Dec. 16, 2025
99 – Justice Is Finding Peace: Childhood Sexual Abuse, Healing & Truth with Kath Essing
What if justice isn’t a courtroom verdict, but the peace that comes from telling the truth? On this episode of the 1 in 3 Podcast, Ingrid sits down with Kath Essing, author of The Courage to Speak Your Truth: Shifting the Narrative on Childhood Sexual Abuse, for a powerful conversation about healing when the legal system cannot deliver a conviction. Kath shares how suppressed memories of childhood sexual abuse resurfaced in adulthood, why survivors often shift their language from “abuse” to “...
What if justice isn’t a courtroom verdict, but the peace that comes from telling the truth?
On this episode of the 1 in 3 Podcast, Ingrid sits down with Kath Essing, author of The Courage to Speak Your Truth: Shifting the Narrative on Childhood Sexual Abuse, for a powerful conversation about healing when the legal system cannot deliver a conviction.
Kath shares how suppressed memories of childhood sexual abuse resurfaced in adulthood, why survivors often shift their language from “abuse” to “rape,” and how reclaiming accurate words can be a critical step in trauma recovery. She walks us through an 18-month police investigation, the emotional precision required during a four-hour official statement, and a facilitated call with her abuser—a moment that allowed her to reclaim her voice and return misplaced shame.
Together, Ingrid and Kath unpack the myths that keep survivors silent, including the “stranger danger” narrative, misconceptions about what perpetrators look like, and the unrealistic expectation that survivors must present as a “perfect witness.” Kath also explains how poetry and writing became a lifeline—capturing moments of crisis with clarity and helping loved ones fully understand her experience.
This episode explores the layered path to healing from sexual trauma, including talk therapy, somatic work, meditation, medication when needed, and daily practices that support mind, body, and spirit. Kath shares how she transformed resentment into connection through storytelling—and how naming the truth created space for peace.
As a mother, Kath discusses how to break cycles of abuse without fear-mongering: trusting intuition, maintaining open communication with children, and teaching that speaking up is an act of strength. The conversation also covers historical sexual abuse reporting, emerging technology that links survivor reports, and the importance of setting personal goals for reporting to make the process empowering rather than retraumatizing.
If you or someone you love is navigating childhood sexual abuse, suppressed memory, trauma recovery, or reporting historical abuse, this episode offers practical insight, hard-won wisdom, and a grounded reminder: you deserve peace.
If this episode resonates, subscribe to the 1 in 3 Podcast, share it with someone who needs support, and leave a review to help more survivors find this resource.
Kath’s links:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/kathessing/
https://www.instagram.com/kath_essing
https://www.facebook.com/bespeakconsultancy
https://www.amazon.com.au/Courage-Speak-Your-Truth-Narrative/dp/0648758060
1 in 3 is intended for mature audiences. Episodes contain explicit content and may be triggering to some.
If you are in the United States and need help right now, call the national domestic violence hotline at 800-799-7233 or text the word “start” to 88788.
Contact 1 in 3:
- Send your emails to 1in3podcast@gmail.com
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- Check out the website https://www.1in3podcast.com/
Thank you for listening!
Cover art by Laura Swift Dahlke
Music by Tim Crowe
00:00 - Welcome And Justice Reframed
01:59 - Kath’s Story And Book Blueprint
03:39 - Suppressed Memories And Adult Recall
07:03 - Making Sense And Healing The Inner Child
11:16 - Family, Bias, And Why Silence Holds
16:26 - Shifting Narratives About Survivors And Perpetrators
21:19 - Me Too Protest And Choosing To Report
23:54 - Inside An 18-Month Police Process
27:43 - Confrontation Call And Reclaiming Shame
31:28 - When Evidence Fails And Anger Remains
35:23 - Language, Rape Myths, And Legal Gaps
40:03 - Telling Family, Protecting Kids, Ending Cycles
44:47 - Poetry As A Healing Tool
48:53 - Empowerment Through Writing And Full Truth
WEBVTT
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Hi Warriors, welcome to One in Three.
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I'm your host, Ingrid.
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Justice looks different for everyone.
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For some, it may mean seeing their offender face legal consequences, but that kind of justice isn't always possible.
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As my guest today, Kath, so beautifully puts it, justice is finding peace.
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Here's Kath.
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Hi, Kath.
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Welcome to One in Three.
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Thank you so much for joining me.
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Thank you for having me.
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And so before we get into our conversation, could you give just a little bit of a background on yourself so everyone gets to know you, Sam?
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Um hi everyone, my name's Kath, and I am a mother of two.
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I live in at Bells Beach in Australia, down on the bottom of Australia.
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I'm an author and speaker, and I've just recently published a book called The Courage to Speak Your Truth: Shifting the Narrative on Childhood Sexual Abuse.
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So that's what we're here to talk about today.
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Yes, and there's a lot to talk about.
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Now, um, quickly, is the book I I listened to it on Audible on Spotify, but is there a hard copy of it available as well?
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There is a hard copy, and you can get that on Amazon or Booktopia.
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Okay, perfect.
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So let's start with what made you decide to write the book?
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I think more the book decided to use me as its vehicle, to be honest.
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That's how it felt.
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I I have this is my second book that I've published, and I always knew that I wanted to use my story as a way to inform and educate.
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About two years ago, I decided I wanted to do a TED talk.
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So I I spent three months working with a coach to define how that messaging would look and what those 18 minutes would look like.
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And when I presented that talk, I realized I had the blueprint for a book.
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So when I came home, literally four weeks later, the book was finished.
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So I sort of went into a bit of a writing frenzy.
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And the only block I had was really where does the story start and end?
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Because obviously it's my story.
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So it's um it's never ending.
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But I feel the part of the story that I've shared so far, there is a bookend to the beginning and end of the journey of remembering, recovering, and reporting my abuse.
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And I feel like that's the part that people need to be informed about.
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Right.
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Now, your abuse, you had repressed the memory for quite some time.
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Yes, which is actually statistically pretty um average.
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My story on many accounts, it was a male relative that abused me.
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My abuse, the first incident happened when I was five, um, and there were two major incidents that followed that.
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I had suppressed it completely.
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I did know that I was uncomfortable about this person's presence, but I I had suppressed it into my early 20s, and it came back like a tsunami.
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Um, and the reason I explored what was there was because depression had come knocking and for no apparent reason.
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So it's like a part of myself had been switched off so that the rest of me could function.
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Um and I functioned really well until I couldn't ignore the knock anymore.
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One thing you mentioned in the book was um how you it was like you had to relive the trauma again.
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You you lived it once when you went through it, repressed it, and then when all the memories came back, it was just having to relive it all again.
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And in some ways, relive it for the first time because when you see an experience from adult eyes, it's a very different, you know.
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Childhood trauma is so complex because we don't have the reference point or language or understanding of what's happening often when, particularly when it comes to sexual abuse, at a five at five years old, there's no context to violence, least of all sexual violence.
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Um, and to add to the complexity that 90% of us who are abused as children know our perpetrator, and 50% of us are related to that perpetrator, it just adds another layer of complexity that a little mind can't possibly make sense of.
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So making sense of it as an adult took a different lens, but the healing of that little girl within me is what had to happen after I made sense of the incidents themselves.
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Well, and I imagine it makes you you look back at your life and question a lot of things in your life too, right?
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Absolutely.
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And also honor a lot, you know, to think that those things were happening and alongside those incidents, I was very fortunate.
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I didn't live with my abuser, which many people do.
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Um, I had a lovely, happy, fun life.
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And so, you know, these incidents can shape us, but in my case, I've chosen for it not to define me in a way that holds me back.
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It's definitely part of my identity because I'm now talking about it so much publicly.
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But it is only one piece of the puzzle of who I am, and that's the way I see trauma.
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Like all of us have a story, um, and they're vastly different stories, but we have to come to peace with our own so that we can navigate the rest of life and enjoy ourselves.
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Another part that I liked is you talked about your mom and how she just she was a woman who was just very like what is I'm trying to think, feminist, I think I guess, in a way, um, but always out for like equal equality for everyone.
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And the reason I like to talk about mom is because I I feel like there's um misunderstanding about what it means for children who suppress their abuse as children, and that there's an assumption that the children had nowhere to go to share their story.
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Um, that wasn't the case for me.
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I know that as an adult, had I have come forward and told my mum what was happening, I know she would have heard me and listened and taken action.
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But I think that often these perpetrators are so skillful in the way that they pick their victims and also pick their weak spots.
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So I was an innate people pleaser.
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I didn't want anyone to be unhappy.
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I loved my family, I loved a community I was involved in, and I didn't want to wreck that for anybody.
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So, you know, being in a family with a woman who was so overt about justice wasn't enough to break through that suppression for me because this was in my family.
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This was very different to fighting a good fight for a group of people.
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This was my story.
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And um, you know, they talk about how, you know, in no other situation other than sexual violence are the victims really put under scrutiny.
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You know, if someone ro breaks into your house and steals your TV, people aren't saying, well, the owner, it's their fault because they shouldn't have had that TV in the first place.
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But when we have sexual violence, there's a a really complex way in which we navigate that in our society.
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And I think that's why the suppression is there for so many of us.
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Well, it's it's difficult to even talk to your family because you're, especially when it is family, because you're you're unsure of how they're going to react to that.
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Absolutely.
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And, you know, I did mention in the book that my abuser was in my dad's side of the family, whom I was estranged from as soon as I was able to make that happen.
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And I still didn't come forward.
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You know, like I think there's so many people that have read my book and reached out to me and told me that their abuser is still in their lives and they don't know what to do about that, other than protecting their own children.
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And that may seem really simple to someone outside, but when it's your whole existence and you're choosing between having a relationship with your own parents because you have to tell them that one of their parents or siblings was your abuser, um, it's very, very complicated and much more complicated than a simple I've spoken up or I didn't speak up.
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Did your family react the way you thought they would react when they found out?
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Um, yes, I I think there's a lot of shock, and particularly, you know, part of the reason I called the book Shifting the Narrative on Childhood Sexual Abuse is because I want to shift the narrative of what a victim or a survivor looks like and also a perpetrator.
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So I think we have this bias and assumption about what we think a survivor of this type of crime looks like, but we also have a bias about what the perpetrators look like, hence why so many get away with what they do.
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And so I think for me, when I first came forward, because I'd been um out of character and like really depressed, and that seemed really unusual for me and my vibrancy and personality.
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I think it helped make sense of why I had been spiraling down for a little while.
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But I also think it was really challenging for people who knew me well to calibrate the happy, athletic, popular girl having that going on in the background.
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Yeah, I imagine so.
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And then did it your parents were already divorced, right?
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That's right, yes.
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And did it draw like bigger lines in the sand or more resentment toward the other opposite families?
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Um, look, I think I had already I had to choose.
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When I came forward, I told my dad and asked him to inform the rest of the family because there were still children in that family.
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Beyond that, I I didn't actually have a relationship with my own dad before he died 10 years later.
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Um, so that was really challenging.
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And that wasn't because he didn't believe me, it was because it was his family and he didn't know how to manage that.
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So that was a big decision for him.
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And um, and I trust that and feel very strongly that there was intergenerational trauma.
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So I think if you are an adult and haven't dealt with your own story, then it's very hard to support a child who's ready to confront their own.
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Oh, absolutely.
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General generational trauma definitely carries, and it's um it's difficult to stop it, uh, especially if you're so immersed in it and it's it's difficult to recognize.
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And if you don't have the exterior support from other family members, I imagine it would be very, very difficult to stop.
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Awful.
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And I think that's why people often leave.
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That's their only sort of line of defense is to get out and start again.
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And um, I'm grateful that I only lost half of my family in coming forward.
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Um, there's people that I know that have had to walk away from their entire families because they're not ready to confront the often generations of um misuse and abuse that's happened.
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One thing I loved, I guess.
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So going back again to your mom is how you mentioned how you know in awe you were of her with her her uh fight for justice.
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And then you taking your children to the Me Too.
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Was it was it was it a march or was it just like a gathering?
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Yeah, it was a protest gathering on the beach.
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And um, you know, my son was six and my daughter was 10, and and I stood there and you know, it's really important to me, I think, to join, you know, the the numbers of abuse seemingly statistically are less for men on paper, but I I do believe that's only because we aren't really inviting men to speak up about it, and often there's extra layers of shame when it's a male perpetrator.
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And so I really want to bring up a strong, empathetic man.
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Um, and I wanted my son to sort of be joined into this conversation that I'm having with my daughter.
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But I stood there at this march, and when I saw the word justice being formed in front of me, I realized that was something I hadn't done for myself.
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And I felt like a bit of a hypocrite, actually.
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And when I looked at my children, I thought, if they ever come to me and something's happened, I want to be able to tell them that I did everything I could to ensure that the person who hurt me was brought to justice.
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And so that's when at that day I dropped them to school and I walked straight into the police station locally, and that started the process.
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Could you talk a little bit about that process and what it entailed and the length and the headaches and the all of the work?
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So it was an 18-month process from that first day walking in, and you know, I'm quite a spiritual person, and I I felt like it was often a bit like an out-of-body experience, and I was being held, and I felt very safe to do that, but I was terrified.
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So it was I walked in and I spoke to that first detective, and the first thing he said to me is, let's just check if your perpetrator is still alive.
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And um, it kind of threw me actually because it hadn't occurred to me that he wouldn't be.
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And so I feel very grateful that he was.
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And I got referred to a specialized um historical sexual assault unit and worked with a detective.
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And part of the process was me giving my statement, and that took four hours to in detail describe the incidents that happened, and um and the reason it's so important is because every word matters.
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And so that was pretty grueling, and I'd never done that before.
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You know, I realized that I was curating my story for my husband and my parents and my siblings because I didn't want anyone else to have to carry the heaviness of this story.
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So I curated it through language, I curated it through giving bits and pieces to different people.
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Um, but one thing I got to do in that investigation was call my perpetrator and confront him.
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And so there was a 12-minute conversation between us, and it was liberating and terrifying.
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And I I think I'd done so much healing and so much work that there really was nothing more for me to do than step through that process.
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So I did, and um and it allowed me to reclaim my voice and to really assert my certainty around the fact that you did not break me and the problem here sits with you, and the shame here sits with you.
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It's not mine to carry, and I hand it back.
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And so it was a very powerful part of the process.
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It's definitely not for everybody, but um, and it took me, you know, decades to get to the point where that was something that I wanted and needed, um, and I'm very grateful that I had an opportunity to do that.
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Unfortunately, because I there wasn't enough evidence, there was evidence that they couldn't find of me being um admitted to hospital after an incident happened when I was 11, but they couldn't find records of that.
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There was an eyewitness who um is also related to the perpetrator who just wasn't prepared to give a statement.
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And there was also a discrepancy between my four-hour interview in which I used the word rape and the three friends of mine that were interviewed, whom I first disclosed to 23 years earlier, and they all used the word abused because that's the word that I used when I first told them something had happened.
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So they suggested that in court um the defense would have ripped that apart.
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And so collectively we couldn't go to trial.
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So although he was arrested, he can't be charged.
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And part of me at that point was relieved that I felt I'd done what I needed to do.
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But then I have days where, as a mother and a woman, I feel angry that things are still set up to protect um those type of people.
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And particularly in these cases where the reality is lots of people take decades to get ready to confront it, um, then it's really set up for many of us to fail.
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It really is.
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And especially on when you think about words, because one in your 20s versus in your 40s, it especially after decades of healing, you're going to be more comfortable and confident using a stronger word like rape.
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But when it's first coming to you, it's a that's a very difficult word to use.
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I know my with my abuser, I had a very hard time telling him the word rape.
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I described to him what he had done to me.
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And he said, It sounds like you're calling me a rapist.
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And I said, I think that is actually the term I'm looking for.
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Uh, so it's very frustrating that a technicality of using rape versus abuse that far apart in time, plus that early in recognition of what happened versus that much long later healing-wise, of course, the terms are going to be different.
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Absolutely.
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And, you know, this ties back, doesn't it, into our societal messaging about what rape is.
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And, you know, we are brought up as men and women to believe that it's a stranger who abuses somebody in a dark alley.
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Like that's almost how we're it's not somebody known to the victim, it's not someone related to the victim.
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Like it's like we're having to reshape what that word actually means.
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And in addition to that, I actually hadn't remembered.
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It took another probably five or six years of therapy for me to remember the last incident.
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So the word wasn't even in my vocabulary around these incidents at that stage when I first disclosed.
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Um, so you know, there was there needs to be more trauma-informed understanding in the legal system for sure.
00:19:55.720 --> 00:20:04.759
So uh one thing you mentioned is how you didn't tell your family and friends exactly what happened because you were afraid of how they would react to that.
00:20:04.839 --> 00:20:27.240
And I think that's a very common amongst uh survivors of any form of trauma or abuse, is they well, it's not sugar coating because it's certainly not making it uh a nice situation, but you're leaving some of the bigger parts out or some of the actual stronger verbs or words.
00:20:27.480 --> 00:20:34.519
Um, but do you think is that one of the reasons you wanted to put it into a book as well?
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Or I mean, not necessarily waiting for your family to read the book, but just a way to sort of get your words out there beyond the police report.
00:20:45.960 --> 00:21:09.079
I think once I verbalized it to police, I well and truly had told um the people that mattered before the book came out, you know, that um many people, my husband, um, best friends, my mum and auntie, like they all read the book well before I, you know, that it came out.
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They saw my speech in which I reference um rape in that.
00:21:14.119 --> 00:21:23.000
I found it that I've part of the reason I put it off for so long is I wasn't ready for my children to know because of their development.
00:21:23.160 --> 00:21:29.319
So I hit a point where I was waited for that to be okay.
00:21:29.480 --> 00:21:31.240
If it's ever okay, I don't know.
00:21:31.400 --> 00:21:39.720
But the, you know, a huge part of my motivation for uh doing this is to stop my children's intergenerational trauma.
00:21:39.880 --> 00:21:44.279
My healing is about their healing too and and I'm very confident that I've done that.
00:21:44.440 --> 00:21:54.200
They have a very safe home and um and a great community of people around them and we have very open conversations and so that's important to me.
00:21:54.440 --> 00:22:12.680
The book as I said almost birthed itself and uh it just came through me in the way that it ended up presenting itself in the you know a lot of my poetry that I've put into the book is how I would make sense of my the words that would float and the feelings.
00:22:12.839 --> 00:22:19.640
You know anyone who's had childhood trauma understands that it's not like a movie of start to finish.
00:22:19.720 --> 00:22:26.200
There's fragments that you see and feel and smell and um and so it's like a puzzle.
00:22:26.359 --> 00:22:34.039
I liken it to a puzzle that you've got to put together and there's still pieces missing for me completely that I may never get back.
00:22:34.440 --> 00:22:42.759
But there's enough there for me to have a pretty accurate picture and and and also to know that the shame isn't mine to carry.
00:22:43.400 --> 00:22:55.640
And I I couldn't keep protecting people in my life because this was hard for them because it was drawing a wedge between myself and them and that was too much for me to bear.
00:22:56.359 --> 00:23:48.599
So about the poetry I really I I've not read a book like this before but I really liked how you would write a certain part and then end that chapter with a uh a poem and that poem almost made it I'm trying to think of the word um actually maybe I wrote it down it was oh yeah it was almost it kind of gave you this like okay I just read about what happened to a child and it's difficult but then the poem made it more reaffirming almost like reassuring like okay we and it summarized it too I think really well and it almost gave you that like okay I can I can tackle this next chapter and find out what happens in the next chapter I really thought that the poems added so much to the book.
00:23:48.920 --> 00:24:13.240
Oh thank you well many of those poems were written in moments of crisis and so the way that I put the book together was sometimes I already had the poem and you know as an example um in there there's a poem when I was deep in depression and so I wrote a chapter about depression based on the poem that I wrote 10 years ago.
00:24:13.400 --> 00:24:27.000
And in another case there was a poem there that my mum and sister had messaged me when I went and saw police and I gave my first initial statement and they asked me if I was okay and the poem just came through me in the car.
00:24:27.160 --> 00:24:29.160
So that's what I responded to them.
00:24:29.319 --> 00:24:40.200
So I used that in the book to show that that's how I how and it's you know it's interesting because it's hard to remember sometimes even who we were yesterday and what persona we had.
00:24:40.279 --> 00:24:45.079
And I find sometimes poetry helps me go back to those places really effortlessly.
00:24:45.240 --> 00:24:49.640
And so I I hope that's the role that they played in the book for Peb readers.
00:24:50.920 --> 00:24:54.519
Did you write poems before or is that okay?
00:24:54.920 --> 00:25:08.680
It's my it's a way that I've healed really forever and you know I've got friends who joke with me that they go through all their old um cards and letters from high school and they're like we just can't throw yours out because they're so beautiful.
00:25:08.839 --> 00:25:32.759
So I've I've always loved writing um and poetry for me is just how I make sense of I think some very deep feelings and I've never shared them before it's not something I ever intended to share but it is how I've made sense of what's going on for me and I often share that with people in moments to make sense of you know where I'm experiencing life.
00:25:33.319 --> 00:25:42.200
Okay so you said how poetry kind of helped you get through parts did writing the rest of the book also help in some of your healing process it absolutely did.
00:25:42.759 --> 00:26:10.119
It gave me a sense of empowerment and I think it's really helped me understand the degrees of healing and the layers in which we need to navigate for me I had chronic tonsillitis as a teenager and I look back now and I remember thinking one day a lot of these strange physical elements will make sense.
00:26:10.279 --> 00:26:28.920
And I look back now and I really do think that there was just so much suppression and there was so much I was holding back and and not just in the big ways but in the small ways too that sort of like I shaped myself into a being that was there to serve people, to make people happy to keep the peace.
00:26:29.079 --> 00:26:38.519
And so then a lot of my communication was based on making sure that everything was okay and what wasn't okay in the end was me.
00:26:38.759 --> 00:26:45.640
And I needed to start asserting my needs and part of that was actually sharing my whole story.
00:26:45.720 --> 00:26:50.200
Because I was feeling resentful and angry at people close to me for not understanding.
00:26:50.359 --> 00:26:53.400
But the truth is they didn't have all of the information.
00:26:53.799 --> 00:27:18.119
So it was the story between us that blocked that connection and so many people have said to me I had no idea and um which of course they wouldn't because if you haven't experienced this you wouldn't want to think about this being a part of someone you care about's life but it did actually create a really big wedge between myself and various people at different times of my life.
00:27:18.519 --> 00:27:32.440
That's a really good point that you bring up because I think that is quite common in anyone who's experienced any form of abuse is a resentment toward those closest to you for not being able to read your mind.
00:27:32.920 --> 00:27:42.680
Really I know when I first had gotten out of my relationship, I was living I formed this little bubble of this protective bubble around myself.
00:27:42.920 --> 00:28:01.720
And then as I went on for that first year, I started realizing I was getting really angry with those closest to me because I was questioning their intentions and I was like don't you understand why I'm questioning this can't you understand after what I've been through you know whatever.
00:28:01.960 --> 00:28:14.599
But yeah I think that's probably very I mean at least you and I but I think it's pretty common across the board for people to have that resentment just because you're not telling everyone what's going on.
00:28:14.680 --> 00:28:17.960
You're you're like you said it's it's building up inside.
00:28:18.440 --> 00:28:21.000
And you know we can only understand so much.
00:28:21.079 --> 00:28:41.160
You know I've had um friends who've passed away with cancer and I've had friends who've had partners you know break up marriages and have an affair and you know there's experiences that you sit back and witness and you learn from as a supporter and as a of those people surviving those things.
00:28:41.400 --> 00:28:47.400
But until you have witnessed it we can't possibly have the reference point to have total empathy.
00:28:47.720 --> 00:29:03.000
And so I think you know I had several miscarriages between my children and I remember having people who would have a miscarriage then come to me and say I just had no idea the depths of that sort of pain until I went through it.
00:29:03.240 --> 00:29:12.119
And you know that's how we all navigate life it's like we you know we can't expect people to understand if we're not willing to share our experience in it.
00:29:13.000 --> 00:29:17.319
And really what we've got to do is stay open and hold space for each other.
00:29:17.480 --> 00:29:23.640
And that's really only the way for us to connect on a variety of stories that we're all carrying.
00:29:24.599 --> 00:29:33.400
Not you don't have to get too personal into what you did for therapy but did you go into therapy right after these memories started coming back to you.
00:29:34.359 --> 00:29:39.559
Absolutely like I joke about the fact that I have one foot in both Eastern Western camps.
00:29:39.720 --> 00:30:08.759
Like you name a therapy and I've tried it and I'm I don't shy away from talking about that because that is why that I'm sitting here today with you with the strength that I have and so everything from meditate meditation to medication a sort of joke about having um there's times when I really needed that initially supportive medication had to help me navigate the initial stages of my trauma you know recovery.
00:30:09.400 --> 00:30:17.880
I did talk therapy for a long time and then there was a point where that felt like it was counterintuitive to my own healing.
00:30:18.119 --> 00:30:34.759
So then I think the next phase for me was really to get into the energetic healing because so much of what I carried was in my body and so much of it was carried there because I disassociated during my incidents that I left my body.
00:30:34.920 --> 00:31:11.640
So I had to then approach it from a more physical and spiritual sort of space and exercise and eating well and you know I think if we look at our own healing like through mind, body and spirit there's so many facets that need to be considered to be a well being and you know and talking is one aspect of it but there are many others and I just implore people to explore what feels right for them and what feels right at one stage or one therapist who feels great may not be a good fit for the next stage of healing.
00:31:12.279 --> 00:31:40.839
Oh definitely is there anything that you would have done differently or wished you would have done differently I wished I had of trusted myself and trusted those closest to me sooner but it is what it is you know and and it's easy to say that when you're on the other side of a response but you just don't know until you are open and vulnerable with people how they're going to receive it.
00:31:41.000 --> 00:32:03.799
So I do wish that I do also wish I had a book like this to have read before I went through the process because I which is part of the motivation for writing it I didn't I did couldn't find anything for specifically for adult survivors who had suppressed memories to and wanted to go through a historical case.
00:32:04.680 --> 00:32:29.559
And I've been inundated with people since writing the book who have had similar experiences but it feels like something we just don't talk about and and we're still putting you know shoving under the carpet because it's too hard it's too scary to think about people trust you know that we're close to hurting our children and we have to talk about it if we want the statistics and numbers to change.
00:32:30.119 --> 00:32:48.359
Did you did anyone just try to discourage you from either reporting it or writing the book um no but there was a few people that said you probably won't get the outcome that you want and so is it worth it?
00:32:48.599 --> 00:33:30.519
So the first time I sat down with the detective actually he shared statistics with me that I've put in the book which was he said look they believe only 23% of um historical cases and survivors come forward to report their crime from that 23% only 10% ever make it to court and from those that are in the court um go through the justice system only 1% will end in a conviction so I definitely knew that that was a slim chance but I think I so I think my advice to people would be if they choose to go through this process to be really clear on personally what they want to gain from it.
00:33:30.680 --> 00:33:43.000
You know for me it was very much being given the opportunity to confront my abuser was very much and so the police system facilitated that and that was extremely difficult.
00:33:43.160 --> 00:33:55.559
I stayed in bed for four days after that conversation it was like an immense psychotherapy session where pieces of me all just came together and I let go of so much.
00:33:56.680 --> 00:33:59.960
But it it was hard but it was important.
00:34:00.440 --> 00:34:18.840
So I knew I needed that someone else may not and so I think it's really important just to ensure that you are clear on what the objective is and um I think it's also important to understand that we can go to the police with this story and share it and not have it taken any further.
00:34:29.880 --> 00:35:08.760
And so collectively I think it's really important that we do speak up but it doesn't mean everyone wants to go through a full investigation or a trial I've actually had some interesting conversations with some individuals who there's technology that's being developed where people can start an account and more or less like use it as a journal as to this is what happened to me and then you can either take it to the next step or you can just leave it at that you can add to it you can edit whatever I think that's going to be so helpful for victims and survivors.
00:35:09.159 --> 00:35:31.719
Amazing and I saw a documentary about an American about the issue of American college rape culture and um that one of the women who was raped I can't remember what college it was but she was in technology and she created an app where individuals because I think the statistics are that the the rapists are often raping multiple victims.
00:35:32.039 --> 00:36:01.159
So to to minimize the chances of that they she created a way in which you can file your case and then when someone else triggers that name then those two people get connected and I think you know in child sexual abuse that that would be powerful because I'm sure in my case there's multiple victims and um and that would make all the difference in this person going to jail if there was more than just my story.
00:36:01.639 --> 00:36:22.199
Absolutely and I, you know, if you know that there's another victim out there then you just feel even more empowered and you know perhaps the two of you or more than two of you can work not together that sounds like you're making up a story but uh join forces more or less to take action.
00:36:22.840 --> 00:36:33.800
For me, if anyone else needed that like I feel like I've got what I needed if anything else anyone else needed that then my all of my the work that I've done would support their case.
00:36:34.039 --> 00:36:47.320
And so that's really empowering and important to me to know that I can help someone else um you know I'm very fortunate I have the resources and um the support to do the healing that I've done.
00:36:47.480 --> 00:37:24.280
Not everyone has that and so you know even though these incidences are vastly different so are the ways in which we can heal you know there's people that don't have the privilege that I have and and that's part of why I went to the police because I thought if I can't make this happen and I'm pretty credible as a witness then how difficult is that going to be for somebody whose life has taken a different turn and they've needed drugs to medicate themselves because their trauma's so vast and or chosen a career that then you know makes them as a witness not as credible.
00:37:24.440 --> 00:37:36.280
You know there's lots to factor in and and I think that you know we're just set up these people are even more set up to fail than than I was so that's why I'm talking about it.
00:37:36.840 --> 00:37:56.519
I also love that you wrote the book even though it didn't have that 1% outcome of a conviction because I think that is so empowering as well because you took the steps you filed a report you pressed charges and it didn't go give it the outcome you wanted but then you wrote a book about it too.
00:37:56.599 --> 00:38:19.800
You took it an extra step to write the book and that I think is so incredibly powerful for others as well because I mean I would think if if this woman could do all of this and write a story about not succeeding at a conviction then perhaps I can say something too well thank you.
00:38:19.960 --> 00:38:32.679
And that was the I remember the moment sitting on the bed when I chased up the outcome with the police and I remember sitting there just being witness to myself thinking okay so what does this mean?
00:38:32.920 --> 00:38:49.800
And part of me was excited because then I felt like it was my story to do what I wanted with and it was exactly that it was the the feeling of have I failed and then reshaping that to say no I think the society has set us up to fail.
00:38:49.960 --> 00:39:01.800
And I want people to know that even though the statistics are against us in getting justice, that justice can be found in smaller steps along the way for our own healing.
00:39:01.960 --> 00:39:14.440
And really at the end of the day that is the most important part if you know one of my favorite poems a Buddhist um saying is you know anger is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.
00:39:14.920 --> 00:39:17.480
And I was sick of drinking poison.
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