I, I it’s not attached to me anymore.
Victoria Volk 28:06
I feel like too, I think shame is something that perpetuates addiction kind of keeps people in addiction.
Brianne Davis 28:14
It’s that shame cycle, man. It’s like a coat, like you said, you just do the action or the drink or whatever, then you put on the shame coat. And then you start all over again, it’s like round a round circle.
Victoria Volk 28:27
Like to how you said, when you’re when you were writing your book, the process of writing your book, it was very obviously it was very therapeutic for you. And a lot of stuff came up and I wrote a book to and that had the same experience. I had the exact same, like, stuff came up that stuff. And I think it’s the power and writing and the power of writing our story. And people can do this at home, you don’t have to write for the intention of writing a book or for anyone else to read. You can just write your story.
Brianne Davis 28:57
Yeah, I mean, journaling is the best thing ever. And I did that I had notebooks and notebooks and notebooks full of those journals. And then I just throw them away because I didn’t want to look at them ever again. But yeah, for writing. I didn’t even know I was writing the book. I took this writing course for a book, and I was doing it as a memoir and it just transformed in this other thing and became you know, a fiction or Roma club fiction. I named her Roxanne after the police song. You know, she’s like, She’s like a model of me. But the beautiful thing is I started having dreams of her experiences and like it took bits and pieces of other people I know, and I made this whole other person that walks her first year of recovery and a lot of my story I would say about 60% 70 60% is my story and the other is like fictional or someone else’s story. And all the characters names are changed. You’ll never know who they are. You’ll never know which stories matter. I know what’s not. But when I was writing chapter five, six and seven I don’t know for you, but those were torture It was about like the why the main character D her main character defects, the one that was like tormenting her all that stuff I don’t know if you wrote about that but every time I had to rewrite chapter five, six and seven I just wanted to throw it over against the wall and give up I was like, oh, it literally felt like this. You know, did that happen for you?
Victoria Volk 30:35
Mine’s more of a memoir.
Brianne Davis 30:37
Oh yeah.
Victoria Volk 30:38
Yeah, I’m more of a nonfiction person but I look forward actually what I would love to read your book.
Brianne Davis 30:44
Oh my god, I would love it. I can send it to you. It comes out February 12 on Amazon Barnes and Nobles everywhere, but mine was a memoir, but I just switched it I felt like I for one I won’t get sued. Because there’s famous people in it and I don’t want anybody to ever know who I’m talking about even though you can try to guess. But yeah, it’s I decided to it’s it’s like a memoir and a self help book because I realized my first year of recovery I had I created these other 10 rules to live by and Roxanne uses those 10 rules and explains Yeah, and I just found myself like when I was writing it I realized every book I read while going through that first year was so educational and it was almost like daunting every time I did step work or read like love attic from pa melody and all these sex addict books and I wanted to write a book where like a normie or someone that’s not an addict can read it be entertained but also get the lessons and understand an addict and a sex and love addict and their their mental addict mind that just you know is out of our control.
Victoria Volk 32:04
I actually have to tell you this to my our when our first daughter was born, I have three kids so no middle ones four and a girl. I wanted to name her Roxanne, my husband said absolutely not. Every time I’d say her name, I think of that fleece song.
Brianne Davis 32:21
Because I could not think of her name. I could not I was like; I don’t know who this character’s name is. And the song came on and I was like, oh higher power. Thank you for giving me her name. And I tried to get the the rights to like write the song lyrics to describe it. And of course, it’s too expensive. So, I just wrote in the book I was like, sorry, it’s too expensive for the lyrics but it’s about you know, being slutty and wearing that dress and prostituting yourself or something like that I write so yeah, I love that your husband’s like no.
Victoria Volk 32:57
And I picture too I don’t even know like in the video but is Roxanne or redhead? Because I picture when I hear Roxanne I think of redhead.
Brianne Davis 33:06
Oh, sorry, all the redheads out there. No, I don’t know I haven’t seen that video. I was just on the radio. So I didn’t see that. I haven’t seen the video in a long time. So, I can’t remember but
Victoria Volk 33:20
but the vision of Roxanne in your book is she described as a redhead?
Brianne Davis 33:23
No, here you want to see the book cover? I just got for
Victoria Volk 33:29
Oh, blonde. Okay, well, it’s fitting. Yeah.
Brianne Davis 33:33
But the thing is, she could be anybody. And that’s what I say. And I say, You know that I could. She could be your mom, your sister, your, your friend, your cousin? like this could be anybody. And yeah, I made her blonde, obviously. Because I’m blonde. But um, yeah, she could be anybody. I mean, honestly, these stories are so universal. I’ve had a lot of people read them and a lot of people in my program and they were like, yep, yep. So I’m really proud of it. And I hope people enjoy it. And I hope they see you know, like, there is a way out of our crazy ness. Even if you’re not a full blown sex and love addict, if you’re in a bad relationship, if you’re with an unavailable person, there is a way out You do not have to be in something that doesn’t make you a good person. And that’s what I say when people walk in the room. If your relationships your friends, your family, your partner, whoever. If people in your life bring drama, and don’t show up for you, then there’s a problem.
Victoria Volk 34:39
Yeah, our environment is a is a reflection of our internal environment and a mirror for us that probably there’s something we need to work on within ourselves. One more I have one more question. So, what has your grief taught you?
Brianne Davis 34:56
Okay, first thing and this took real long-time people, but grief can actually be your best friend. Grief can show you that there are some growing you need to do there some transformation that needs to be taken taken. There’s some loss that needs to be let go of. And I didn’t realize that when shedding my old skin and shedding my old persona, that, yes, I will miss that person. Yes, there was something titillating to life. What is that word? There’s something amazing. Yes, thank you about living that existence. But I had to walk through that grief. And doing that has brought me so much peace and serenity and able to process grief without holding it in how I used to, because holding in grief, and trauma and shame and secrets and all the other things. That’s what causes disease, that’s what causes, you know, you to make bad decisions. And if I didn’t allow myself to feel that pain and that loss, then I would have never learned that and I would be on my deathbed alone, you know, not truly intimate with anybody not truly connected to another soul, and most importantly, not truly connected to myself.
Victoria Volk 36:25
So let me ask you, then. So, your husband, so he came into the picture before you went through the program stuff? So first of all, how did that relationship come about? And then secondly, do you feel like the inner work that you have done? Is what helped? probably helped him grow alongside you? Like, did he start doing his own inner work and things too, because, you know, it’s like, there’s this paradox, right? When we start growing and evolving, sometimes either people that love us and care about us, either they’re gonna come along for the ride, or they’re not. And obviously, your husband did. So how did that? What was that like for you?
Brianne Davis 37:08
Well, the beautiful thing, and I have to say, my higher power God universe picked a man before that was already in a 12-step program. He has been in a he just celebrated 32 years of recovery. So, I picked somebody that understood what addiction was. And I think that’s the blessing of something bigger than me picking him. And I just remember, we had this moment where our mentor died. It was before I went into the program, our mentor died. And I thought I was over the cheating, the intrigue, the flirting when him and I started dating, and because he’s like, the best person I’ve ever met, I loved him as much as I could love somebody. And if we weren’t together, I’d want to be his friends, like I really cared about him. So, when our mentor died, I found myself two days later on location in another city, about to blow up our relationship completely bolt, blow it up. And I remember sitting in my hotel room going, I thought I was done with this, like, something is wrong with me, it can’t be every other guy. It can’t be that the butterflies go away, like something’s really wrong with me. And reaching out to the therapist doing the work, walking into sex and love Addicts Anonymous. And growing that first year of recovery, going through withdrawal for the nine months, starting my step work, turning it over finding a God, all of that my husband, and I didn’t have sex for a year. Oh, he was my boyfriend at the time. But we didn’t have sex for a year. And we both taught a conversation that sounded something like this. Like, if I have to get healthy and it breaks up our relationship, then that was that’s what has to get done. If we don’t work out, that’s what has to get done. And we were both willing to let go of each other, for me to get healthy. And in the process of finding myself grieving and him not being able because we live together him not being able to like comfort me if I’m crying, we had a rule. If I was crying, he could not come and talk to me or comfort me. I had to go through it myself. And I think us honoring those boundaries and understanding that this was bigger than him and I that he and he’d worked his program and I worked my program and luckily, we both grew but grew closer and it’s brought us so much. You know we celebrated our 16 years together our we got married on on our 10 year anniversary and it’s just been I’m just so grateful to have him as a partner.
Victoria Volk 39:58
It’s beautiful. I love that.
Brianne Davis 39:59
Thank you.
Victoria Volk 40:01
Congratulations for all of you go through what you grow through. What’s that quote? I don’t remember what it is. It’s something about how we grow through what? I cannot think of it. Oh my gosh, edit that out.
Brianne Davis 40:18
It’s okay. We can add it.
Victoria Volk 40:20
Yeah, no, I just, it’s a beautiful story of self sacrifice and for the higher good of both people. And I think that when you are confident and secure within yourself, were willing to set your ego aside.
Brianne Davis 40:41
Yeah, definitely.
Victoria Volk 40:44
Yeah. Is there anything else that you would like to share?
Brianne Davis 40:48
Yeah, I just want to say to anybody that’s listening. If you identified with anything I say, and you need help, please reach out to me, you can DM me? on Instagram, I try to answer everybody’s DMS it’s at the Brianne Davis, I can point you in the right direction, I can help you find meetings, that you do not have to do this alone. If you know you’re struggling with another addiction I or grieving a loss or suicide attempts. On my podcast, secret life, we talk about that a lot. There is help out there. And the first thing I always like to say is talk to somebody, talk to somebody you trust, you know, just say, I feel this way, I’m going through this pain because you are not alone. There’s so many people around the world feeling the exact same way. And I think that if we all band together and talk about it, then it takes the stigma away and we start healing and helping ourselves get through that pain, that trauma, that grief, that shame that secrets, whatever. So yeah, I just you know, get help at talk to a therapist, get to a program. There is so much help out there.
Victoria Volk 41:59
And be open to it be open to receiving I think that’s so hard too is when you feel like when you have self worth is issues, it’s really difficult to receive an ask, especially if you’ve been burned before, like you asked for help. And then it’s not the help. That was probably the right thing at the time. I think when when the teacher student is ready, the teacher appears totally agree grief recovery to its we as a society, we grew up learning to grieve alone. And the society does not know how to talk about grief. And, you know, be a heart with yours for people. So that’s why we grief alone.
Brianne Davis 42:36
Yeah, it’s probably too painful sometimes even for me, when you don’t know how to help someone that’s grieving. You then pull back and instead of opening up and leaning into like, I’m here, I don’t know how to help you. But I’m here if you need to talk if you need to be quiet, if you just need to cry, and I think just showing up that way can help so many others.
Victoria Volk 43:02
Absolutely. I think we’ll end on that.
Brianne Davis 43:03
Great.
Victoria Volk 43:04
Thank you so much for being here. I will put all of the things you mentioned in the show notes when you reach out to Brianne and her book and all of that. And remember, when you unleash your heart, you unleash your life. Much love.
Addiction, Grief Stories, Grieving Voices Guest, Grieving Voices Podcast, Mental Health, Sexual Trauma |
Sandi Derby | Child Satanic Sexual Abuse, Meth Addiction, and Miracles
SHOW NOTES SUMMARY:
Sandi Derby, a fellow Advanced Grief Recovery Specialist, and Life Coach, shares her life’s traumatic story that led her to do the work she does today.
As a child, Sandi was sexually abused by her father, followed by sexual, satanic/ritualistic abuse at her uncle’s hands (a pastor) and his friend (also a pastor).
In adulthood, she became a functioning meth addict (by outside appearances) for 3 1/2 years until a pivotal, life-changing moment woke her up, and her transformational journey began.
Sandi didn’t say this, but I think if you listen to her story, you may agree that how she’s been able to turn her life around is a miracle. And, what she did say, was that she heard God speaking to her.
Growing up in an anti-God home to finding faith, God, and a spiritual connection has been the miracle in Sandi’s life.
Life is mysterious, and so is this greater force, whatever you choose to call it: God, Universe, Spirit, etc., that work through us and with us. We are the co-creators of our lives, and Sandi shares what that journey has been like for her.
“Your past is your present until it’s healed.”
Resources:
Connect with Sandi:
Victoria Volk 00:00
Welcome to another episode of grieving voices. I’m so excited for today’s guest Sandi Derby. She has played a big role in my life in my grief recovery, healing, and has been my heart with yours many times. And so I’m very pleased to bring her to the podcast and give her a chance to share her story because as grief recovery specialists, I think every single one of us, our work is based on our story to like we come to this because of our story. And Sandy is an advanced grief recovery specialist and trainer and professional development coach. She’s actually one of the most amazing people at the grief recovery Institute. And I’m so happy you’re here, Sandi, welcome.
Sandi Derby 00:53
Thank you so much. Well, it’s an honor to be here. I mean, I feel like I’ve gotten to see you on your journey. And then here you are bringing this to so many people that need to hear it, and you have an amazing story. So, it’s an honor. Thank you.
Victoria Volk 01:07
Thank you. Thank you. So, what brought you to grief recovery?
Sandi Derby 01:12
Initially, what brought me to grief recovery is you know, had grown up in this home. With a lot of abuse. My story has a lot of abuses. It was physical, verbal, and sexual abuse for the majority of my childhood. And you know, the other ingredient in my home was denial, there was a lot of bad things happening. But then all the adults around me were acting as if everything was fine and kind of keeping up this image. And I had taken that and really gone into my life, put the blinders on and just heaped on a lot more a lot more pain, a lot more brokenness. There was alcohol, there was drugs, I was a meth addict for three and a half years. And then I walked away, you know, I walked away from meth, I wasn’t using meth anymore, but my heart was still broken. And to be quite honest, I would have never thought that I would have been someone that needed grief recovery, because I associated the word grief with death. And so it was because somebody who heard my story said, Oh, my gosh, you need to do grief recovery. And I thought, no grief recovery isn’t going to help me. But they kept insisting that I do it. And so what I did is I went and I got the book, and I was just going to kind of go through it on my own. And they said, either you get in the group, or I’m going to make the call for you, you need to do this. And it was kind of that gentle, assertive push. And so, I did, I went thinking one, I’m too broken for grief recovery, you know, because even though I wasn’t using meth anymore, my life was definitely not present or full, you know, I was anxious, I was depressed, I had a hard time getting up out of bed in the morning, there was just so much pain still inside my heart. And I had by that time I’d been in therapy at for maybe two, two and a half years. And it had been very helpful. But it had not addressed the deep pain that I carried. And I didn’t realize that the things that had happened to me as a child, were actually losses to be grieved, you know, I had lost my innocence. I had lost safety and trust and purity, I’d lost identity and love and connection, all of the building blocks that a child really, really needs at the hands of people that should have protected me and should have, you know, watched over me. And so when I did grief recovery, the whole way through, I kept thinking, no, this isn’t gonna help. I mean, I did it, I did the work, I engaged with the process, but I really didn’t think it would be effective. And it wasn’t until I got to the final exercise toward the end, that it literally felt like boulders just lifted off my shoulders. And I remember looking at the specialist who was leading at the time, and I said, oh my gosh, it worked. And she was like, well, of course it worked. And I was like, you don’t understand. I didn’t think this was going to help me. You know and so Truthfully, I engage I kept engaging with the tools and I went from someone who was very out of the moment I used to describe myself as I watched my life on a movie screen. That’s That’s how you know unpleasant I was. As I continued to use the tools, I became very present very emotionally aware for the first time in my life. So it was really people that understood grief recovery that kind of brought me there but the losses were you know, I mean I it’s not like I haven’t lost people along the way I have had death experiences, but the major losses for me were the abuses and the neglect of my childhood.
Victoria Volk 04:43
It’s just for a backstory for those listening. Sandy was my heart with yours at my certification and who I shared my who helped me lift my boulders and and when I heard Your story when you shared with me because we were partners, I, oh, I, I cried with you. And I just that moment was so powerful for me to be there with you and to have that experience and just like you said, was going in there, like, it’s not going to help me it’s this isn’t like, skeptical, right? I went in skeptical. Yeah. And it is it’s like this, I just I too felt like this instant relief that I’d never experienced. And similarly, when you mentioned watching your life, like on a movie screen, do you feel like with abuse, particularly with child abuse and childhood, there’s almost like this dis association with our bodies, that happens, and that we kind of just like, that creates that movie screen type feeling of our lives?
Sandi Derby 05:52
Absolutely. I think that you know, as a child were so ill equipped, you know, to begin to understand abuse, and the pain and the fear, and the terror, that go with abuse are often such an overload. For a child’s system, heart, mind, soul and body, that the only way to really cope with it is to leave the body, you know, I can’t, I can’t say that I had those thoughts. As a child, I’m going to leave my body. But I it definitely happened, because it was really the only way to survive. You know, and in my story, there were abuses that happened very young. And then there was, you know, rape, like at the hands of my father. But then I had religious abuses happen at the hands of an uncle and a pastor. So I had, you know, it was this over and over and over again, all these different types of abuses that had happened, and there was no one to help me to navigate any of the things that were happening. And so leaving my body was the only way to survive, because leaving my body also meant that I had didn’t have to be connected to the pain and the terror, it also meant I didn’t have to be connected to the memories. But what that produced in my life was that I wasn’t connected to my life. I was never in my skin, because I stayed disassociated. Even the therapy that I did, which again, it was helpful, I’m really big on any of the healing modalities, what it did not address with the emotional pain, the unresolved grief that I was carrying inside, because of everything that was lost. And I think if I had not discovered grief recovery, I would be in a very different place. Because grieving those experiences helped them to not just be this trauma that happened to me, but it helped it to be something that I could actually walk through emotionally and get on the other side and get in my body. You know, and that was I mean, that was a miracle for me. I never imagined that I could experience life present and in my body. But yeah, to your point that dissociation is very key, especially for children.
Victoria Volk 08:08
I think it’s just miraculous that you are sitting where you’re sitting, that we’re having this conversation. I mean, I I one thing I ponder and I think about often is how so many terrible things can happen to some people, and one person may come out of it. And another it just completely puts them in the ground. Like physically, like actually puts them in the ground like they they just can’t take it right. So how did you get from being the meth addict? Then? to like, what was there a defining moment for you that got you to therapy that led to because I think everything in life kind of leads to the next thing? What was the thing that changed for you? At that time?
Sandi Derby 08:55
Yeah, for me, it was, there was a I think a couple of things. I mean, I lived a lot of my life not being aware of what had happened to me, you know, I had taken on this idea, this denial idea. I have a nice family, everything was fine. My dad was just a little bit hard on me. That’s my life. You know, I loved it very much at the surface. But of course, in order to keep all of that pain, and all of those things at bay, and all of the dark thoughts and all the things that would come, it was I really engaged in a lot of risky behaviors, and then that led into to meth and things like that. But a couple of things happened. One is I came into awareness of what had happened to me, I actually, my defining moment was I had an ex-ex boyfriend that tried to kill me. And it was it happened in Hollywood; it was this big thing. And I mean, there were hell helicopters like police, helicopters and police and it was this huge, huge thing. And by then I was already a meth addict. And there became this moment When I asked a question, and I was asking myself this question, like, wait a minute, I’m on drugs, I chose a man who tried to kill me. And I don’t remember a lot of my childhood, something’s wrong. So, there was a defining moment there, like something is wrong. And that that attack Actually, my ex attacking me a few months later, is when I started to connect with some of the memory from my childhood, which I found out later was textbook a lot of times it takes a traumatic event to start to bring those memories to the surface. And that’s what happened. And when it did surface, it wasn’t like this huge shock. It was kind of like, oh, yeah, I’ve always known that. I just haven’t wanted to look at that memory. The other defining moment for me is when I had Child Protective Services called, I had Child Protective Services called on my father, because I was trying to protect my niece. And that was another big moment, it was kind of like that family secret that I had been carrying all that time was out in the open, and I had the help of a therapist, by the way, I was still on meth, when I made that call, and when that happened, and then the investigation ensued. So, once it was out, and once I wasn’t carrying the family secret anymore, that is when I was able to get off of meth. And my story’s a little bit different. I think a lot of people you know, would need to go to rehab and things like that. For me, it was you know, I kind of had a moment with with God and then after that, I was going to bed one night, and you know, I’d given money to my my friend who was my friend who was my drug dealer, and I had given him money, and he hadn’t returned with my drugs and it was like a couple days later, and I got angry and I called and I left a message for him and said, Give me my money back. You know, most drug dealers don’t return money, but that’s I was mad. And that night when I was going to bed, I just had this thought and the thought was, you know what, if he gives me my money back, it’s time to quit. And the next thought was, if he brings me drugs, I’m going to keep going it was not a big epiphany. It was like a little glimmer and the next morning when I woke up, I went down and went down the hallway and there was this envelope under the door and when I opened it, it was cashed so he gave me my money back and so that was the last time I used but the catalyst really for me not using anymore was that I the secret was out I wasn’t carrying it anymore. And so I walked away from meth and and that was a huge moment that was in October of 2005 you know, and when people see me today, they never look at me and think oh, a meth addict you know, I don’t look like I used meth but I was actually a hardcore I was an everyday user for three and a half years. So and that was a big moment and a huge and miraculous It was also a grieving experience because math was how I got through the day math was how I kept the pain at bay. And then you know, my appearance had altered drastically from that, so it was like trying to come out of all of that. In all honesty, though, if I had stopped there, if my journey had stopped there with, I’m not using anymore, I still wouldn’t be here. Because there was so much pain still in my heart. It was a miracle that I wasn’t using, but the use was more symptomatic of the things that were buried inside of me. And so dealing with the things buried inside was the bigger piece. And I will say the for me and I find this with people is that you know we’re taught you know the toy, we’re taught these things in our culture, we’re taught a couple of things we’re taught you’ve gone through a lot of pain. And once once that’s happened, you’re just always going to live this kind of less than life. You’re all you know you’re aware of it and you’re always going to just be in this place of living this life that is subpar. Or the other the other thing is don’t look at that just that’s in the past go be happy because the pain will be too much so just go be happy. And quite honestly, both of those lies because they are lies in our culture are what stopped people from living the life they can live the truth of the matter is is that what makes the difference for somebody coming out of something like that or not, is realizing that you can walk through the pain if you have the right tools if you have the right people if you can you know you have you know that you can find safe community. Like you can walk through the pain you can and once you walk through the pain, there is another side I don’t wake up anxious every day I don’t wake up depressed every day. I’m a normal person I have my you know, I have my ups and downs and you know life experiences like anyone else, but I don’t live a subpar life. I don’t live a life that would look like I have been severely abused because I have been very, very severely abused. As a child. I have seen things that no child should ever see. And I have experienced things that no A child should ever experienced. But that’s really the difference. It’s like when people can step out of those lies, and realize that there is another side, they can do it, they can walk through it, that that makes the difference.
Victoria Volk 15:12
Thank you for sharing all of that. There’s so much hope in this conversation. What are your thoughts on people who might say, I don’t need to dig up the past? It’s not necessary to dig up the past to relive the trauma to relive the experience in our minds or whatever to move on from it. What are your thoughts? When when you hear that because I hear that a lot.
Sandi Derby 15:40
Yeah, so there’s this sign, it’s in my in my lobby, and it says your past is your present until it’s healed. See, the truth of the matter is, is that the things that are unhealed from the past, it’s it’s it becomes pervasive it, it filters into every area of our lives, it affects our relationship with people. It affects our romantic relationships, our friendships, it affects our vocation, it affects our ability to make money. For people that are believers, it deeply affects their relationship with God, it affects your ability to step into purpose and live your purpose. It affects everything. There’s no getting around that. And so what I tell people when they because I hear that a lot, too, what was the point of digging up the past, and it’s like, well, because it’s affecting you every single day, you don’t have to dig it up. Even though I wasn’t looking at my past. It was with me every moment. It was filtering into everything that I did. I couldn’t like you can’t run from yourself. Wherever you go, there you are. We can’t run from who we are, we can’t run run from ourselves. And we’re really not digging anything up. Because it’s really not truly buried. It’s there. And so that’s what I that’s what I share with people, because I find when people get that and they go, right. And then they actually deal with it, it’s like, then it actually becomes the past. You know, I look at my past. And again, it’s it’s very intense. But I can look at my past, I can talk about it freely and openly. And I’m not on the floor. But I will tell you, I still look at my past. And yes, I’m sad for the little girl that went through that. I am not one of those people that looks at my past and goes, Oh, that made me who I am today. I look at it, like no child should ever go through the things that I went through. And I believe that for me and for anybody that sits in front of me. But it truly is the past. For me, it truly is something that doesn’t come into every area of my life. I’m here, I’m present, I’m living on purpose, I’m excited, I’m passionate, I have a lot of joy. I have a lot of amazing things in my life. Because I do believe that recovery is totally possible. Now, it doesn’t mean that I forgotten those things. It doesn’t mean that those things were okay. And it doesn’t mean that there aren’t consequences for the people that did those things. It just means I don’t have to carry those boulders with me anymore. If that makes sense.
Victoria Volk 18:17
I love that. I love that phrase that quote. When you spoke about how religion was used against you, and faith and things. How did you find your way? back to that then? Was it with that awareness of you know, this was put on me? It’s not like how did you come to be curious about that again, and allow it into your life?
Sandi Derby 18:44
Yeah, well, I love that you’re asking that I’m going to answer it from my perspective. And then from some of the people that I’ve worked with, so for me, the the actual home that I was raised in my nuclear family, there wasn’t religion, as a matter of fact, there was it was anti it was, you know, we don’t, we don’t believe in that. We don’t believe in God. Well, I don’t even know if that was even spoken. But I definitely didn’t have that. Now unfortunately for me, my very religious experience was the uncle that abused me. And so this uncle was a pastor, and also had a good friend who was a pastor, they were at the same church, and both of them abused me. And you know it, I don’t mind talking about it, but it went to the satanic level. So, it was a tannic ritual abuse, which was, you know, a step beyond just being sexually abused, which is horrific enough in and of itself, but there were rituals done in the name of God. So, I had, I had a real double-edged sword in the sense that my experience of God and religion was done at the hands of what were supposed to be men of God, who were actually working for Satan and doing horrible, horrible things. So, I had this idea of God number one that he was extremely punitive. And mean and cruel, and not something that I would ever want to be a part of. And so what happened for me is that much later in my meth addiction, I actually had a vision like that came from God, that God gave me a vision. And that vision just helped me to understand that he was that there was a God and that he was real. And that’s what kind of opened the door for me was just this kind of supernatural experience that I had. And then I ended up, I ended up on a plane next to to two pastors in an airplane. And that’s what led me to start going to church. And so, the faith community, for me was extremely beneficial, because it was a lot of love. It was a lot of, you know, happy to see you a lot of like, being this person who was lonely, and not really in a family, because in my story, when I spoke up about the abuse, I was pretty much ostracized by my family, they were like, didn’t happen, we don’t believe you, you know, and so I kind of was really on this lonely, lonely journey. And so having a faith community of people that not only were happy to see me and kind of wrap their arms around me, but believed me and held belief space, for me, was really, really huge. And that started to repair some of the things about God that, you know, obviously, I held in my heart. But the other thing is that I also did, did some work around belief systems and realizing that a lot of my experiences growing up experientially had taught me things, not just about God, but about myself and about others, about my worth, and all of the foundational pieces that should have been so much different, right, I should have been taught this foundation of worse than and, and specialists. And instead, I felt like I was worthless, and garbage and all these kinds of things. And so I actually did work around that to believe something different. All of those things helped me, as well as just having some of my own supernatural experiences, you know, with Jesus and realizing that the abuse that was done to me, like the whole goal of the abuse was to separate me, you know, from from God, it was to separate me from Jesus. And unfortunately, kind of to your point, I work with a lot of people who have, you know, had these types of experiences. There are people they might not have the abuses that I had, maybe they weren’t mechanically ritually abused by somebody claiming to be a Christian, but maybe they were I mean, I’ve definitely worked with that. Or they may be brought been brought up in these very staunch legalistic, hardcore religious systems where the Bible was weaponized against them, you know, the God being punitive was weaponized against them. And those are abuses too. And so, for those people, it’s the same thing, when we can grieve those experiences, and grieve what was lost it a lot of times can open our hearts to the things that will actually help us. And so I find that with the people that I work with, also, and I don’t ever approach anybody that I work with, with this idea of, Okay, we’re gonna go through this so that you can be a faith, you know, so that you can go this route. It’s like, no, no, no, I just want to hear your heart. I just want to be with you and what happened, and I just want to reflect back to you, kind of like, you know, what you and I got to do for each other, and the training and what we get to do for the people we work with, I want to reflect back to you the pain in my eyes. Because I’m, I’m hearing what it is that you experienced. And that’s what I want to do with you. And wherever that person goes with that is up to them. But what I do find is that, religiously, the heart is one of the most neglected and assaulted components of our being. It is assaulted, it is neglected, it is seen as a deceitful thing it is seen as your emotion shouldn’t lead you don’t be emotional, we’re black and white. And people grow up sometimes under so much religious pressure and pain. And then that pain is compounded because they’re taught to just be grateful, and you’re not supposed to feel those things, and you’re not being spiritual, and you’re not believing if you believe those things. And if you have depression, that’s because there’s something wrong with you. And you’re not you’re not seeing God, right? And they’re like under rocks and boulders of all of this stuff. And what I find is, is that when the heart is actually met, and seen and heard, and validated, and gets the opportunity to grieve, that actually a lot of times for people helps them to see that maybe the God that they’ve been taught isn’t really who God is. I have a good friend and one of the things that she talks about is that when she did grief recovery, she said I said saw this other side of God’s heart that wasn’t judgmental, that wasn’t angry, that was compassionate, that had boundless measures of compassion and love. And now you and I both know victory that when we walk people through grief recovery, there’s no religious aspect of grief recovery, we’re not, you know, what we always say to people is we’re not here to impose faith, and we’re not here to interrupt faith, it will do neither. There’s nothing in the process that will interrupt anyone space. And there’s nothing in the process that will impose faith. But what is really beautiful about it, and I’ve never seen anything like it is it brings this soft, understanding, compassionate place to a person’s heart. And because the heart is in religious circles, I’ve seen it as one of the most assaulted places within a person, it’s a really, really beautiful thing when somebody’s heart actually gets heard. And they actually get to realize that the heart is a beautiful thing. And our emotions are beautiful thing. And the pain that we’ve experienced, is that it’s pain, it’s going to be with us until it’s grief. And when they get all of those pieces, that’s what’s helpful. And that’s what was helpful for me too. And that’s what opened my eyes to see that, okay, what happened to me was because people did really evil things, you know, and when I can grieve that I can actually be in my heart and be connected to my heart. And I actually hear God, way more than I ever have. Just because I’m so hard connected. It’s the opposite. Oh, that makes sense.
Victoria Volk 26:37
100% 100% agree, I, I do feel like just doing the work on myself and tapping into my heart and working through all the gunk in there that it’s helped me to really have honestly, like, a spiritual connection to God like more of a wholehearted connection, rather than it being based on any one any religion or faith or whatever it may be. I’m curious what you would say to this question, because I’ve heard this too. You know, sometimes people just aren’t, they’re not ready to go there with grief recovery, or they feel like or they have a very strong faith that can you know, you have a very strong faith. I feel like I’m very connected with God. I don’t need this. Because I have God. I pray. And that’s all I need. Have you have you encountered? What would you say to that?
Sandi Derby 27:40
I mean, I, I hear that often. Yeah, I’ve encountered that many, many times. And, again, I think if somebody has a strong faith, and they’re praying, I think that’s a beautiful thing. I think that’s awesome. I agree. Praying is not grieving. They’re two different things. And so, what I do say to that person is a couple of things. Number one, in the Scriptures, it talks about poor laboring, and it’s this idea that we co labor with Christ, that there’s a part in our sanctification process that we do. And there’s a part that Jesus does. Grief recovery is about helping us it’s about giving us the tools for our side of the street. It’s, it helps us to engage in the coal labor process. It doesn’t take Jesus’s role. He has his role. But we do have a role, our role with God with Jesus, it’s a relational role we are in relationship. We’re co laboring together, we’re being hands and feet. And in our inner process, which is a sanctification process of becoming more like Jesus. There are things that we do, it isn’t that he comes and just takes it off. There are certain things that we do, and grief recovery helps us with our side of the street. Another way to look at it is we were created to grieve, by the way, like we were made by God to be able to grieve we’re born being able to grieve. We’re born grieving. You look at little kids, they’re in the moment it is up and out, and then they’re on to the next thing. They are emotional processing plants. We learn to be emotional storage units, we learn to store things inside and by the way, what people do need to understand is emoting meaning like, well, you know what, Sandy, but that’s not true. Because you know what, there’s times when I’m by myself and I’m praying, and I do cry, or there’s times when I go in my room and I do cry, Oh, there’s times when I’m driving in my car and I do get angry and I do feel feelings and all that kind of stuff. That’s great. But emoting and grieving are two different things. We unlearn grieving. And so another way to look at it is imagine you’re born and you got a little backpack and it’s empty. And then things happen. You might get stolen, you move, a parent dies, or parents get divorced or grandparent dies or you get abused or things happen and guess what, when we’re little we look to the people around us because they’re the ones that They’re supposed to teach us how to grieve. But by then the adults around us have learned to stuff and compartmentalize and not grieve. So what happens for us is that every time one of those things happen, either a rock, a pebble or a boulder goes in our back. You know, john James says, We’re taught how to acquire things, we’re not taught what to do when we lose them. And so over time, we end up with a pretty heavy backpack. It’s full of rocks, and pebbles and boulders. Grief recovery method is the tool so that we can relearn how to get rocks, pebbles, and boulders out of our back, none of the religious practices will get rocks, pebbles, and boulders out of the backpack, because we were created by God to already grieve. And we were created to do that in community, with people grieving has to be done with people, at least one other person. And so because we live in a society where we don’t come together and grieve, we are isolated, and alone in our pain. And in our experiences, we don’t have the communal tools to be able to walk through the grieving process. And remember, grief can happen for multitudes and multitudes of things. And so grief recovery recovery method is specific to getting rocks out of the background. And I will tell you, I’ve, I’ve done lots and lots of trainings, I’ve trained lots of grief recovery specialists, and you know how to training not long ago, and there were people in the training that were, you know, very much believers and Christians, and, you know, prayerful and all those things. And that’s awesome. I mean, great. And they had all the same questions that you were just talking about. And I kept going back to the rocks in the backpack, and there’s a little diagram that I that I draw, her name is Sally, and she’s got dots inside. Don’t make me draw Sally again. And I kept going back to Sally, but I will tell you, because in the training, they walked through the grief recovery method, by the time they were through the method, every single one of them was in shock. I can’t believe how much later I feel. And I can’t believe how much different everybody in this room looks because they look lighter. Because the tools to get the rocks out of the backpack are found in grief recovery method, that’s just the reality are there probably other tools out there, there may be I just haven’t seen any of them yet. And so for somebody who is someone who is prayerful and all those kinds of things, like I said, I, I am too. I am a big prayer person, I believe in all of that stuff. And there’s an inner healing even that Jesus has brought, to me that has been deeply profound. But when it comes to grieving, those things will not get those rocks out. And we have to remember, we’re co laboring, we’re not just sitting back and Jesus or God is just going to do it all. We have to engage in the process. And this process will give you the tools that you need for your side of the street. And like we talked about, when you get that right that gunk out of the heart, what happens is, is that your heart opens up. And now there’s this deeper connection. You know, for people that are below that there’s this deeper connection. And so I find that for a lot of people that’s what happens and they don’t realize, oh wow, with these tools, I actually go deeper in my faith, my prayer life changes and it gets deeper and more profound. So that question I think comes up a lot. I think it’s a valid question to be honest, I think you know, when we’re taught these certain things about about prayer, of course prayer is is amazing and of course it does it moves mountains roof recovery doesn’t interrupt that at all. It’s just it’s a different lane. And if you don’t address that lane, then guess what that lane filters into all the other lanes grief has an unresolved grief has a way of impacting every area including the spiritual area.
Victoria Volk 34:05
Yeah, I’m reminded of a quote I’m not sure how it goes exactly. Maybe this is it but pray and move your feet. Pray and move your feet so it’s about taking action to not just sitting back praying but sitting back and waiting waiting for something to change within you waiting for someone else to you know waiting for him God whatever you believe in to take those boulders and pebbles and rocks out of your backpack for you. No one will do it for you, right?
Sandi Derby 34:40
No, it’s like there’s this one scripture and it says you know, and again you talking about action. It is an action scripture cuz it’s like, Love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength. It’s a quick one people know it off the top of their head. But when you think of that first part Love the Lord your God with all your heart. How Do that. And how do you love with all your heart when your heart is all stopped up with pebbles and rocks and boulders? How do you do that? Bingo, that scripture is calling you to action. It’s not saying God is going to come in and he’s going to, he’s going to get all that stuff out. So and then, you know, move you into loving, it’s no, this is an action that we take, how do you live that out? Well, you need the right tools in order to be able to love wholeheartedly. There’s another scripture that says, hope deferred makes the heart sick. But a longing fulfilled is the tree of life. And it’s just this idea that, you know, when we have deferred hope, when our hearts are all stopped up with stuff, our hearts are sick, well, if your heart is sick, if your heart is holding all of these things, you’ve got to take action. In order to get better, it’s no different than if I have a gash on my arm, I’m going to the doctor, if I break a leg, I’m going to the hospital, I need to take some kind of action, it’s the same with the heart, it’s, I think, for a lot of people a little bit less tangible, because I can see a broken leg or you know, blood gushing out of my arm. Sometimes a broken heart is a little bit harder to see visibly. But when you can think of the analogy of all those rocks and pebbles and boulders in your backpack, that that becomes a bit more tangible. And you go Okay, so I’m carrying this, it’s really heavy. And these tools will lighten the load. And I can actually engage in something that will lighten the load, and it works every time.
Victoria Volk 36:31
You know, speaking to grief that begins in childhood childhood trauma and things like that. Yesterday, I had this awareness that came to me I never really understood why when people say this, it makes just makes my skin crawl, it just irritates me. But when people say that children are resilient, it just always, just as always gotten to me and I could never really articulate why it bothered me so much. Until yesterday, I came across a post for someone talked about being self reliant, and how self reliance like if you want help go look to the end of your own arm. You you know you have you have the power in your own, at the end of your arms in your own hands, to help yourself, right. And it’s about being self reliant. Like self reliance helps us to see that in a self reliant. So, what I thought back to was my childhood and how I, unlike probably you as well, if you have you, you grow up having to be self reliant, you have to be your own hero. And I think that’s different than resiliency, but yet very much the same. And I think someone people would say, well, children, when people say that their children are resilient, they’ll bounce back. It just occurred to me yesterday that the people who are saying this, like is it people who are on able to look at what that child has experienced, or look at that child’s pain, without being able to really empathize. Because I think if you’re looking at a child and what they’re going through, regardless of what it is, that might be hard for them, it’s easy to think, well, you’re resilient, you’ll bounce back, you’re not going to address what it is that child is experiencing, you’re not going to be able to put yourself in that child’s shoes, because you’re seeing it from the lens as an adult, in your experience. And if you have not addressed anything in your own heart, your grief, trauma, anything. How can you see that in the child? How can you empathize with them? You’re going to say, children are resilient, and they bounce back. And it just occurred to me yesterday, why that irritates me so much. Because it’s not about being resilient. It’s about not being given the choice of having to be self reliant. I didn’t have a choice. Yeah, I did not choose that. So the resilience comes from a lot of pain and suffering and having to be self reliant. And I think that’s why they’re so intertwined. And that’s why it just really just grinds my gears. What are your thoughts on that?
Sandi Derby 39:27
Yeah, I couldn’t agree with you more. I think that when people say that, because I work with the adults that have been through the things as a child, number one, I looked like a resilient child. I did, you wouldn’t have known the things that were happening to me I learned to function in spite of all of it. That’s not resiliency that’s coping. And I’ll tell you what, it comes out later. Children will meld into their environments and do what they have to do in order to try to get any little scrap of love that they can get because they’re so dependent on the adults and caregivers. is around them. But it will come out later. number one. Number two, when you teach a child, like you’re saying that idea of resiliency and self reliance, and and I love what you said about you know you didn’t have a choice, you got to figure it out, you’re teaching them to stuff mountains of pain that let me tell you it will affect them in relationships, it’ll affect their health, it’ll affect their well being and their career and all of those different things. And now they have no tools even as an adult, right? Because what we learned as a child is what we carry into adulthood, to be able to connect with people and actually get the things that we need in order to get better, because like I mentioned with grief, you can’t do grief in self reliance, you have to actually be with people who are with you in your heart. And we have all these people that have learned to be self reliant. And guess what, nobody’s healing. You nobody’s healing. And yes, maybe you’re living a life and maybe you’ve gotten your career really far. But guess what, everything else is falling apart. Because all you’ve been able to focus on is your career. Because that’s how you’ve coped. We have so many people walking around today that are in coping, and they’re coping and not living. Being self reliant. That’s what it teaches us to do. It teaches us to cope instead of live. Think about how you and I are on this call right now. And we’re so connected in our hearts are connected. And, you know, we could probably talk for hours, right? Because we’re being with each other. And because we’ve done this work, and we have this heart connection, and it’s really beautiful. And it’s this amazing experience. But how many people go through life and they don’t get to have this. They don’t get to live and be present and connect. They’re coping. And to your point, that’s what we teach children. We teach them to cope, when they’re born knowing how to grieve, and they’re born knowing how to get things out. We teach them to live in coping, and that’s what that does, I was a great cover, I was really great at it. But that did not mean that I was living in that I was present. And that’s for so many people that I know, even if their life looks really good on the outside. We want to be living present people, we need other people, by the way to do that. We need other people in our breathing experience. And I’ll say this, I know we’re almost out of time. But that’s why grief recovery method works a lot. Because it’s not just that you’re getting the tools. It’s that you’re either walking through it with one other person, or we’re in a group setting, breaking into smaller groups. And you’re getting that community validating, compassionate experience that lets your heart come out to heal. Because your heart won’t heal unless it feel safe. And when you teach people to be with and say that kids are resilient and the whole self reliant thing, it’s not healthy. It’s not healthy. It’s not actually how we’re created to live.
Victoria Volk 42:53
Yeah, and I have a whole podcast blog post social post, I’m going all over the place with that message, because it came to me so clear yesterday and hit me like a thunderbolt. And yeah, it’s something I really want to speak to for children. Because hurting children become hurting adults. There’s a lot of hurting inner children out there right now. Especially with COVID, everything mounting up.
Sandi Derby 43:22
And then what they teach other children is also how to be cope.
Victoria Volk 43:28
Yep, that generational learning continue, the loop continues.
Sandi Derby 43:32
Yes, yes, definitely.
Victoria Volk 43:36
I wished we had more time. We do part two, at some day. I would love that.
Sandi Derby 43:46
Yes, absolutely. That’d be great.
Victoria Volk 43:47
To speak to another aspect of grief. I think. I would love that. Where can people find you?
Sandi Derby 43:55
You can go to sandiderby.com, and there’s contact info. Um, there’s all kinds of stuff.
Victoria Volk 44:08
All of Sandi’s amazingness right there for you. Sandi, you hold a special place in my heart, you always will. I’m so glad our paths connected in March 2019. It’s a remarkable journey for me, and I’m so glad to have been able to share it with you. So, thank you for being on this podcast today, and for sharing your story. And remember, when you unleash your heart, you unleash your life. Much love.
Grief Stories, Grieving Voices Guest, Grieving Voices Podcast, Mental Health, Sexual Trauma, Veteran |
Ruthie Bowles | Fight, Flight, & Freeze: Sexual Assault in the Military
SHOW NOTES SUMMARY:
Ruthie Bowles shares her story of being raped not once but twice during her time serving in the U.S. Army full-time. The first assault occurred at the hands of her then-boyfriend. The second time she was assaulted was the very day she came back from deployment.
Surviving a deployment, only to come home and be assaulted in her own private space, along with the previous assault, set Ruthie up for a long road of healing.
Between her first case never being resolved, leaving her to feel defeated and made to feel like a victim all over again, she never gave it a second thought to not report the second assault. Besides, she was higher ranking and, she had already learned, from her first experience, that the process of reporting was painful and yielded zero justice.
Ruthie shares how these experiences impacted her decisions moving forward, how she nearly lost the love of her life, and how her experiences influence how she parents her children.
There is something to learn for everyone in this episode. We discuss:
- Fight, Flight, & Freeze; you never know what you’ll do in a situation until you find yourself in it.
- Shame and sexual assault.
- The revictimization sexual assault victims are often subjected to after reporting – and even by well-meaning friends.
- Red flags in relationships.
- The mind-mess that happens when consent isn’t given.
- Her transition from military to civilian life after these experiences.
- Tips for how she began to heal.
- Things to look out for in friends who may have something they’re afraid to share, specifically a sexual assault.
- Military sexual assault stats.
- Why the phrase “boys are easier to raise than girls” drives her nuts and the one thing many parents of boys are probably missing when it comes to the “sex talk.”
Resources Mentioned/Worth Mentioning:
Need help?
Call 800.656.HOPE (4673) to be connected with a trained staff member from a sexual assault service provider in your area.
Connect with Ruthie:
Victoria Volk 00:00
Thank you for joining me on another episode of grieving voices. Today, my guest is Ruthie Bowles. Welcome, Ruthie, thank you for being here.
Ruthie Bowles 00:11
Thank you, Victoria. I’m really happy to be here.
Victoria Volk 00:15
This is going to be a much-needed conversation around the military. And we’re both, we’re both service members, please share with us a little bit of your background and we’ll go from there.
Ruthie Bowles 00:33
Okay, awesome. Awesome. Awesome. So, yes, I am a veteran, I joined the US Army when I was 18. right out of high school, I traded a scholarship before I traded a scholarship for boot camp, basically, oh. And they got me because they didn’t get me but I was planning on going to school for cultural studies. I hadn’t picked my geographic region or culture of specialty ad just at that moment. But they told me like, hey, if learning languages and stuff is what you’re interested in, we have jobs for that. And I was like, Oh, really? That’s interesting. And they’re like, yeah, and you can get to go to the California language school Defense Language Institute in California, Monterey, beautiful Monterey, and you know, you get paid, you know, and that’s your work for the whole time that you’re there. And I was like, that sounds legit. And I don’t have to waste a bunch of time on useless classes, like more calculus, useless to me. I have yet to use high school calculus. And so yeah, so I joined right out of high school. And so I consider myself a very fortunate, I don’t want to say lucky, because that was my choice to join. But I’m very fortunate millennial in that I do not have any student loans, because I opted to join the military instead, you know, I went to California, I was in school for tech, or I was in Texas for school, and did some training Arizona, some training in Washington, DC, which was fantastic. And then I deployed to Afghanistan. I met my husband in Afghanistan, and we had a long-distance relationship for a while because he came back before I did, and my first duty station was Fort Campbell, Kentucky, and that was where I deployed from came back. I was stationed in Georgia, after that, and then stationed in Texas and ended up getting out because just a week before my husband was actually going to relocate to Maryland for a while for work. And then we were you know, I was planning on requesting a change of station and going there. Since I was coming from a training duty station, they typically give you your next assignment, and I hadn’t been assigned to Maryland yet. A week before he left I found out I was pregnant with our third child. And so I did the math. And I was like, ooh, so I already have two toddlers and then then I have the baby. And then I’d be here for more time by myself. Yeah, no, I’m not. I can’t do that. Like not especially not on a training base in Texas, right? No, neither of us has any family, no support, no nothing. So, um, I was like, Yeah, I can do that. So I separated and I became a stay at home mom for a while, then we decided to stay in Maryland. And we wanted to buy a house. So I went back to work as a federal contractor. The way we were set up in the company, because we were set up by language, I had no options for promotion or anything, really. And so that was incredibly disheartening as like the high achieving person that I am. So then I started to explore alternatives. And I started consulting on the side and marketing of all things, no experience there. But you know, that’s what the military taught me is, hey, you don’t know it. You can learn it. So that’s good. Yeah, yeah. Right. And so so that’s what I did. I learned it. And you know, as I got more results for clients, I got more clients. And then I was pregnant with my fourth child, and I use my maternity leave to quit my job and grow my business, you know, to a full time capacity in that three months, and that was in 2018. And here we are still going strong, full time. You know, things look a little different with Coronavirus and everything. But one of the driving parts in terms of what we’re talking about today, and when you look at that timeline is that when I got out of boot camp, basic training, and I was in California, I experienced my first sexual assault while I was in California on that training base, and it was somebody I was dating, but it was an incredibly unhealthy relationship. And he was very emotionally and mentally manipulative. Really good at gas lighting and you know, all of those things. And then the right after I got home from deployment, so I was a sergeant and At the time, and it was I experienced my second sexual assault, it was the day I got back that night, in my barracks room. And you know, it was completely like I didn’t, I barely knew this person is completely different scenarios, completely different situation. And so those two things, those two occurrences really had a serious impact on me, of course, as I built up to the, you know, going through the ranks and getting promoted, and then even like, on a personal level, my relationships, and then even some of the PTSD, I suffer now, which means some things happened while I was still serving in terms of like the PTSD symptoms that I experienced. But there were some that cropped up later, after I became a civilian, working in on a base where there were a lot of military members. So I know we’ll get into a lot of that stuff. But that is a big overview. I’m married. We live in Maryland, as I said, I’ve got three goats, 12, chickens, 10, ducks, and I have four children, three boys, and my youngest is a girl. So, we just, we’ve got a lot going on over here.
Victoria Volk 06:19
That’s awesome. Let’s go back then in time, to that first experience, because what many people may not think about a sexual assault within a relationship? Is that yes, you can be sexually assaulted in in a relationship? And because no, is no. And so, take us back to that time, and how that changed things for you moving forward.
Ruthie Bowles 06:46
Reflecting on it, I like at the time, like and anytime something horrible, like that happens you, you of course, like wish that it hadn’t, you know, because it’s horrible. But at the same time, as I mentioned, like the relationship was incredibly manipulative. He was my first relationship since I joined the military, I had a long distance like boyfriend from back home, and that didn’t you know, that didn’t pan out, imagine that. And, you know, coming right out of high school and being so young, and he kind of swooped in on the coattails of that emotionally, and was able to take advantage of me. And that that was like there was no alcohol involved. There was it was just I did not want to at that moment. And he did. And people talk about you know, and this and this stuff comes up all the time. And for anybody who’s listening, keep an eye on how you respond in on like Facebook and social media and stuff, because you are showing survivors who maybe are not comfortable sharing their story yet that they definitely can’t be comfortable with you. Because people always say things like, well, why didn’t you fight him? Why didn’t you ask for help? Why didn’t you scream, you said you were in the barracks? And the thing was, is that and thinking back, my brain could not comprehend what was happening to me. Because especially at that age, I think like you’re just so very much wrapped up in bad things happen to other people, and they don’t happen to me. And so, you know, there’s fight and there’s flight, but there’s also freeze. And that’s what happened to me. I just could not process what was happening to me while it was happening. And I just couldn’t believe it. And even while it was happening, there’s just so much shame fighting or running away would mean that other people would know and I definitely I definitely didn’t want that. And so, the big thing about that though, is that if that hadn’t happened, I might not have been able to break up with him when I did. And even right after like, just to give you an idea of how emotionally twisted this relationship was even right after he was acting upset and apologizing and I was comforting him while also trying to simultaneously get him out of my room. But once he was gone It was kind of like this magic spell at least that that part of it kind of evaporated and disappeared and I was like okay, yeah, I can’t I can’t be with him anymore. And he stalked me for months. After that, you know, I’m assuming just like kind of trying to like wait me out. And I hadn’t reported it. I hadn’t told anybody. Because again, it was just there was a lot of shame around it. But my best friend and roommate, we went out to see the Dark Knight movie in theaters while we were in California. And when I got back, we are just Hey, I remember I remember like so clearly are certain parts I remember so clearly. Like I barely remember the movie, but I remember getting back to my barracks room and taking off my purse and hanging it on my chair and my roommate and I talking about how good the movie was. I picked up my phone and it vibrated, and I remember looking at it flipping it because it was one of those slidy phones, I was very fancy slidy phone and looking at it, and seeing how was the movie. And it was from him. And I’m not talking to him at this point, like we’re not communicating. And so either one of his friends told him I was there, or he followed me there or something else like it was, it was just it caused me to freeze and chills and and so that was the I was like, Okay, I’m going to report it because he’s obviously not going to stop and this is getting even more dangerous and more scary. And so yeah, so the next day I reported it to a sergeant at my language school and you know, per the rules because I told and I that was the thing is like, I want this to be an unrestricted report because he shouldn’t be allowed to do this to me. So I made sure to tell somebody who was obligated to run it up as an unrestricted report versus telling somebody who was obligated to keep it restricted. And so I ran through the whole process that day I might have chosen to tell him that Sergeant earlier in the day if I had known that like it was going to kick everything off the way that it did. But you know, I got you know, ended up we have in the military, we’ve got a Sexual Assault Response coordinator, at least that’s what they were called at the time sark’s. And then I was also taken with that person, that woman, I was taken to the Criminal Investigative division, their office, the CIT office. And so he’s taking my statement, this officer, and you know, it’s been months now. And he’s like, okay, we don’t really have any evidence. I was like, Well, what if he confessed? And he’s like, would he do that? And I was like, if I call him right now, I think he would. He was like, well, we can record that. And yeah, and then we would use that. He was like, do you think you can do that? And I was like, he Yeah, yeah, cuz he’s been stalking me. And I don’t want to live like this anymore. And so, I’ve got the SARC person on one side, she was on my left side, on the long side of the table, and then the CIT officer was sitting on the short side of the table. And I put my phone on speakerphone, lay it on the table. He’s got a tape recorder right next to it, because we weren’t super fancy yet. And so, he had a tape recorder right next to it, and he’s on speakerphone. And so, I call him and you know, as like, Hey, I got your text message. And so he was just like, Yeah, I just really wanted to talk to you never respond. And so, I just thought that that would get you to respond. And you know, I’m just really sorry, and I just want to get back together. And I was like, but what you did was horrible. And he was like, I know, and I was He’s like, I know, and I should never have done it. I was like, so you admit it then? I was like, so you admit that you raped me that that day? And he was like, Yeah, he’s like I did. And I’m so sorry. And you know, I got off the phone with him. I wasn’t even really listening anymore after he said, after he confessed, and they went and picked him up. And so it seemed like it was in the bag in terms of closure and being over, you know, this part. And the SARC coordinator, she dropped me off back in my barracks room was telling me about all like, the, you know, they’ve got group therapy options, and, you know, I could do individual therapy. And you know, she would schedule me for medical testing, and all these things. And so she said, she would call me and she had some paperwork for me and everything. I was like, okay, and they and like, and then the CD had gone to pick them up. So they Okay, finally, this is over. And it was not, it was not over. I never heard from the SART coordinator ever again, like she disappeared in terms of how I understood things to be, there was never any group therapy or individual therapy or medical testing, which it turned out that I needed because he had given me chlamydia, which I didn’t find out until months later was picked up by ci D. But then, you know, he was released, like, you know, pending the investigation. And it was a few months later when I was getting ready to do my language testing and things so I could leave the language school. I mean, he did have a restraining order, which is hard on a small base. So yeah, so there was a restraining order, but he was pretty good at being present without breaking it. So I was typically the person who left any place where I saw him.
Victoria Volk 14:14
So he was still stalking you at the time?
Ruthie Bowles 14:18
On the way Yeah, yeah, just you know, kind of staying out of the bounds and things like that. And then when I get closer, it’s time for me to leave the jag. That’s our you know, our military judicial officer system. They came back and had my chain of command call me in and I was like, Oh, great. Somebody is about to tell me the results of the case. Great. No, that’s not what’s happening. They call me back in because ci D had stored my recording, which was basically my only piece of evidence as compelling as it was it was the only piece next to some sort of a track unit or air conditioning unit or whatever, that malfunctioned and destroyed. I tape as well as some other people’s thing. And so jag said they had to take my statement and get in all of its detail. And so I gave it again, not thinking and then, you know, it was just kind of, Okay, I took it. And then I just I just wanted to forget about it again, because I needed to go take this language test so I could graduate and it was actually around that time, because you’re doing processing to get off the base. So part of that is medical. So I did do testing and that was around the time as well that I found out that I had chlamydia. Thankfully, it wasn’t anything, you know, permanent. And I was able to, you know, get rid of it. It wasn’t until I moved on to my next duty station, where the jag office was headquartered for the two bases. It was at the next duty station. I walked past it every day, wondering like, Man, what happened, what happened? And then a few months, I had been in there and I started seeing some of his classmates show up. And I was like, what if I walk past him here? Like, nobody has told me what happened, like with my case. So, one day, I go to the jag office, go up to the appropriate floor, I sign in, and I end up in front of one of the same jag officers who took my second statement after my evidence was destroyed. And she was incredibly uncomfortable. And she was like, so nobody told you what happened with your case. Like somebody was supposed to tell you like, didn’t you get contacted by Sark? I’m like, no, I never heard from her ever again. The day after, like the day I reported that was last time I saw her so can you please just tell me and so she said she was incredibly uncomfortable. And so, she told me that because my evidence was destroyed. And all they had was my statement, the Air Force had opted to give him a letter of reprimand. So that was the other part where it was confusing was that it was a Joint Service incident. And so the Air Force was in charge of determining what his punishment was to be not the army. And so the Air Force decided probably based on the merits of the fact that he was such a great airman. Because he was, at least on the surface, right, he got a letter of reprimand. And so, I left the office feeling just like completely let down like I had wished that I had just let him continue to stalk me until we left because that whole process like because it was a unrestricted report, even while I was still at the language school, like there were people talking about me and all this other stuff. And because he was such a good airman on the outside, and he was very charismatic, had a ton of friends, like so then now all of his friends hate me. It was really bad. And I regretted reporting, for sure. So, when it happened the second time, like I was just like, no, y’all are not doing this to me again. And I’m a sergeant now. And I was assaulted by somebody who was one rank lower than me alcohol involved. And it was the day we got back from deployment, like I was in more danger in my own barracks room, then I was over there, they shot at us. That’s true. But the most damage that happened to me was right when I got back home. And so I definitely didn’t report that I was planning, you know, I was I just re enlisted, I was changing duty stations in a few months again, and I didn’t want to be held up there for this guy who had a lot, a lot of things in common in terms of him as a person, because he looked like a great soldier on the surface, he was engaged to somebody who lived across the hall from me, he was, you know, getting ready for promotion, you know, he looked the part of a good soldier. And I was like, yeah, I’m not going up against that again. So I did not report it. The second time, because of that, like that first experience taught me that nobody was going to help me, and that it was just going to be horrible for me.
Victoria Volk 18:27
Thank you for sharing, first of all, your story on that. And I’m curious too, and maybe the listeners were there warning signs for the first time?
Ruthie Bowles 18:42
I mean, just the whole relationship was bad, like, like he was really good at guilting me into things, and making it seem like any emotional hang ups that I had, were like hurting him. And I’m, I’m an incredibly empathetic person, I qualify as a highly sensitive person. And so I’m just I’m very sensitive to the emotions and what I perceive is the needs of other people. And especially at that age, I was very good at subjugating my own needs in favor of taking care of, you know, whoever I considered my people. Now this is fine. In reciprocal relationships where the other person is willing to do as much for you as you are for them. Whether it’s a romantic relationship or a relationship, like a friend relationship, like my best friend at the time, we’re still best friends, because we had that type of relationship where I would do anything for her, but she would also do anything for me. And that was fine. But when you’re that type of person where you will do anything for someone else and an empathetically, you’re so good at just reading body language and my facial expressions and, and things like that, like you pick up and try to take care of and satisfy whatever even if they haven’t said it, and they can hurt you almost as much as if they had, you know, actually struck a blow with a facial expression, or a shift in body language because you’re so in tune with the people around you. And so the whole relationship was a warning sign because he was that type of person to take advantage. The whole relationship was bad. But the thing is, is it looked great on the surface, like many things, it looked great on surf, you know, we looked like a good couple, we did all the right things, we went to the movies together, and we studied together, we went to go eat, and we like to dance like on the surface, things looked good. And so the only person who would have been privy to the warning signs probably would have been me, but I just I wasn’t aware. And because of the the huge culture shock to joining. And basic training, like you volunteer in the United States, you volunteer, but you’re still ripped away from everything, right? Like all the people, as long as you have a healthy home environment, all of the people who love you and your friends and everything that’s familiar, you’re ripped away and thrown into this thing. And and when I went through basic training, they still screamed in your face. Right, like, I remember crying the first day because like, like I could have been in college, and here I am getting dirty and dusty, and there’s dirt in my eyes, and I’m just crying into the dirt because I can’t do all these pushups that they want me to do, like, the culture shock was still happening even at the language school, it doesn’t wear off because you’re still adjusting. And then of course, having the relationship with the boyfriend back home go bad, coupled with all of those other things, I was just like, a quivering pile of vulnerability in a set of AC use the army combat uniform, at like just waiting for somebody to walk by and take advantage. You know, maybe that’s something that should be more readily considered, at least in terms of training soldiers, you know, probably very much like college students. But with a bit more extreme ness, you know, when compared with the college experience in terms of how you’re, you know, you’re you’re pulled in and how you’re broken down and built back up. I obviously was not built back up in some of the right places. You know, basic training is not necessarily meant to give you you know, emotional resilience and understanding, you know, how those types of things can happen to you in relationships. They don’t put those up on the quarterly slideshows.
Victoria Volk 22:35
Well, one thing too, the military doesn’t take into consideration. And I’ve spoken about this before on in other podcasts and things like that, but that they never really do a screening of what’s happened to you, what have you gone through in your life? What are your aces, you know, in, you know, your adverse childhood experiences? Because the more aces you have, the more susceptible you are, to having addiction issues, you’re more vulnerable to somebody to take advantage of you. When you haven’t processed any childhood trauma or anything like that. That’s one thing I wish that they would do for people who want to enlist in the military. So, thank you for bringing that point up. I think it’s very important. And for parents who are listening, and their kid wants to join the military take into consideration it isn’t for everybody. Would you agree? Like it’s not for everybody.
Ruthie Bowles 23:35
It’s not and then even just on the surface, when you look at the number of people who you know, would fail out, or what we would say whether they would recycle, they’d have to do it again, those are all those are all indicators. And just to be clear, I loved being a soldier. I loved it. And part of what I felt like my mission as a soldier was was to improve things so those types of things, at least happened less or stopped happening all together, I had decided that I was gonna I was going to retire I was going to be like that crunchy old Sergeant that people just didn’t understand why this person doesn’t just get out. I wanted to be that person because I wanted to be in long enough to incite real change and to help people and to try and affect some culture change. So for people who want to join or parents who have children who want to join I like I had the person I am right now I would not be without my experience. And my military experience overall was positive. It was like I like I said, if I if I hadn’t felt like I had to get out when I was pregnant with my third child, I would still be in but maybe instead I would be okay now. You know, Ruby’s Master Sergeant. bowls are something you know, I wanted to be a Command Sergeant Major. And I wanted to make serious changes within what we call the sexual harassment, Assault Response Program sharp, I wanted to be involved in making serious changes there. So just just to be clear, I do love the person that I am right now. And I again looking back like I can’t. Now I can’t say I wish those things hadn’t happened, because I’ve learned that I was strong enough to bear it. And now I’m in a position where I can talk with people like you openly about it, and hopefully, give some encouragement and energy and hope to people who aren’t yet at a point where they feel comfortable sharing when something like this happens, you feel incredibly alone, and there’s so much shame that you bear that is not your own. And that is the position I’m in now is that I can share. At a minimum, I can share and hope that somebody will hear it, who needs to hear it and gives them something, whatever they need whatever they can extract from my story, I hope that they extract it, and they can take what they need from it. And so that is the position I’m in now. And I’m just grateful that I was a strong enough person to be able to bear it and then move forward,
Victoria Volk 26:15
I would agree to like it, if it wouldn’t have been for my military experience, I wouldn’t be the person I am today, it was a very positive experience for me as well. I’m just saying for someone who’s gone through, you know, sexual trauma or things like that broken homes, for a lot of people, it’s a way out to join the military, because it’s a way out there escaping something. And so in those instances, and then you go on, you deploy and some people deploy time after time after time, and that’s where the mental health crisis within the military is what it is today. So all of it plays a factor and things that need to change and be addressed. And I think they’re, I think there’s strides being taken and doing so far. There was actually an episode of ABC 2020. I just watched this last weekend. I DVR it, DVR a lot of crime shows anyway, but it was about Vanessa again. And she was a I believe a private first class for a promotion, who had been being sexually harassed by a fellow soldier who was higher ranking than her I think a sergeant at the time and ended up being ultimately murdered by him because she was going to report it. And towards the end of the episode representative Jackie’s spire spear, I’m not sure how you say it. She’s the US House of Representatives in California, she had said, and I want to share the statistic because I think it’s important. She said that 20,000 service members are sexually assaulted every year, only 5000 of them will report it. And of the 5000 only 500 will go to a court martial. And only 250 of those 500 will actually be convicted. And she said what does that tell anyone who has been sexually assaulted? don’t report because you will not receive justice. And I think this is very similar. I mean, this story. And this was at Fort Hood, which has this story really opened a can of worms on it is happening at Fort Hood. There’s a huge internal and external investigation going on right now. But I think though that story is one of millions. And it’s not just the military, it’s just in general, I think in sexual assault, you don’t report because you’re scared because you’re intimidated by your offender or feel shame.
Ruthie Bowles 28:40
And her numbers in terms of who it’s happening to, like I would even question those, right? Because you can’t like we in the military, we’ve got the restricted and unrestricted reports. Right. But then you also have people who don’t report at all, right? Like my second, my second one was not counted. Why? Because I did not report it at all. And I lived in a military barracks, our floor was male and female, half the floor was female. So he just walked down the hallway, you know, um, and that’s just it is it is, what it is, at least in terms of how things were set up, and how vulnerable you know, a position we were in, but you can’t count people who don’t report, not necessarily so even that 20,000 like that’s an estimate. That’s an error, for sure. And I’m willing to bet that it’s worse because, you know, alcohol, you know, abuse and such runs rampant, especially when you look at the bases who deployed time and time again, that the base that I was on, where I deployed from they they were like 12 months on 12 months off. So they deployed pretty much every other year, and then they just plugged you back in. They’re like yeah, okay, you’re back now. Don’t crash your car, or that new motorcycle you just bought, which happens all the time.
Victoria Volk 29:52
Well, and you’re so young, right? Like you said, 18 like you don’t know yourself when you’re 18 I think some people we don’t I like, I don’t even think I really knew myself until oh, gosh, 35?
Ruthie Bowles 30:04
Yeah, I’m learning new things about me. It’s wonderful.
Victoria Volk 30:10
Yeah, so I think it’s just like, how can you possibly, it is there’s so much responsibility. First of all, I think that we have when we’re in the military when you wear the uniform, and there’s a different culture there for sure. Yeah. Um, how has this impacted you? Do you feel as a parent?
Ruthie Bowles 30:34
So, this, uh, my experiences, to be honest, any time and I mean, it’s not that anybody has a way of knowing that anytime somebody says that it’s easier to raise boys than it is to raise girls. Anytime somebody says that. I like whether I see it on Facebook, somebody says it out loud. I always reflect on my experiences. I don’t want to say that it’s like a trigger. Exactly. Because I don’t, at least not anymore. emotionally. I don’t like spiral necessarily. But I do. I am bit more vocal about it now. But I was a girl, right young woman who was sexually assaulted twice, I was sexually assaulted by two young men. I have three boys. And it was like, oh, you finally got your girl, you’re gonna have to watch out for her. And it’s like, that’s true. Like, you know, people talk about girls, you know, getting pregnant, but they get pregnant because they have sex with boys. You know? And it’s like, oh, if your girl goes out like what if something happens to her. More than likely if something happens to her and it’s of a sexual nature, it’s going to be by a boy. Boys are not easier to raise than girls. As much as I don’t want my daughter to go out and have something bad happened to her, I do not want my son’s to go out and be the bad thing that happens to somebody else’s daughter and so that is something that I always think about any time that comes up like Oh your boy mom, or at least when I was just just a boy mom, it was so easy. I always think of that and anybody who has sons like I think that should be a concern. You have to have those conversations with your children no matter their gender, or what they identify as because if it’s not openly stated, then they’re not going to know their options. Right? Like if something happens at a high school party or college or something and nothing was ever openly stated like hey, if this happens to you, this is what we’re going to go do and you know, we’ll talk about options after that but we at least want to make sure you go to the doctor and you know here are some warning signs that maybe somebody is following you or or anything like or talk to like so in my case it would be talking to for sure to my son’s and make sure like, Hey, don’t let peer pressure allow you to take advantage of somebody like that’s not okay, in fact, I better see you keep your friends from trying to take advantage of that person as well. Like it’s talking about the entire scenario, not just as if they have the potential for being a victim but also if they have the potential for being a perpetrator and what that looks like because as a culture, you know a dude and I’m you know, I’m using this as a stereotypical setup, because anybody can be sexually assaulted. But especially in the military, a dude, you know, hooking up with a girl who’s had too much to drink. That’s a high five moment, right?
Victoria Volk 33:20
College too, especially, right?
Ruthie Bowles 33:23
Yeah, notch on the bedpost, good for you, you got game, you know, ladies, man, that’s what that is. That’s how they see it. That’s how they’re taught to see it, it’s a display of their masculinity, when Instead, it should be viewed as, hey, you’re a perpetrator, you’re taking advantage of this person. That’s how they need to be taught. And so that is what I feel is my responsibility as a parent is to do that for my children not to talk to them, just as if they only have the potential to be victims. We’re human, there’s a duality in us for great good or for great evil and it’s my job. As a parent I feel to prepare my children for either to prepare them for the the fact that they may be in a position one day where no, they weren’t like following, you know, maybe some stranger from a bar or something. Maybe this is somebody that they go to class with or work with. So no, you weren’t like stalking them down the street and hiding in the shadows. But that is not what the vast majority of sexual assault perpetrators look like. They don’t look like somebody creeping in the shadows, they look like someone you know. Now we have to be more open and talking about that, especially as individuals in terms we have the power to either, you know, be somebody who’s standing steps up for people who are in a vulnerable position, or somebody who takes advantage of people in those vulnerable positions. So as a parent, it’s something I think about a lot, especially as I look at my kids and my oldest one is nine and my youngest one, she’s two and a half. And it’s something I think about a lot because I want to share my experiences with them not in such a way that it like scars them necessarily, but I often hold myself up as Hey, this could happen. And if you learn something from my story whether you know me or you’re my child and it’s intimate or, or you’re my brother or my sister because I have five siblings, whether whoever you are, if you take something from the story, then great. And that’s why I try so hard to openly share it. So even with my kids, it’s being very open about okay. She said she’d like so Evelyn, that’s my daughter. Sometimes she doesn’t want a hug. And the boys get sad. They’re like, Oh, I’m sad that she was 100 mins like, Okay, well give her a few minutes, you know, maybe you can ask her again. But she said no, right now. So you need to leave it alone. He’s like, Yeah, she gave me a hug a few minutes ago. I was okay, but she doesn’t want to give you a hug right now. So you need to leave her alone. And then like, usually, like 30 seconds later, I was like, Huh, you know, but you can’t force her. And it’s even to the same among the boys. Even when they’re playing. It’s like okay, well, you know, Cameron says he doesn’t want to play anymore right now. You can’t just keep roughhousing with him and he doesn’t want to play anymore. He said not to touch him anymore. But we were just playing. I don’t care. He said he doesn’t want play anymore.
Victoria Volk 36:00
No, is no.
Ruthie Bowles 36:01
No is no.
Victoria Volk 36:02
And if we don’t I absolutely I love that this came up because when you don’t instill that in your child when they’re young that knows no, and when I say no, it deserves to be respected.
Ruthie Bowles 36:15
Yeah.
Victoria Volk 36:16
That someone will stick up for me if someone isn’t listening, right? Well, he might advocate for me How do you ever learn to say no when you’re 16, 24, 35 whatever it is, right?
Ruthie Bowles 36:29
Whatever age, yeah. And that’s the big thing. And yeah, we just we have to make okay getting that consent like that is we need to make getting consent attractive.
Victoria Volk 36:40
Yep. I agree.
Ruthie Bowles 36:41
We’ll like having those types of discussions like and it’s all I think it’s probably a larger conversation, but it’s all shrouded in the general sense of shame we have regarding animals anything of a sexual nature right so if the very act itself even when it’s among consenting adults is shrouded in even a layer of shame. How like anything that comes after that just has additional shame. Like even and even for myself you know being you know in a relationship I’m married my experiences made it really hard to talk about you know, certain things you know, whatever it was that I was you know, interested in things that I like things that I didn’t like it made it hard to, to even even on the emotional side of the relationship to be comfortable with any type of confrontation, any type of confrontation, because if I like then I after the first time I went through this phase where it was like well if I don’t say no, then you can’t take it from me. Right whatever it is. If I don’t say no, you’re not taking it from me. But I mean if I if I give my consent 100% of the time even if I technically don’t want to I mean that that was an internal battle that I had to learn how to fight because I was mostly on my own but yeah, we have to make getting consent and having those types of conversations and incredibly attractive thing and as my kids get older it’ll be something that we talk about because you know just because you know our sexual activities are you know, private. I want to try and be as clear as possible in terms of the fact that it should not have any shame attached to it like we like we all go to the bathroom Yes, we shut the door, but is what you’re doing in there shameful. No, but we shut the door. And I just I want that to be a more clear distinction like just because I’m shutting the door doesn’t mean that it should be I should be embarrassed. And that’s something else I’m hoping to teach my kids as we have you know, those types of conversations around you know, anything related to sex.
Victoria Volk 38:43
I love that analogy. Thank you for sharing that.
Ruthie Bowles 38:45
You’re welcome.
Victoria Volk 38:46
And my son is 15 and then I have a 14 year old and almost 12 year old so yeah, I’m starting to navigate the teen years and I just remember how hard it is you know you just you start to remember and think back to when you’re a teenager and just how difficult those waters are to navigate and and again to like with my son it’s it’s showing him no this is not how you talk about girls. This is not how you refer to other two females or things like that, you know, having that conversation of of just respect. How do you show respect? Like what does respect look like towards the opposite sex and yeah, I think that’s huge too. I mean, it really comes down to respect.
Ruthie Bowles 39:37
Yeah, for sure. And just kind of normalizing it you know, and being very clear so you know, I mean, we’re careful even about like what the kids watch like if we’re not around and stuff like that, because there’s a lot that slid in under the radar. I realized now in terms of you know what I saw on TV or heard on the radio when I was growing up a lot slid under the radar. A lot And you know, so we have to, we have to keep an eye on that. I mean in nothing, no system, no person is perfect. We can’t it’s not this not about trying to keep them in a bubble necessarily, but my biggest thing is that if something happens, I want my kids to feel as if they can come back to me, if they’re in a situation, I want them to have heard me say how important consent is so many times that they can’t help but think about it in any situation that they’re in where it comes up. And, you know, and that’s, that’s, you know, that’s what I feel like I can be for my family, for my friends from my network is just, you know, oh, I don’t know anybody that this has happened to, it’s like, well, no, no, you know, me, you know, me and I can tell you with 1,000% certainty is mathematically improbable or impossible is that is that, you know, people, they’re just not comfortable sharing with you, but you know, them, and they are probably way closer than you think they are. They are probably way closer than you think they are. They could be your aunts; they could be your mom. It could be your dad or your grandparents your uncle’s like, it could be anybody. But because of that shame, they haven’t shared with you. And, and symptoms of what we go through pop up so far after. That was something I did want to say because I was so surprised when it came up. But when I became a federal contractor, I started experiencing anxiety any time I was alone with a service member, who was a man or identified as a man, who was, you know, had a man appearance, and they were in uniform, I started experiencing severe anxiety, if I ended up alone with them. And you’re thinking like, well, how would you end up alone with them, the place I used to work has a ton of elevators. And you might be surprised or not at the number of times, you would end up in an elevator with just two people, especially when you know traffic isn’t high. And if it wasn’t if it wasn’t just me and one other person who was me and like, you know, if it was like two soldiers or Airmen in the sailor or something, and they were in the elevator, I would have to get off the elevator. I could not stay in the elevator with them. Now it was fine for service members that I’d gotten to know that were maybe like that I worked with every day, I did not experience that anxiety with them. But I still felt a low-grade anxiety, you know, in terms of like being alone with them. But I think it happened because I no longer had what I considered my shield, which was my uniform with my name and rank on it. Because I was a staff sergeant when I got out, and I had cultivated this persona that was pretty rough shot and you know, would completely like snap on you before asking questions like don’t mess with her, she will kick in your teeth type of personality. And I cultivated on purpose because you don’t mess with the person who you think is gonna kick you in the face. No, wait, I cultivated that personality on purpose and my uniform. And I didn’t realize how much how much I had used my uniform as a shield. But I did. And so when I went back to working in an environment with servicemembers, and I was in civilian clothes, I felt like and I often feel this way about my civilian clothes, particularly if I’m on when when we went to events if I was on my way home from an evening event, and I was in the dark when I was at work and you know, ended up in those situations. My civilian clothes felt like a trap. They felt like some sort of flag that said I was prey. And that’s something I’ve had to wrestle with, especially now as an entrepreneur and I would attend events in the evening, I would ask, you know, people to walk me to my car, because I was like I’m wearing a dress right now, which seemed like a really good idea. But now it just feels like it’s like hey, come get me. Here I am. And it saddens me to hear that but that is a new development as my life has changed. And my experience color my experiences color my perception of of, you know, my day to day, because I never used to feel that way when I was dressed in civilian clothes when I was a service member. But now that I civilian clothes, or what I wear all the time, that is something that I you know, I started going through and so being an entrepreneur now I don’t really have to worry about running into service members. But that is something I reflect on as in my time as a federal contractor like I being in an elevator with a service member was something I could not tolerate if I did not know them. And there were two parts of me one side of my brain is like that’s pretty horrible, that there’s a part of you that just assumes that this person could attack you. There’s like That’s true, but I also didn’t think the two people who actually did attack me would know, so I just get off the elevator. And I, I’m not sure how else things will pop up. But, you know, I’m actually going through the process right now of filing a VA claim. So, we will see in terms of how they’re able to evaluate my PTSD and anxiety and things, what will come from that. And because this is a newer experience for me, I’ve never gone through the VA claims process before. I am not as positive like I’m not experiencing as much positive energy regarding it. Because with this specific occurrence, and the subsequent things that have happened, since I’ve been taught over and over that the system is not to be relied on the system is not to be trusted. And so while I want this to work out, I want the VA to look at me. And I guess that’s the problem is I want the VA to look at me and acknowledge you went through these things. And they were horrible, and you’re suffering as a result of these things. And so we will be able to, you know, give you these benefits, whatever they are. The fear, of course, is that it’ll be just like, what happened to 19 year old me? And it will be, yeah, no, that’s not bad enough.
Victoria Volk 46:19
Like a victimization again?
Ruthie Bowles 46:21
Right. Like or did that even happen? Like did it happen the way that you remember it. Because this this here? This doesn’t sound very bad at all.
Victoria Volk 46:29
Well, look how much time has passed?
Ruthie Bowles 46:32
Yeah, yeah, like I got out in 2015. So it’s like, well, why didn’t you file then? Even though there’s no statute of limitations on when you can file your VA claim? FYI. So yeah, so it’s just so we’ll see what happens. But my my fear now is that of course, the the process will dig deep into my case, my reported case, at least, and come up with nothing, right? Like, I never saw the SARC person again, I never heard from CIT. There was a letter of reprimand, which probably got lost somewhere, I am afraid that they will have nothing to find.
Victoria Volk 47:05
I thought of a question. And I actually thought of it too, as I watched that ABC special but being in the military, I don’t even know the answer to this. Maybe you do. But what would have stopped you from reporting him as like on the civilian side? Like, could you it not have been? Like, is there something to it that the military is almost like its own institution in that way, when it comes to criminal acts? Like why is it that you couldn’t have reported the first incident to your local police department versus going through the military chain?
Ruthie Bowles 47:43
I think the military ends up with jurisdiction, I think, at least that’s the way it’s kind of always that I’ve always understood it. And that could be accidental or purposeful, misunderstanding that was, you know, cultivated during my time in, but it’s my understanding, because we have our own, technically, we have our own, you know, law type structure, that unless you go out and do something like, like a soldier who’s out there, you know, drinking and driving, yeah, they’re getting arrested. They’re getting arrested. And I mean, it’s incredibly likely, though, that if a chain of command is like, hey, police department, we’re actually going to give them to the MPs. And I know that most civilians feel like our military, police, and structure and our law and stuff is actually more harsh than there. So, they probably happily hand them over. But you know, if you’re out on the town, and you’re speeding, you will get a regular person ticket, you know, but if you’re on base, you will get a ticket from the police on base. So I think that if what I had gone through had been perpetrated by civilians that probably would have exclusive like that would have immediately been under the civilian police, because yes, I’m a soldier, but the perpetrator, right is, and then vice versa, if the perpetrator is military, and the victim, the survivor is civilian, then that again, that again, probably becomes a question of jurisdiction. But the civilian police would certainly be involved, whether they work things out, you know, with the military side or not, but we were both service members. Now again, I could be wrong. But one of the things I teach you though, is like that faith in the military, that faith in the system, filing some type of complaint or report to the local PD, never even crossed my mind. And once everything, you know, it was over, I just, I was tired. I was tired, and I was let down and I wanted to forget it as much as was possible. But it’s not it’s not possible. There are days I go without thinking about it. That’s true now, but I’m never going to forget it. It’s never not going to happen. impact on me, the one thing I can say is that as time goes on, I’ve been changing the type of impact that it has on me. So, it does not damage me to talk about it with you. It is not damaged me to talk about it with anybody, I may feel a little withdrawn later. So, I may curl up with like a book or something, just to kind of emotionally unplug a little bit. But when I was still serving, and we had our quarterly sexual harassment and assault training, like the programs that they would put us through in terms of like the the training, I would be emotionally upset for like a day or two, I would, I would, I would warn my husband ahead of time, I’d be like, hey, we’re doing sharp training today. And he’s like, okay, okay, and he would know, I would come home, like I just I would need to eat, I would not want to talk because I would just get so angry. I get so angry at those on every slide that went by, they would do this. And I’m like, yeah, so nobody can help us Screw you, too, you know. So it just made me so mad sitting through those trainings. Like I just, I can’t like I can’t believe you guys made me sit through this, because you’re just lying. Like, I would just get so mad. And I was very angry about it and hurt. And that doesn’t happen anymore. And I think it’s because I’ve started to, I started to view my experience not as something, I don’t view it as something that happened to me anymore. So much as I view it as something that I can use to help other people just in the telling of it. And once I started viewing it that way, and it’s now a teaching tool, as horrible as it was. It’s a teaching tool now. And so it hurts me, it doesn’t hurt me at all, to share it. And then I just need some time to kind of like emotionally recharge.
Victoria Volk 51:42
What is one thing that you found most unhelpful to you, as you’re going through, as it as it really kind of came to a head in your life? Both of those experiences?
Ruthie Bowles 51:56
The thing that was definitely the most unhelpful was trying to figure out what I could have done differently. I’m a big believer in, you know, taking ownership and responsibility for things. And so, I was raised that way, but I was applying it wrong. I was trying to figure out how I could have changed what happened to me not including, in my analysis, that I had absolutely no control over their choices. I had no control over them, what they thought what they felt what they decided to do, I had no control over that. And I kept plaguing myself with that question. The same question that other people well, what were you wearing? And all these things, right? Like, what could you have done to keep yourself from being assaulted? Like, what could I have done? Especially the second time because it was like, I just I just let an F bomb go. I was about to drop one. But it was like, What the heck, like a second time Really? Like, what are you doing? What are you doing that it would happen to you a second time those types of questions were incredibly unhelpful, they did a lot of damage as well, because it just mentally turns and turns and turns? I had no control over them. And what they chose to do, I only had control over me. So as a result, like those experiences definitely influenced choices I made after, right. But those are the only things that I could control. And then you know, I had to be a little careful of going too far to the left in terms of reacting too far left or right in terms of reacting as a result of that. And that was you know, that was another struggle that I had as I grew older and was able to view those experiences in a different light.
Victoria Volk 53:50
And help that shame fade away with more empowerment, right?
Ruthie Bowles 53:55
Yes, yes.
Victoria Volk 53:56
What is one tip that you would give someone listening today who has been sexually assaulted in military or otherwise?
Ruthie Bowles 54:05
So, I know that it’s not necessarily for everybody in terms of the way that I’ve shared my story. But I did not start out sharing my story in interviews and things like that. I started out, sharing just the one sentence with a friend, my best friend who was with me the day that I went and saw that movie. And I told her, I was like, you know, that person? She’s like, yeah, so he raped me. And that was all I shared. At first, it was just the one sentence of course, the other thing that you can control in that instance, is that you want to be careful about who you share it with. Because what you want is somebody who is open to listen and receive your story and not somebody who’s immediately going to interview and quiz you. Like I think after I shared it with you the first time, we just had a cup of tea you know, because that’s just the way We were, but they’re even like I said, like it’s not it’s not about getting on and interviews and things like that like that is the way that I’ve chosen to use my story. But if you can share it with somebody and receive maybe some of the compassion that you haven’t been able to extend to yourself. That was something that helped me a lot initially, because I felt like I was able to tell somebody, and unlike the army, and unlike that guy’s friends and stuff, that was somebody who completely validated what I had experienced. And I felt safe and comfortable. And that like being able to do that is probably a huge reason why I’m able to be vulnerable at all, versus, you know, completely shutting down and not being able to even have healthy relationships.
Victoria Volk 55:54
Grief recovery, we call those special people in our lives a heart with ears.
Ruthie Bowles 55:58
Oh, that’s amazing.
Victoria Volk 55:59
Yeah, someone who won’t criticize, analyze, or judge and can just sit with you. Yeah, I love that, that you said that you just had a cup of tea. I love that, that she was there for you, for you in that time. So, ways that others supported you that you found most helpful. You just kind of mentioned, you know, your friend that just sat with you. What are other things that you can think of to share that might be helpful? You know, I? How about your husband, your husband supported you and your immediate family? How about that?
Ruthie Bowles 56:34
So, in terms of my husband, that is actually that was a close one. Because after the second time, the second assault, you know, I was home, and he asked me to marry him. We were just dating at the time. And he asked me to marry him. And I said, yes. But that second time was so new, and there was a lot just kind of shrouded in mystery. And I hadn’t told him because I was afraid. Because being in the culture, I felt like it was very easy for him to either see it my way, or be like, no, you cheated on me. Like there’s alcohol involved and whatever. And he demonstrated the power that somebody else could have if they have enough knowledge to help you. Because we, we almost broke up. Like after he asked me to marry him. We almost broke up because of the way that I was behaving and stuff. He was positive. He was like, you’re not, you’re not on board with this the way that I’m on board with this. Something’s going on. There’s something you’re not telling me. And I’m like, no, of course, I’m lying. Like, no, you There’s nothing I’m keeping from you. It’s fine. And he’s like, why are you acting like this? And I’m like, it’s fine. That was not fine. And I think he was probably like, a hair’s breadth away from being like, look, we’re not, we’re not getting married. We’re not together, like, I don’t know what you’re doing. But I can’t do this anymore. And we were in a hotel room, because we were in Virginia visiting with my grandparents, we were sitting in bed, he had gone through my phone and found something I can’t remember. And he’s like, what is going on? And I sat there, and I just knew I was like, if I say that nothing’s happening, and everything’s fine. One more time, he’s gonna leave am I okay with him leaving. And I just I was not okay with that. And so, I just I it was a short synopsis. Very short, just told him you know, the day that we got back from Afghanistan, one of the soldiers in the barracks he came into my room after I’d had a couple of wine coolers that I weigh overestimated my tolerance for being just freshly back from Afghanistan and he raped me and then I got up without another word and went into the shower because my skin was crawling and I came out and he was still just sitting on the bed looking devastated and then we just laid there for a while. And it was it was still hard after that right because I still had a lot of things you know to work through. And I mean, he’s four years older than me so I mean I was young and he was a little bit older but not that much older and I don’t think it really matters what age you are when somebody tells you something like that it’s still very shocking, but we were able to move on after that, you know, and he knew like what I didn’t like I didn’t give them the nitty gritty details or anything at that time because I wasn’t capable of sharing that yet but over time, I was able to just you know, kind of reveal everything and share it with him and and just explain everything that happened you know, he you know, because one of the things that happened was I got new friends, right as soon as we got back and we were long distance, he’s like, Who are these people? You know, and they were people I felt safe with this what it was and so that was part of it. And so yeah, so it’s just it was he was incredibly supportive and and you know, in terms of like our relationship he got really good at looking for when I was hiding my wants and needs. And he would push me and be like, no, come on, what do you really want here? Like what what he’s really like I can tell there’s something bothering you just go ahead and tell me like don’t he’s like I’ll if you want to leave it alone for right now we can leave it alone, and we’ll talk about it later. But we do you need to talk about it, you know, so you got good at seeing when I was hiding, because I got good at that. And that was just really important for our relationship and for our family. Because the depth of our relationship now is completely different and just deeper than it was, you know, in the beginning. And I think that that is something that I needed, right? Like I have one person in the whole world that I can be that deep with. And I could be that vulnerable with to share every detail and everything. And that was something that I needed, that I think unconsciously, I didn’t even realize it but I thought that I was never going to be able to have.
Victoria Volk 1:01:02
So, my question to now is when you weren’t talking about it? What were some of the characteristics? So let’s say you’re in a friendship, let’s say I have a friend or my friend group or whatever. And what are some characteristics of someone who has been assaulted? Like what are some characteristics that you would think someone would exhibit who has been sexually assaulted that someone like, you know, if you’re not feeling like talking about it, sometimes you just want someone to ask you what’s wrong, or you know what’s going on or?
Ruthie Bowles 1:01:36
So, some people think, like, so one of the big ones, especially when I after the first one, and I was so much younger, you know, it’s 1920 ish 1819 was when it happened. And so, it rippled through my early 20s. And I arguably the second one happened still in my early 20s. So just was not a very good late teens, early 20s. For me, so a lot of people think that if you are sexually assaulted, then you would not want to have sex at all anymore. Right? And that is actually not necessarily true for everyone. For myself, at least after that happened, and there was probably like a refractory period where I was just like, this is all overwhelming. I don’t want to, like everybody get away from me. Once I got to the new duty station. I, I was at that duty station for like six months. And I think I must have had like, I mean, for me, it was a lot. But it was probably like, five guys that I dated in sequential order, not concurrently, but like I dated. And because we were dating, like, as soon as they were like, yeah, you want to go to Home Base. It was I was in that position where I was like, well, if I say yes, then they can’t take it. So, I said Yes, right. I think that was something my roommate picked up on was kind of like, hey, not judging Exactly. But your patterns of behavior are a bit different than they used to be, like, the whole time I was at the language school, which was like a year, I was with my boyfriend long distance, and then that one guy, and then we get to a new base, and I’m running through them, like water. So, it’s very serious change in behavior. And the reason why, like I said was if I if I’m not saying no, then you can’t take it. And then it also kind of having them as like, you know, dating them. And then you know, being boyfriends or whatever, it kind of helped protect me in terms of I could always say, well, I have a boyfriend, I have a boyfriend, instead of saying, actually I just don’t like you, and then having somebody get offended and then you know, attack me or something later changes in behavior, probably a pretty big one. And then to be honest gaslighting, like, if you’re sensing that there’s a change in behavior, or a change in attitude or something with somebody, and they’re insisting that you’re crazy for it. There’s probably something going on, because I was good at that, too. I mean, I had a very horrible, good teacher. But you know, people would be like, Oh, you’re acting really different. Are you okay? And I’m like, I’m fine. You’ve been acting different though. You just completely turn it around, like, or maybe not even gaslighting, but you bring up them and then they ask you about something about you like maybe last week you were complaining about your boyfriend or your girlfriend, and then you ask about them. And they’re like, no, yeah, I’m totally fine. But what was going on with, you know, you and Stacey or you know, you and john, like what happened? And then now all of a sudden, you’re like, oh, yeah, that happened. And you’re completely distracted now. So they become really good at misdirection. And so, if you are worried about somebody, you’re going to have to be gentle, but focused, you’re gonna have to be gentle, but focus, and you’re also going to have to realize that it may take you more than one try, because that’s the other thing like are you just just testing me? Like, are you just trying or like, are you in it to win it? Are you actually in this with me? Are you ready to hear what it is? That I could tell you if I choose to? Now if you’re just like, oh, are you okay? And then you believe me when I say that I’m fine. Okay, well, you obviously weren’t ready to hear it. But I mean, in a way, that’s kind of what happened with my husband when we were engaged, right? Like he kept insisting something was wrong. And I was like, No, you’re not ready for this, you’re not ready for this. And so I just kept insisting, and he kept trying, and he kept trying, and he kept trying, and then it just reached a point where I was not okay with him walking away, because he had tried so many times. And that, you know, it was just that I was afraid of telling him. So, it got to a point where I was positive, he was gonna walk away. Either he was gonna walk away, because I didn’t tell him, or he was gonna walk away, because he didn’t believe man. In such case, I probably shouldn’t be with him, or he was going to hear what I had to say. And he was going to believe me. So, in those three scenarios, two of them, he was walking away anyway. So at that point, I’d reached a point where I just felt like I didn’t really have much left to lose in terms of him and that our relationship, but that’s, that’s the big thing, you want to be gentle, but you want to be focused, because your first attempts at trying to get them to confide in you will probably fail, they will probably fail unless you catch them at just the right moment. But if they’ve had time to kind of fortify and that shame to kind of, you know, weave into their barriers and things, it’s probably going to take you more than one one try. And it’s not a reflection on how much they like you or love you or anything like that. But you are literally wrestling with this monster, and you just can’t do anything else. Like I don’t have, I don’t have the space to trust you right now. Because I am wrestling with this inside of me. And you know, you’re going to have to knock on this door more than once. Because I’m fighting so hard here. And I’m exhausted. And you know, the first few times that you try, I just can’t open that door, I can’t do it. Because how do I know you’re not going to come inside and transform into another monster that I have to deal with? I have to now then I have to wrestle with the assault and your rejection, you know, and you saying that it was my fault, or I could have worn something else or not gone out that late that I have to wrestle with both of those things. So that’s why I think sometimes it takes more than one try. Like you would think if you’ve never gone through anything traumatic like that, that’s so tied up in the shame as well. You would think Well, why don’t you just tell me you tell me everything. It’s like, well, I’ve never had anything like this to tell you before. So, you got to be gentle, you got to be focused, and you just got to be in it for the long haul. Because I’m telling you is definitely not like that might be one of the hardest things that you are able to do initially in terms of getting them to confide in you. But the battle, you know, isn’t over for that person.
Victoria Volk 1:07:49
That’s grief that never goes away. It just changes.
Ruthie Bowles 1:07:51
Yeah.
Victoria Volk 1:07:52
And so and and with Grievers, you know, just this is what we say to like, if you want to be a heart with ears, you just show your support. Let them know you’re there. And when they’re ready. You’ll know they’ll let you know, right?
Ruthie Bowles 1:08:11
Yeah.
Victoria Volk 1:08:12
Thank you so much, Ruthie, is there anything else that you would like to share today?
Ruthie Bowles 1:08:17
I just want to say thank you for, you know, building the platform that you’ve built. The topics that you touch on that you dive deep on here are not topics that people consider for everyday consumption. But but they are topics that some that somebody somewhere is going through every day, you know, and, you know, this is one piece of the story that I’ve shared. But we all go through a variety of different things. And this experience does not define my identity by any stretch of the imagination. But it does help so much to share. And I know that you’re helping a lot of people by addressing these topics that people are like, Oh, that’s not polite conversation, or that’s too heavy. It’s like okay, well this is something that we’re walking around with every day you are surrounded by people who have things that are too heavy every day. So just thank you so much for opening the floor for you know these types of conversations.
Victoria Volk 1:09:25
Thank you for sharing that with me, means a lot. Yeah, my why’s is pretty big for this podcast, so but it’s because of beautiful souls like you who are willing to share your story and I’m just being a heart with ears. and hoping that the messages that the hurting hearts share with others bring hope. There is hope there’s hope to have a beautiful life of a beautiful marriage, children, all the good things that life can give us right?
Ruthie Bowles 1:09:56
Absolutely.
Victoria Volk 1:09:57
Thank you so much again, Ruthie. If people want Want to reach out to you? Where can they find you?
Ruthie Bowles 1:10:01
Looking me up on social media is probably a good place to start Ruthie Bowles, in terms of what I do professionally, defythestatus quo.com if you’re in search of any personal branding and marketing information, but yeah, those are probably the best places to reach me. I am very easily found. A Google search will actually also help you find me very easily.
Victoria Volk 1:10:29
Awesome and I’ll put the information in the show notes as well. Thank you, listeners, for tuning into Ruthie story today. I hope it helps you or someone you love. Until next time, take care much love. And when you unleash your heart, you unleash your life.
Grief Stories, Grieving Voices Guest, Grieving Voices Podcast, Sexual Trauma |
Katie Chonacas | Loss of Innocence & Lessons Along the Way
SHOW NOTES SUMMARY:
Katie speaks up, for the first time publicly, about a moment that wrote on the slate of how she would show up in the world moving forward.
Follow along, as Katie shares how the very decision to speak up alone, has helped her to begin to heal years and years of emotional dis-ease. It takes an incredible amount of courage to speak about our trauma, and also, for the first time in this very public way.
As you listen, please send Katie some energetic love, and perhaps, by the end, you’ll come to the same conclusion as Katie; we can’t heal what we don’t acknowledge. And, we can’t heal what we’re unwilling to allow ourselves to feel.
Through reflecting on her life, she’s also been able to connect the dots of what happened to her, to certain behaviors and beliefs as she got older and the body of work she would create as an actress, voice-over, music creator, and artist.
It is my hope that this episode inspires courage, and also, that this message reaches teen girls and boys. As parents, we must have open communication about what “No” means, what boundaries are, how to protect oneself, the importance of a friend “buddy system,” etc. And, open communication also helps your kids know that, as their parent (or even mentor), you’re a safe person with whom to share these kinds of experiences. I’ll talk more about this in the Takeaways & Reflections episode (episode 27).
In the meantime, listen with care, and then go have a much-needed convo with your teen, if you’re a parent/mentor/guardian. And, if you haven’t established a level of trust and safety, now’s the time to start!
Resources Mentioned:
Connect with Katie:
Victoria Volk 00:00
Welcome to grieving voices. Today, my guest is Katie Chonacas. And she will be speaking to us today about her experience being raped, and adolescent. Katie, welcome to the podcast.
Katie Chonacas 00:18
Thank you. Thank you so much for having me. Victoria, I appreciate you.
Victoria Volk 00:21
Thank you for being here. Introduce yourself, where are you from? How did you get to? What made you decide that you wanted to speak today?
Katie Chonacas 00:34
Sure. Um, so originally, my family is Greek. I’m from Michigan, I come from a big Greek family. And, you know, my little girl dreams and desires was always to go to California and be involved in the entertainment industry on so many different platforms. And so now I’m by Coastal, I live in Los Angeles and New York City. And because of what’s happening in the world, right now, we can literally be anywhere in the world. So I’ve actually, I drove home to Detroit. And I’m here now, for a little while, and I’ve been reflecting in It’s wild, because right now we’re in 2020. And just came to me this past week that we’re in 2020. And I left home in pursuit of those blueprints 20 years ago. So it’s a full, full circle of two decades. And now I can, you know, look at the blueprint that I designed and created look at the experiences that I’ve had thus far with travel with my career, modeling, acting music, you know, every which way and in the arts, and kind of turn over a new leaf as a young adult, and just really look at, you know, my circumstances as a child, through that lens, the journey thus far, kind of reflecting closing on that chapter, and just planting new seeds to create a new blueprint from a young adult lens with the experience that I’ve had, and, you know, forward to the next two decades.
Victoria Volk 02:06
I love how you describe that new blueprint. So, would you take us back to the first blueprint?
Katie Chonacas 02:17
Sure. Sure. Well, thank you for holding the space and having me on to share. I’ve been in isolation about it for so many years, and I’ve been in isolation, a lot of times, and I listened to some of your podcast episodes, and I love the six myths. And one is, you know, when you try to go isolate, or go to a closet, or go to your room and do it alone, and, and, you know, we’re taught these things. And, yeah, I feel like I was that as well, like, go to your room. Or if you’re, you know, your baby, or, you know, go to your room and, or you’re grounded, like you’re crying, it’s like, go to your room. And it’s like, even now, like, if I’m crying, it’s like, you know, you’re almost edited out, like, you’re crying. It’s like, God put an age on crying. You know, I’m an empath. I’m an artist, I’m very sensitive. And, yeah, so anyhow, my, my experience was, I was 14 years old, and I was in high school, I was a freshman in high school, and I was on the cross-country team, and I was at a public school, a great, you know, public school. And, and, basically, I had cross country practice. And when we had cross country practice, the boy’s locker room was to the left, and the girl’s locker room was on the right, and we, you know, we had practice at the same time. So, when we went out to run the boys were, you know, on the football field warming up, and we would be going for our warmup, and we would do our run, and we would come back. And when we’re coming back, the boys would be finishing up and then you know, we would all be in our lockers. And then, you know, after you change and take a shower, and everything, we kind of all got out at the same time. And there were the side doors to, you know, be picked up from your parents or walk home or ride a bike or however you come and go from school, right? And there was this one boy, and he fancied me and it was at the beginning of freshman year. And there was like cutesy stuff back and forth. You know, you know, you’re you’re 14 years old, and you’re like, Oh, you know, and you’re getting attention from a boy and he’s hot and he’s like, maybe the captain of the football team or in my mind, he was or, you know, that’s the fantasy of it, right? Or, I don’t know, and, and he walked me to my locker, you know, like, walk me to my locker to get something like a book or something that I needed to take home but it was, you know, to spend the moment spend the time in a safe space at a public school, right, just to go to your locker, to go through the school to get to the locker and then I Close the locker door, and he puts his varsity jacket on me. And he looked at me and he, you know, asked me to be as girl like, he wanted me to be as girl now, right? And I was just like, you know, he’s taller than me, I was looking at it. And I felt special, you know, you feel that feeling. And so, we’re walking back and the bathroom before, you know, we pass all the trophies in the lunchroom to get back to the lockers, he pushed me into the girl’s bathroom, he pushed me into the girls bathroom. And like, he just started like, you know, kissing me and groping me, and I’m just like, I’m like, whoa, and I’m just kind of like, later, like kissing him and going with it. And I’m just like, Okay, and then like, it’s like, it happened so fast, it was just like, a couple seconds. And then and then he’s and then he like, pushes me to the handicap bathroom to the last stall, which was, you know, the biggest stall, which was the handicapped bathroom. And sidebar, I feel like that’s caused a lot of psychological mental trauma on my mind, that we can discuss later if we come back around to it. But he basically just, like, pushes me on the ground, and like, starts, you know, obviously, like, just doing what he needs to do really quick. I mean, kids move fast. So it was like, it was like a fast thing. And I’m like, No, and I’m like, No, and I’m like, pushing, and he’s, like, big, and he’s a football player. Right? And he’s, like, bigger than me. So I’m, like, pushing him off me. And I’m just like, no, in my head is like hitting the concrete on, you know, on the, on the wall. And, and so like, you know, it’s like, he was just on me, I mean, it’s just like, habit, and who’s just like, then it was just, like, done, it was like, quick, and, and so like, that was it. And, and I like went home, and I was like, in so much pain, and I was bleeding. And it was like, in my upstairs bathroom, which is right here. And, you know, I’m like, in pain, right? And, and that night, it was it was a Friday it because it was the first it was the first it was the first homecoming game of my freshman year, in high school, I started off my freshman year in high school. And it was the first home game and I remember like; I must have gotten dropped off. And I was by myself. And I remember just like walking, and you pass like, you know, you arrive if you pass all the bleachers. And like all the like, popular cool kids or whatever, you know, they’re like, at the very end, like in like, the very end you like walk pack all will be reshares. And so I’m like, and then like there’s like, you know, like five or seven of my girlfriends who are like, you know, my girlfriend’s, and I’m going, and I’m like, I’m walking up and I’m walking up towards them. And there was this one girl. And they were they were they were boyfriend girlfriend, but they broke up. And, and she, she just like she just like, glared at me. She does, she does glare, she just glared at me. I was 14 years old, these were my girlfriend’s One moment. And then the next moment, none of them are my friend, they all took her side, they were all silent to me, she glared at me. And in that moment, and on that day, not only was I raped, I was taken advantage of, but I was shamed and blamed by females and I and I took it on. And I took on that responsibility of being blamed and being shamed and feeling so small and so invisible, like it was my fault. You know. And so that was, that was the beginning of my freshman year, happened on Friday. And I ended up sitting up top, because on the other, another person, they probably like, run off and cry or something, I don’t know. But like I, I just went like a couple bleachers above and, like sat there, and I just sat there, and I sat there through the whole game, but, and I remember being able to, like, sit there, but I was like, numb and just felt very paralyzed. And I feel like a lot of times I’ve been able to freeze and be in situations and just kind of like, take it you know, and just sit there and in, in whatever the abuse was and just like sit there and because I have strength and strong will and and I’m just like present in there, but it was very, you know, diminishing and, and like I said I was I was 14 years old. So, it, it was a lot. It was a lot for one person in one day that that really you know, shape shifted. Some of the choices that I’ve made and some of the behavioral patterns and some of the things of how I’ve been how I’ve been you know my life thus far.
Victoria Volk 09:56
I’m so sorry that happened to you I felt my own body tense up as you were talking. I have my own stories. This one is about yours. I’ve heard. So I just want you to know that my heart goes out to you. I know it’s a really difficult thing to navigate.
Katie Chonacas 10:40
Hmm, yeah, especially when you take it on. And like, I’m a very intense, loyal person, you know, and I’m very strong. So I’m like, oh, like, it’ll just, you know, go away, or, like, never happened and happy wasn’t there and you bury a deep, you just keep burying and deep. And when you make the choice to bury it deep, and you just keep burying it deeper and deeper. It just becomes like a habit that you do, and you think it’s like the right thing to do. And you justify that choice. Because you didn’t have someone to talk to, like you didn’t, you know, not let anyone wasn’t there like, Well, actually, what happened was, um, I had summer school that summer, so the whole year passed. And then I had summer school. And then I got my first boyfriend. And he was a senior. And because of the, the intimacy of it, obviously, I was able to share and tell him what happened. And so he and all his senior friends, they’re all like the popular guys, him and all his senior friends showed up at his house, showed up at his house with me in the car with baseball bats, and I remember his, he wouldn’t come to the door, he wouldn’t come outside, it was his mother. And it was it was his mother. And so there’s, um, you know, the town where I’m from, and there’s like, the wealthy side. And then there’s like the old side. And so he was on the old side. So, the homes were a bit smaller than the new side, you know, my dad, he designed and did the blueprint, an architect and had built our home, you know, here, my mom, and so on, on the old tracks on the old side. His mom was at the door, and I feel like he came from a broken family. So like, I mean, I didn’t know this when I was 14, but reflecting on it now, he comes from a broken family with without a dad, he, you know, had his mom, his mom was at the door, his mom was needing to deal with these seniors, with the baby with baseball bats at his door. And so, his mom very well knows what he did, right? But you would think at that state that a mom would go to the school, right? But she didn’t want her own child to be in trouble. She was suffering. She was scared. She probably couldn’t handle her own child. You know, he was troubled. And obviously he took that out on on me, right? Not only in football, but but on like me, like another. He was a child. I was a child. We were we were kids. He was he was in my grade. He was a freshman as well. abrasive and aggressive on to me, it doesn’t matter how attractive you are doesn’t matter how cute you are, you know? Like, like, no means no, you know, um, but anyway, so in the story of, you know, my boyfriend at the time when I was 14, and all his friends as senior showing up to this kid’s door. In my heart, in my mind, I felt good. I’m like, oh, yeah, I’m like, I’m like, he got what he deserved. And that’s, that’s, that’s that was that was in my mind. That was clarity in my mind. But, but now, but then, you know, recently I was thinking about, it’s like, no, no, definitely not like, the school shouldn’t know about it. This happened on school property, like the school still doesn’t know, like, the school should have known about it, you know, that that mom. Like, I mean, I was, I was too scared to tell my mom, like, imagine if I had a relationship where I would could tell one of my siblings, or I did tell my mom or, you know, I actually had a friend I could talk to instead of my friends going against me in shaming and blaming me, if I had friends who actually told a counselor told someone, or if I went and told the counselor and told someone, right, instead of taking the shame and the blame, but like, this, this conclusion of, oh, like, he got what he deserved, and there’s victory because my boyfriend at the time, you know, came in and like, you know, went to bat for me, and, and, and, like, put him in his place was also very adolescent. It was very, you know, it was child like behavior and that Mom, you know, were healthy, functional, ethical mom, right or wrong, I feel should have went to the school, you know, but like I said, you know, obviously she didn’t want her own child to get in trouble. And for it, so so that didn’t happen. And and so you He knew what he did was wrong because I’m sure his mom has given him crap for it over the years. But yeah, that’s that’s kind of what happened. And that was the only closure I had with it in the school system.
Victoria Volk 15:13
And that closure, and air quotes closure is a story, I think that repeats over and over. In situations like these, when you feel like you, like you said, are paralyzed, and don’t know who to talk to, or you don’t feel like you have someone you can talk to, or you take on the shame and the blame, right, and you try and rationalize like, Oh, you know, kissed him back or, you know, I whatever it is, right. It’s just very easy to take on the shame and the blame. And so fast forward. How did that experience shape you? Once you left Detroit and started to start a new chapter.
Katie Chonacas 16:05
We’ll fast forward even before I left Detroit, I started skipping school. I was the fastest I was the fastest runner on the cross-country team or I was top three. It was Kelly Kelly. Katie, we were the three frosh Ks that’s what we were telling us. I was on the announcements twice a week. No one cheered for me. I was in the papers twice a week, which I loved, like you know, being a go getter and being in the paper and being on the announcements. Everyone would like clap and cheer. But no one no clap for me. I was so embarrassed when they said my name because I would do so well at the races, and I was on cross country and so after that year after my freshman year I ended up dropping out of cross country I dropped not only that I dropped out of cross country and university Michigan and all these like top 10 schools were looking at me for full scholarships. I you know, my dad was a cross country runner and he turned me on to cross country running and we had like we had this special bond and we do have a special bond and I was born on his birthday and our birthdays are 1111 and but yeah, so like I dropped out of cross country I started skipping school. I became you know, just like this this person I was just like I had disassociation from school I like no interest whatsoever I knew I’m like I’m an artist, I know what I want to do I want to be an actor I want to be an entertainment so like I knew like my calling. And so I just I’m just like eff these people and I just I turned I just like just like turned off school I just decided just to like turn it off and just like go numb I would like act out I would get sent out of my class I would get sent out of one of my classes and in like third period or something in this teacher just because like they didn’t want to deal with me. I would be sent to this room where it would be people with a special disability and so it was like lose handicapped person. And this other person who was like a big bully, and he like smells really bad. And he was a bully. And I tried to I tried to bully him one time and he like he like came after me and it was so scary. And I never did again. But then I would doodle I would just be doodling and then I would get in trouble for drawing so I’m like I don’t I was always thinking like I don’t belong here. I belong in an art school. Like I don’t I don’t belong here. I’d be in trouble for doodling, and I love doodling I love I love art. So and then and then I actually it was it was so bad that you know my social life at school that I ended up leaving that school and transferring to another school in Livonia and and I it’s funny that you say how the cycle repeats itself because it’s like the exact same thing happened in a different way, the exact same thing.
Victoria Volk 19:00
And did you have support that time too?
Katie Chonacas 19:08
Well, no. But this time I was a senior there are two boys who asked me to prom, and I should have went with this one boy, I should have I should have went with this one boy, but I went with this. this other guy and Wow. It’s like,
Victoria Volk 19:32
I’m so sorry, Katie.
Katie Chonacas 19:35
Yeah, yeah, it’s wild how you are in these situations, and you just find yourself so alone and so isolated and but then you’ll have to yourself it’s like how do you put yourself in these situations? So that’s what I’m thinking is like how do you put yourself in these situations? Right? So, the second time it was during prom and I literally went to prom. With this kid, and he was the one getting the hotel room for like everyone to go back to, to party at afterwards. And so he literally, during prom, had us leave prom, to go to this hotel room, so it’d be all set up. So when everyone came afterwards, and so I didn’t want to leave, I wanted to stay with the kids, you know, they’re all like the popular kids or whatever. And I wanted obviously, I was completely insecure. And I wanted to, you know, stay and have a good time. And he had a sleeve. And he got literally literally the hotel room ready with the keg, two in the bathtub full of ice, and, and took advantage of me completely. And just, like, put himself on me, and pressured me into having sex with him. And it was just like, so quick again, like, you know, when you’re 17 or whatever, 16 of 16 it’s just just like, I don’t know, 617 Yeah, knows. Yeah. 17 I think I was always I was always like a late starter, I started I started my period late. I was, I start, everyone could drive, and I couldn’t drive because my birthday is in November. So, I like I graduated when I was 17. You know, so like, everyone else is 18. But I was 17. So maybe I was 13 actually, when I was a freshman, and that happened. Maybe I was maybe I wasn’t 14 you I was 13 because when I got a boyfriend, I was 14. So I think I was 13 actually wouldn’t wouldn’t happen because I was I was thinking I was 13 in my freshman year when it happened, this was the beginning of freshman year. So yeah, so when I was a senior, and they just like happened, and it was like done. I just felt like he was like, done with me. And like everyone showed up at the hotel room. And like everyone knew, everyone knew. And it was like, again, shame, blame. And it was just like, felt like, you know. Yeah, so that’s that’s kind of like that’s that that’s what, that’s what my high school experience was like. You know, and I don’t want to blame anyone or myself. But I definitely took on a lot of shame. And now as you know, as a young adult, I just look at look at it. Like if I were talking to a friend, which I do in the mirror, I’m supportive and positive for everyone else, they just hold space for myself just to be positive for myself and Haley. You know, you’re a good kid, you’re a smart kid, like, you come from a good family, and everyone has their stuff, you know, but there wasn’t drinking in my house, there wasn’t drugs. There was an infidelity in my home you know, but but, you know, like, I have three siblings come from a big Greek family and you know, you go to school and it’s a whole different story at school, you know? Yeah, there’s ways to you know, that’s why community is so important. building communities and and having open communication and practicing open communication and no matter what it is to be able to, you know, hold space and let people know like I won’t judge you. I don’t blame you. I don’t shame you. You know, all these things I’ve learned and I practice along the way and you know, I practice them with others and I practice with myself and I just come to realize that it’s important to do those things and to keep doing those things.
Victoria Volk 23:54
You mean obviously you didn’t feel like you could talk to your parents? Despite having good role models and good examples and good family life? Where do you think that disconnect was? We couldn’t talk to them or I was just gonna say I think when when we take on that shame and blame I think that’s a lot of what keeps us silent. Right?
Katie Chonacas 24:34
Yeah, I mean, that that shame and blame definitely kept me silent and definitely kept me restricted. But um, you know, every family does have their issues and and based on, you know, how my mom was raised in her circumstances. She hasn’t been a person, I could go to Intel things and she, I don’t think she had the the message Until bandwidth to deal with it. And I thought probably I would get into trouble. But, you know, like, when I was younger, I’d always like, talk to my mom, it was like, really difficult and share things. But when I would talk to her, it was like peeling an onion. And I would do one layer that gets really excited. And on a psychological level, I would like, you know, like chess, like, do do different layers of like talking to my mom. And right when I got to this, when I would get to like the second layer and start to peel it, it was like, she got like a tear, or showed any sign of vulnerability, she would just put her shield back up and, like, go to your room, or, like, that’s enough, Katie, you know, and like she couldn’t, couldn’t handle them anymore. You know, crying to her is weak, not not a strength. You know, she didn’t have her parents she could talk to, I would be sent to my room are told to stop crying, if that gives you any frame of reference of being able to be vulnerable, so it wasn’t advocated in my life with with my mom.
Victoria Volk 26:11
It wasn’t neither in mind. And that cycle repeats. And that’s why I’m so passionate about helping children with loss program that, that I facilitate, because it breaks that cycle, once we learn as parents, how to be hurt with the IRS, where our kids potentially could change the trajectory of their lives. Because, you know, had you been able to talk to your mom, or she was that safe space for you? You can’t unknow it, once you know it. So what do you what are you going to do about it? Right?
Katie Chonacas 26:52
Yeah, I think that’s where, like a lot of my anger came from. And then so I think some of that’s where some of my blame came from, like some of my anger towards my mom, or maybe towards my dad, like, maybe some of my anger came from, and I was blaming, but like, I hadn’t, but that’s also where my compassion came from, because I don’t blame them. Because I wouldn’t in this world if it weren’t for them. And they, they didn’t know how, like, you know, my mom didn’t know how, like, because her parents didn’t know how, but at a very young age, I decided I was going to put myself and my life first and appreciate this God given life to me and fully live it and understand it as much as possible before gifting life to another. So in the sense of my career, my my different individual aspects of my career, those have been my babies, and I’ve been nurturing them, and in nurturing my life and my relationships. And those have been my babies. And then I decided I wanted to have children later on in life. So I have never been married, and I don’t have children, and God willing, I will. But now that I’ve been through what I’ve been through and really know myself more, I feel like I’m able to break the pattern that you’re talking about and and have vulnerability and compassion and open communication. And you know, the Greeks say communication is key, you know, like, communication is key. And I was always raised going places, my mom saying, you know, going to a family member’s house or going to someone’s house? Oh, don’t tell him anything about her family? Or like don’t don’t say anything. Like don’t don’t say anything. So we were always tell like, Oh, don’t say this. Don’t say that. So, it’s like, you know what I mean? Like, it gives mixed messages for children. It’s very, very confusing and difficult. So, me, I’m just like, up. And I’m just like an open book. So, it’s like, you know, but I mean, obviously, there’s certain things you say and don’t say, but when it comes to the home, I feel like communication is needs, it needs to be transparent, completely. So that’s really cool that you have that program.
Victoria Volk 28:48
So, what, where do you go from here?
Katie Chonacas 28:52
Well, you’re the first person I’ve spoken to about this on a platform. And it mustered up a lot of courage within me to do so. So I, where I go from here is keep taking these huge leaps and steps in speaking out loud, you know, to be a ripple effect. So other people could hear my story and learn from what I’ve been through and maybe identify with it. And so it’s important, I feel to, you know, speak on it, not all the time, but definitely speak on it because if I don’t, and I kind of think this would apply to all human beings, that it has power over you and it takes it takes over and it’s like a it’s like a blanket like just like, engulfing on on you and you’re like not able to breathe and see clearly and it’s just so dark and it’s such a lonely place. And So, I just don’t want to feel that way, you know, I just, I just don’t want to feel that way at all. And I don’t want another to feel that way. So, um, you know, I just, I’m just like, it’s like chipping away, you know, with like an ice pack and just chipping away to, to not not have it not let it have any control over me. And also, another thing that I do is that I’ve done and that I do, as a human being, I take all of it, and I apply it to my work, I put it into my actor, I put it into TV, I put it into film, I put it into my drawings, into my paintings, I put it into my poetry, you know, so I take it, and I apply it to art, you know, because that’s what life is for me. So when I feel like, you know, those are healthy things that I can do with the circumstances that were given to me, and I don’t want to justify or compare my circumstances, my circumstances, somebody else’s, because I know we all have different circumstances. So there’s physical circumstances, which is bloody and gory, and, you know, but then there’s psychological mental circumstances, you know, like a spiritual war, psychological war, and mental health that is just as gory and bad as a physical and in a blood that you see, you know, so mine’s more of the invisible patterns and the invisible energies that you think you can’t see. But you really can see, and you definitely feel them. You know, energy is just energy emotions. So breaking down old negative patterns, and calling them out, identifying with them, and replacing them with nourishment and positive patterns.
Victoria Volk 31:59
It’s rewiring. It’s a rewiring of our brains.
Katie Chonacas 32:03
Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. So it’s like, we have 60 to 70,000 thoughts per day, 90% of those thoughts have the same thoughts, right? So what are we thinking about? And so, like this, one thing that we’re speaking on, is very, very deep rooted on so many ways. So to be able to speak upon it, and, you know, apply new language, new, new words, new, new things, I feel is Ultimately, the goal, right? So, when it when, when it when you’re in an ocean wave, and they cycle and they circle back around, and you hit that iceberg, it’s not as you know, detrimental. Hopefully, we can iron out in and keep forgiving, and take responsibility. And hopefully, it won’t feel as bad or hurt as much.
Victoria Volk 33:00
Those of you listening to this, just energetically, I would just want you to send Katie some love. Because I know this was not easy for you. It wasn’t even easy for me to hear. I’m being honest. Because there’s a lot I haven’t spoken up. But it just really honestly came to light this year. And so I’m still unpacking all of that. You give me courage. This is such a message to for parents to hear. I have a 13 year old actually, she’s going to be 14 she has a countdown going on when she’s turning 14 and I’m terrified.
Katie Chonacas 33:40
Yeah, she’s 12. And so, I want to like same, right, but it’s like, also, I want to be careful not to hold that worry. And that terrifying energy because I want to hold light and space and excitement for them, you know, to, you know, to not to not have that energy, vibration be so low. I want to be mindful of that. But also I want to be like, mindful of how I can approach her and mindful of how I can share with her in a healthy way. Certain things you know, to be able to have that communication. And it’s like with what’s happened and being in the world. You would think one would know how to approach those kinds of things, right? But when it’s your child or a child there is it’s it’s not easy to you know, have that conversation.
Victoria Volk 34:31
Well, a new resort to what you know. And thank the Lord that I discovered grief recovery because and Reiki because together they have definitely opened up my eyes and helped me to peel back the layers of myself and made me a better parent.
Katie Chonacas 34:54
I’m attuned to level two, what level are you attuned to? Did you do the master two for?
Victoria Volk 34:59
I’m a master.
Katie Chonacas 35:00
Oh cool. What number?
Victoria Volk 35:01
Yeah, I’m not sure. Well, I’m a Reiki Master, and I’m going to be doing my Corona in a couple of weeks. Reno holy fire. I’m gonna Sui holy fire Reiki Master is the Sui lineage. I know there’s several different lineages there’s many lineages.
Katie Chonacas 35:21
Wow, me first time I’ve heard of that.
Victoria Volk 35:25
Yeah. And it’s it’s changed my perspective on energy for sure, really opened my eyes. And it’s been brought me a lot of healing actually to, in conjunction with grief recovery. And sort of circle back, you know, with what you shared today and with the audience. And it’s just so important that we recognize that, when something like this were to happen, whether kids or with ourselves, we resort to what we know. And I just want to say that there are new tools, and there are tools out there, and new knowledge that we can acquire, to better serve ourselves and our children and our communities and things like that. And so I’m just so grateful that I found that.
Katie Chonacas 36:23
What are some great that you found useful? The new resources?
Victoria Volk 36:29
The grief recovery method itself to process because you can utilize that for the relationship to the person who abused you, you can utilize that for the relationship that you have to your body, to yourself to your inner child. You can utilize the method to money, actually, your relationship with money is just very versatile. And I’ve applied it in many ways in my life.
Katie Chonacas 37:03
How do you find the program?
Victoria Volk 37:06
Google?
Katie Chonacas 37:07
Okay, okay. Is it in North Dakota that you did the program?
Victoria Volk 37:11
No, it’s actually online. You can find it online, the grief recovery method, it’s online, but I got certified in the method in Austin, Texas. March of last year.
Katie Chonacas 37:25
I was I will, I’ve always wanted to go to Austin, Texas, I haven’t been there yet. I always went a few times for South by South South by Southwest but cool, that’s it’s so great that you went through the program. That’s why I felt like really safe in trusting to speak with you on this topic. Because you’ve, you know, been in the program and you’ve, you know, how to hold space, and I just felt like it would be a really, you know, good safe space to be able to share, you know, for grieving voices.
Victoria Volk 37:57
Thank you for that. Yeah, and that is my goal. That is my goal, to be a heart with yours. So, I, as I mentioned, you know, as we talked about, I discovered the grief recovery method and, and Reiki that’s greatly helped me heal back the layers of my trauma and grief and all of that. And you mentioned that you’ve been basically channeling it into your art, what you experienced into your art and the work that you do. What are your goals for your art? And do you how do you plan now that we you’ve kind of started to speak out about this? How do you feel about it moving forward? And you know, is is advocacy something that you’re interested in?
Katie Chonacas 38:57
Definitely, I definitely want to be an advocate. I definitely am I feel very raw and vulnerable. When I first identified with it, I think it was like in 2016 when I saw this film girl on the edge of the sag foundation in Los Angeles you know when when the lead actor at the end, you know, she picked up her little rock and it said rip on it said rape on it. It really struck home with me and I connected with the director and I was so moved by it that I wrote an article on the Huffington Post and actually was so raw and real, that the Huffington Post didn’t publish it. I had to edit it down and make it more tailored. So, so it’s it’s published now but I’m not sure if it’s because I was. I’m not a doctor, like, you know, a PhD to speak on this topic or if it was just like too much of the time, but I was able to publish that article. And I was very, it felt really like you know, when something first happens, it’s like that raw feeling where it’s like really fresh, like wounded and very vulnerable. So, I felt that for a while, and that was in it was in December I remember and then and then I in May I went to lightning in a bottle. And I was driving with a healer during lightning in a bottle this week Music Festival he had, he did this like ocean thing, where I put the person and the situation into an ocean bottle, and it just got smaller and smaller. And I kept going away. And I was just like, it was a huge music festival with like, you know, 15,000 people there. So I was like, rah, rah. And I was like screaming and crying and just really letting it out. And I felt like I did, I felt like I did, and I did, I had like, a big release about it. And then and then 2017 happened at 19 I kind of went through life and things were still like, you know, kind of like, confusing and foggy. And then the obscene documentary came out. And I was very I like, wanted to see it, but I was hesitant to see it. And I was I had the resistance, but then it was during, it was like right when 2020 during the lockdown, right when the riots were just happening. And literally, I it was a Thursday and I sat down. And I watched for all four episodes in a row. And afterwards, I was just stone cold, like buzzing and numb. And I was up till like, six, seven in the morning, I couldn’t sleep I was just up. And it’s like, all these pieces of like, all these years, it was all these pieces just like came together where I thought they like came together before but now they came together, and it was like it was the clearest they could ever be. It all came together. And it was it was like mapped out and I and I just watched my choices from being 14 up until now in my life of all the choices that I made with, with with males and male partners. And, and circumstances and situations and invitations and, and I when the whole me to movement came out a few years ago, but like i was i was like I was I was noticing the way I didn’t talk to anyone about it. But I was noticing the way I was reacting to it inside I was very like judgmental I was very like I was there was there was a voice in there. It’s like I want to share there’s a voice in there where I wanted to post something, or I want to do a hashtag Me too. But then that then the next thought was like Oh, those those girls just want attention or someone’s just gonna think they want attention or, or, um I don’t want to be a part of this because that’s like, oh I’m like one of the herd or one of the sheep but I’m so like, I’m judging them. I’m judging me. Like and being a part of that I’m judging so I’m doing a lot of judging here. And me two things happening. It just it’s just keeps happening. It just keeps going on it just keeps cycling back up and and I continue to stay silent. I continue to judge I continue to you know, say something to myself about it, but not to anyone else. But the buried deep down and some like because I disassociate. I’m like, Oh, that’s not me. Like I justified Oh, that’s not mean that that’s them. That’s not me, right? That was the justification for it. And then I saw this obscene documentary. And I watched it. And the first woman and her sister from their experience, and they went to the police in the FBI and said something off of that experience. I was like, holy crap, this is like, this is like nothing compared to what I’ve seen and what I’ve been through. I’m like, if this person is saying it, like, how unhealthy Am I how unhealthy is this situation that I’ve been justifying, because of this is a this small the situation but they went, you know, I was like, Oh my God. And then I went on to watch, you know, the, the, the four series, the documentary in LA looking and hearing all these other girls stories. And because of these other girls that had a broken family, or they didn’t have a mom, or they didn’t have a dad, or they were into drugs, or they were they were like drinking or, or didn’t have parents or they dropped out of school, they or whatever. It’s like, Oh, I didn’t I didn’t have i would i was justifying this whole lot. I didn’t I didn’t do cocaine. I didn’t do drugs. I didn’t have parents who did drugs. I don’t my mom’s here. My dad’s here. They’re here. Like, I don’t have like stepfathers and people coming and going, I wasn’t sexually abused, like, you know, by a parent, like this didn’t happen to me. So I would, I would. I went on in life. And I would be on these private yachts in the south of France. I would be, you know, with these multimillionaires and multi billionaires. And I would be going, you know, I would be having lunches and dinners and, you know, like, I’m like, oh, that, you know, they would tell me how smart I am and how pretty I am. They would tell me how gorgeous I was and how smart I was. And I felt so special. And I’m like yeah, obviously. Of course, I’m beautiful. Of course, I’m gorgeous. Of course, you want to be around me because all this in that although I’m not going to have sex. I’m not going to let you touch me, I’m not going to do anything with you. But allow, I’ll allow you to buy me dinner, I’ll allow you to buy me lunch, I’ll accept the invitation to go on a private jet, and to go on yachts and to have these experiences all over the world. And I’m, I’m the one, you know, having a good old time on your dime. And I’m seeing the world and I’m doing all these like cool things. But you’re not, you’re extending an invitation to me, but you’re not, I’m not sleeping with you, I’m not sleeping in the same boat with you With you, I have my own. I have my own bedroom, I have I have so so I would justify, I’d be like, but but then you’re watching the documentary. And they’re telling the girls how special they are, how, how smart they are, but then they take it to the next level. And they abuse them sexually. But I justified it, I’m like, Oh, that’s not me. Because I don’t allow them to touch me. But know that you know what I am, I am the same situation I am the same. It is me too. I am in the same category because because these girls who are you know, doing the drugs or you know, doing the whatever they want the the sexual stuff that I’m not doing. I’m just like one of the girls, I’m just one of the pretty girls where it’s like, they just, you know, some of them, they just like to have like, you know, five to 10 girls around, right? They just like to have like all these eye candies around. And so for them, even though what’s them paying for a meal or, or paying for a flight or having me go here or there. They just like having the entourage of females around, right? Not that I went to like too many things where there’s like entourage as a females. But I have been in situations where there’s been, you know, more than one girl there. And although I wasn’t doing anything, and they were I felt like oh, I was like scamming them or I got away. But no, I was under the victim umbrella. And I was justifying my own circumstances under that umbrella. And I was like, Oh my god, that’s so unhealthy. And by seeing that documentary, obscene, I was like, Oh, I am me, too, it is a me too thing. And I felt like the shackles come off, I felt the shield. Come down, you know, and I had a lot of deep sadness for myself, I had a lot of deep sadness for myself, because this whole entire time, you know, growing up in California, and being around all these different people, and events and parties, in LA, and New York, and Paris, and London and around the world. And it wasn’t all that but it was it was in there. It wasn’t all that it was but it was intertwined. It was inter woven, you know, and I just I kept this like thread, it was like this thread of, through my life. And I know we all have different threads we carry around. But this this one thread, I feel stems from that experience from when I was 14, you know, and I took on the shame I took on the blame, I took on the pressure I took on those things, I took on those things, although I protected myself and I’m, you know, one with God, and I have my faith and my morals and my values. And I wanted to experience, you know, all these materialistic fantasizing fun things, without the cost of giving up my sexual identity, right. And also being taken advantage of, I was already closed off, like, no one could get past there, I was like, closed off, like, it’s not happening, you know, and it just, it just wouldn’t happen, you know, it just, it just went in, you know, a lot of times, because I was tough, and strict and strong in these ways of my personality, but also my morals and my values. I also feel like some of that closed off, because I made the choice not to let anyone in because I something was taken for me because like No means no beat, but because it was taken from me. So maybe it when it happened in my young adult life, you know, going through my 20s you know, in California and around the world and stuff, maybe that also gave me a internal strength and a build on to where I wasn’t gonna let anyone prey on me, you know, because I knew what it felt like already. So these other girls in life, who have their own experiences, you know, I’m watching them in the documentary. And it happened, you know, many times over and over. And I was always just like, oh, they’re so weak, like before the document, right? Like, all those girls are weak, they have no morals, they have no values to allow those kinds of things, I would justify it, you know, and just say something like, oh, they’re doing Coke, they’re doing an A bowl of coke or something like that, you know, they’re, they’re just, you know, having sex for money or something like that, you know, and I would, I would judge them, I would, I would judge them. And when you’re judging others, you’re only really judging yourself, you know. And like I said, I felt like I had one up over them, like I was better than them because I didn’t allow that repeated abuse going over and over. But it was it was still abuse on a psychological level. And it was just unhealthy patterns, just to be a part of right when I could have been in a relationship with somebody when it could have been around real friends, real friends, and not people who aren’t your friends, you know. So, I was really, really frustrated. And angered and really mad at myself for not building up healthier friendships and communities earlier on. I do now, I’m grateful that I have them now. And I’m developing them. But of course, you’re always wondering like, Oh, you know, what if that didn’t happen, or what if I wasn’t a part of those things, thinking I had to be a part of those things to, to make certain things happen, you know, from my own limiting beliefs and isolation of not communicating and, and sharing, you know, unhealthy, unhealthy thoughts and beliefs come up.
Victoria Volk 50:43
Well, and the one thing that when you’re sharing that what came up for me is, I remember back to when you said, when you first saw your girlfriends after that happened, and they pretty much just dismissed you, and shamed you and judged you and kind of cut you off, right? And so these girls, then later in life, you know, it’s get them before they can get me.
Katie Chonacas 51:15
Well also, growing up, um, you know, my mom, she really did coax us with, like, how beautiful we were, you know, how she was very nurturing with like taking care of our hygiene and using lotions, and taking care of our bodily tumbles. And so, I always grew up knowing I was beautiful, you know, like, and my sister was gorgeous, too. And she is and so I went to school thinking like every I was complimenting all these girls. And I was like, oh, you’re so gorgeous, you’re so pretty, like I love your hair, I love your eyes. And I would always be very complimentary of what like someone was wearing or how they looked or something like that, just because it’s like, in my friendly nature, personality. But I thought everyone was beautiful. Like, like the bat, like, like your hand. Like, you know, you’ve a front and a back. Like, I just thought everyone was gorgeous. Like, that’s how I was trained. That’s how I was I was taught growing up. And so, a lot of times, girls, they’re so insecure, and with my like voice and my bold personality. They, I guess I they, I would make them feel small or insecure because they would shy away from me. Or maybe they thought like I was being fake about it. Or maybe they didn’t think I was being authentic, right. And so sometimes I had girlfriends, but then as soon as they got a boyfriend, they would stop being my friend. And I remember some of my teachers this one teacher when I was a freshman in college, I ended up getting a full scholarship for cross country running. But when I stopped running and then came back to it was like the comeback queen. But that’s that’s another story if you want to hear about it, but I ended up getting back into running because of my dad and I went for it. And I remember one of my teachers, she sat me down, and she said, Listen, like you’re you’re so beautiful. You’re like you’re so attractive. And she’s like and you’re smart. And you know I’m with my voice she said you know she sat me down and told me that a lot of girls are going to be jealous of me. A lot of girls are going to be the way that they were cuz she saw how they were in school to me, they were so mean to me, they were so mean to me. I’m so in addition to being taken advantage of, you know, and having my virginity taken away from me without my consent, in addition to all that, with the blame and the shame, with also just like being like a, like a beautiful human being the kids are very cruel. So, so then so then it’s a lot, right? It’s like there’s this layer and this layer and there’s this situation, this situation and then when they all come together, how do you spread it out to know what, what, what is what? You know, it’s a lot. It’s definitely a lot. And I started remember growing, also growing up in entertainment. One of my best friends, he’s so cool. J Logan horn. He took me to his friend’s birthday dinner, and I knew about his one friend and I like I really like idolized her and I admired her. And it was her birthday and he brought me to dinner with her and her name is Jessica Stam. She’s gorgeous. She’s from Canada, and she’s beautiful model. And we went to this dinner and she’s younger than me. But the way she was with me, she was so graceful and kind and she looked at me as her equal and like she was like edgy and cool. And we became like friends instantly. And we’ve been friends ever since. And she’s younger than me and she’s quote unquote more successful than me, right? I mean, success is, you know, measured, right? So but in my eyes of wanting a role model because at a young age, I’ve always wanted role models and for an interpersonal female feminine divine relationship. That was really For me, I remember when I met her, and she was younger than me, and I looked up to her. And she was so because she was so successful and like, in her career, she didn’t even though I was gorgeous, you know, and bold and loud, like she could had space to celebrate me and to honor me and, and she wasn’t jealous of me and she wasn’t cutting and looking down to me. And it was really nice to identify and get with someone who was who was like a mirror reflection of how I was for others, right. And it took a long time for me to, to meet someone like her. And, and she’s very special and, and I admire her greatly. And she kind of gave me a new hope of confidence of what it could be like to, you know, keep the faith and keep being how I was and, and, and since then I’ve met a lot of beautiful, empowering beautiful women and gems along the way. And I deepen my relationship with the divine feminine and have real true relationships with females. So that’s, that’s a part of it all, too, you know.
Victoria Volk 56:05
A lot of ripples want to experience. And that’s just, that’s a very good example of ripples of how we can have one experience and how it just transcends time, and writes on who we are, and how we present ourselves to the world. And once we recognize and have a certain level of awareness, it’s kind of rediscovering ourselves again.
Katie Chonacas 56:33
And it’s like, the way that I always was, that’s how I wanted, like all my girlfriends to be, that’s how I wanted to be with all my girlfriends, you know, and to truly be a man, but with, with how I with how I grew up, and you know, you know, we’re kids, like, I didn’t grow up, you know, as a child in LA, where there are people who have careers already, right. So, like, I’m growing up in Michigan, so people are still, you know, kids and go into school and what have you. So, I understand, I understand that it took time for me to meet a match of mine, who was at the level where I was at, in regards to women empowerment, and the strength. One has for, you know, being being a human, and being that voice for others. We are who we are, and sometimes it gets covered in some luck, right? But then once in a while a gem comes around like Jessica and it just like it just it’s a mirror reflection that remind you of who you are. And in you being your best self and, and, you know, knowing that maybe you’ve had some like lonely times, and then roads. You know, it’s very, obviously intimate and raw. And I don’t even think she understands the level of impact it’s had for me, and how special Our friendship is, but it really is and, and so I continue to be that for others because it’s who I am. And, and like I said, I’ve met females along the way, Tish Hicks who has the vo dojo, who’s you know, a pioneer in voiceover, Randy Thomas, who was the first female disc jockey. And she paved the way for women in voiceovers. She’s the voice of ABC nightline. She’s the first woman anchor, you know, she was the first female disc jockey. She’s the first woman anchor, she’s been the voice of the Oscars for 10 times. Total she’s been the voice of the Tonys for 21 years in a row. And she’s my friend and she’s my role model and mentor and, you know, I’m like her spiritual daughter, she’s like, my, she’s like my spiritual mom. And so I’ve met these beautiful women along the way who are successful, and, you know, proud to call me their friend, and I’m honored to have them on my journey. And they support me, you know, speaking, what I do what what comes up for me, and they hold space for me, and I honor them. And it’s like, with everything that’s happened, it’s, I feel like I appreciate it even more in the relationship is even more juicy. Or, you know, because I’ve been through the hardships and they know what it’s like, because we all have our, our own hardships, you know, and I know I have the strength and the determination to be there for them if and when they need me. And I feel like that’s what you know, the journey is about being showing up and being there for one another.
Victoria Volk 59:34
A lot of great messages today. For parents, thank you for sharing your story, your grieving voice for the first time. And I’m honored that you felt safe sharing it with me.
Katie Chonacas 59:50
My pleasure, my pleasure. You know, I write poetry as well. And I haven’t even written about this in my poetry because it’s so isolating and so Scary that I’ve been even scared to write it down, like even even in poetry. So maybe in the near future, you’ll be able to read some of my poetry as I’m being more open about this. And I make music under the sophisticated psychos. And the music’s really cool. And so I put the emotion and things into music. There hasn’t been too many lyrics on this topic. But it’s food for thought, in this moment that maybe there’ll be songs in the future. Because I do spoken word poetry as well. Maybe I’ll create a piece where you know, I talk on this topic in a poetic kind of way to share and educate and be a ripple effect for others. To meditate on that some more, it’ll come to me but I do make coming from Detroit in the underground music scene. I do make beats and all the musics available on all streaming platforms, I actually have an EP coming out October 20. It’s in a few weeks here and I leaked a couple of my own music videos on YouTube. It’s on the sophisticated psychos YouTube page. But I actually teamed up with subtle energy. And so we put healing frequencies, we encoded healing frequencies in our music, and Eric Thompson, who owns created subtle energy sent me all these frequencies, and I could choose which frequencies I wanted on these beats that I’m releasing. And what stuck to me immediately was 639 hertz, and 639 hertz, Foster’s forgiveness, forgiveness on a planetary level with what we’re going through right now. And for self and for others, and just to mend our relationships, whatever kind of relation ship we’ve had with all these kinds of relationships that we’re dealing with. So I’ll send it to, I would love for you to check it out. And if your viewers want to check it out, too. I’m really proud, it’s something new, I feel like I’m really turning new leaves right now. So I’m really I’m really excited, you know, that we cross paths and that we’re on each other’s journeys. And knowing me more, I think you’ll probably understand my art more as well, maybe you’ll see it in the depths of my soul, when you’re seeing me on TV or film or something, that I’m not just acting that it’s actually comes from a place where I’ve had the courage to, you know, tap into these vulnerable moments. And, you know, that’s why actors and artists are who they are, because they’re willing to go there, you know, they’re willing to, to go there. It’s um, you know, it’s, it’s an honor, it’s an honor to be able to be a vessel for everything we’ve talked about.
Victoria Volk 1:02:36
That’s amazing. I just love how you’re channeling all of that into the, into the work that you do, and, and it does, it creates ripples. And I hope that this podcast does as well. And one of the messages too, that I feel I want to mention and that you shared is that it’s important to find your people. Find the people that support you, lift you up that, like you said, hold a mirror view of who you really are, and where you shine, and they lift you up.
Katie Chonacas 1:03:14
Yeah, I love Kundalini Yoga. I really found my tribe through Kundalini all these years before I knew the word Kundalini Yoga before I ever practiced it. I was naturally doing Kundalini growing up, I started doing Kundalini when I was eight, I would just do it naturally by myself. I didn’t even know I was doing it. Or what I was, I was just practicing it. And so that’s definitely in my tribe. I do a lot of voiceovers. And I love voiceovers because you can be as big and loud and wacky as you want and the wackier and the louder the better, the more fun it is, because in voiceovers and acting you don’t want to be a bad actor and overact but in voiceovers, they want you to go super big with animation because they can always bring you down but if you’re going so small down like this, they don’t know if they could bring you up so it’s really good to be bold and big. So I find through the vo community I’m able to you know be in a booth and I’m able to do my work and it’s all about my choices my intention and how I sound more so to what I look like and I feel like I’ve done a lot of on screen acting and I like to put it on the backseat for a while and I was doing other things and now I’m I’m gonna get back on screen again. But when I took the time out, part of the psychological journey of taking time out and and not being on camera and not being seen was a part of me hiding and I would just be hiding because I would feel judged by people right hiding the shame hiding the blame isolating so i’d feel safe to be wild, loud and crazy in a voiceover booth. But not having people look at me because I’m gorgeous or judge me or treat me a certain way because of how I looked or something that I’ve been through. So, I’ve been acting the whole entire time. I just kind of took a backseat from being on screen for a while just from you know the pressures of of life and stuff we’ve talked about. But I’ve done a lot of soul searching and digging and things we’ve talked about, I created my own podcast. So, if y’all want to check it out, it’s called she’s all over the place podcast. So, I’m grateful to have the podcast and I’m grateful to, you know, have the space to take the space to sort and figure this all out, and then to share it. And yeah, so um, I just took new headshots. And so now I’m going to focus on getting back on TV and film. So that’s, that’s very exciting.
Victoria Volk 1:05:32
Awesome, come out from behind the microphone, right? And it makes sense to me that you would feel like, 2e’re made feel small, and to shush, right? made to shush for a long time. And so your time to shine.
Katie Chonacas 1:05:49
I’ll just say like, like, I came out of the gate, like, you know, like, boom, all out. And then I’m out there and I’m doing these things. And then with the stuff we’ve talked about, now I’ve taken time and space to reflect, identify sort through them it took like a long time to because then you feel like you know what you’re doing, then you keep going, but then it’s like, wait, something’s still feels off. And there’s the confusion, the cloudiness, and there’s the whole journey that you’re going through. So, I feel like now, especially in 2020, since the lockdown I’ve been able to just really take a backseat and really stop everything stop all the patterns, stop all the cycles and just just let everything just like fall down. And when I think it’s all down, because before like I thought it was all down, and then I kept going, but but some stuff came out but but it wasn’t right. And so now I’ve been able to just really stop and just when you want to like okay, okay keep going node be able to stop more be able to stay still longer, and and more stuff has come up. And so now I’m excited because I since I really had held depth of space, you know, now I can like I said before I can take it and apply it to my work so I can go back on screen. Knowingly knowing like more confident than ever it’s like and this time execution like Bullseye like no one nothing, whatever is gonna stop me because through and through, in and out. everything that’s happened good bad in between. I know myself so well, like Socrates says Know thyself, before, it’s like you think you know yourself, and you’re always getting to know yourself. But now it’s like, in 2020. Now more than ever, right? Know thyself, I can take that ammunition and apply it to my craft into my work and make multi millions of dollars doing it with a smile on my face.
Victoria Volk 1:07:39
Amen. I love that. Because that’s your birthright. And you don’t have to do to be or say or perform in any way to receive love to receive. You know, we got to give that to ourselves first. And really, thank you for being my guest today. And for sharing all that you shared. And if people want to reach out to you, where can they find you? I know you mentioned the podcast.
Katie Chonacas 1:08:10
Yeah, she’s all over the place podcast subscribe. My handle is my brand is the sophisticated psycho. So, we’re on all music streaming platforms. But you know, people can just email me imagine [email protected] [email protected] and then you know, I’m on all the social media handles, I just go by chonacas my last name.
Victoria Volk 1:08:32
And I will put the links in the show notes.
Katie Chonacas 1:08:39
Yeah, my website, just chonacas.com that’s probably the best way to reach out. Everything’s there.
Victoria Volk 1:08:44
Thank you so much, Katie.
Katie Chonacas 1:08:46
My pleasure. Thank you, thank you really unique experience. And I just I love the name grieving voices. And I just, I really identified with it immediately. So, it was a really good fit for us. I really appreciate you. And it was an honor to share my story here, you know, because it’s like, if not now, when, you know, like when it’s like it’s been happening for so long, and I’m not getting any younger. And if we really wanted to make an impact, we just need to actually take action on those things. So, I feel like today was a big success for both of us. Thank you.
Victoria Volk 1:09:23
Thank you. Love that. All right, everybody. Thank you for tuning in. And like I mentioned earlier in the podcast, just send Katy some energetic love. And my grieving voice, my grieving heart goes off to you. And this is not the end. I have no doubt we will be keeping in touch.
Katie Chonacas 1:09:48
Yeah, definitely.
Victoria Volk 1:09:50
Thank you all for listening. Until next time, take care and much love.
