Sexual abuse victims

Overview "Gathered here, in a collection of narratives, is a personal reflection on the post-traumatic lived experience of survivors of sexual violence. Chosen Permanence challenges the portrayal of sexual violence that centers rape, by offering an incisive look at what is achieved when survivors are provided a safe space to speak up. The decorative but necessary elements of this project include: first-person narration that is applied to every story as a way for survivors to stand as one in an...

Overview "Trauma is like an exclamation point internalized as a question mark. After being sexually abused as a child, I'd always wondered what was around the corner; I'd always braced against how it might hurt me. As a young adult, I'd often put myself at risk to muffle that eternal question What happened to me? and convince myself that I didn't know, didn't care. Still, I wondered who I could have been, who I would have become, without it. When I examined the abuse as a sober adult in trauma...