A Reintroduction
Unfolding the whole map.
I’ve shared extensively about how I came into relationship with my ancestors.
The part I’ve largely left out, especially in this online space, is about the deeper process that was unfolding as that relationship was developing.
I am a survivor of childhood sexual abuse. I was molested by a family member for the first seven years of my life. The kicker is that I had fully repressed all memory of these experiences, allowing my perpetrator and myself to live double lives. I first wrote about this here.
The memories stayed repressed for 25+ years. Throughout that time, I had immense difficulty navigating life. I was dissociated, numb, distracted, disempowered, and confused. Warding off some distant sense that something was very wrong. But what? Romantic, platonic, and even professional relationships always left me reeling: proving again and again that I was unworthy, unlovable, too much— I was broken.
I was raised by Baby Boomers who fit the stereotype of emotionally deficient parents. Yet as I got to my mid-20s, meeting countless others with what I thought was a similar upbringing, I was made more and more aware of the distinct difference between how my peers and I seemed to be navigating and integrating our experiences. Something wasn’t adding up. Ten years in and out of therapy, mostly hearing platitudes. I would describe what I now know to be flaming red flags of CPTSD symptoms and a therapist would say: “It sounds like you need to learn how to take better care of yourself.” Or one time, rather infamously, “It’s hard to be in your 20s.” I spent more time blinking in disbelief at how useless it all felt rather than having any breakthroughs.
In November 2021 the first tremors made their way to the surface of my conscious mind.
A whisper of a memory. As if watching though a fog. A flash of a toy from my childhood. Sensations and activations in my body. Specific parts of my body. A flash of a family member. It was too much to process. It was deeply confusing. Nothing about it made sense. For weeks after this experience, I'd wake up with a constant urging in my head: call a particular person in my family and ask them what they needed to tell me. This felt ludicrous. I did not do that. Instead I tuned everything out, developed debilitating anxiety and depression, all but stopped eating, and barely got out of bed. A flash of the truth that made me want to die.
It would take six more months for the truth to erupt in a way I could no longer ignore. After a breakup, sobbing about how broken I was, my dear mentor was holding space for me and pressed me on why I thought this. Where did this thought come from? I believed it but I also knew it had an origin.
Suddenly, there it was. A thousand fragments of memory available for the first time in decades.
I wasn’t broken. I had been abused.
The map of my trauma unfurled. I realized that I had spent my life looking at the scale in the corner assuming that was the whole map. Never comprehending what "an inch equals 100 miles" actually meant.
It would take a long time to stabilize all of this. Truthfully, I still am.
Florence + The Machine would release a song within days of my reclaiming of memories which poetically gave words to my experience of the erasure of all points of reference I’d ever had in my life.
“Well, can you see me? I cannot see you /
Everything I thought I knew has fallen out of view /
In this blindness I'm condemned to /
Well, can you hear me? I cannot hear you /
Every song I thought I knew, I've been deafened to /
And there's no one left to sing to”
Though this, as a bottomless well of support, love, compassion, and resource have been my ancestors. This story is not simply my own, but yet another chapter of the story of a burden passed down though my lineages for a very long time. What became clear very quickly is that part of my mission is to shine a light onto this darkness. To talk about it. To say: this is the water we swim in. My story is not the exception. In my experience in recovery, it is one of the most common lived experiences. It is a toxin hiding in plain sight.
I am a practitioner for survivors of sexual abuse. My dharma is walking folks through the stabilization, recovery, and integration of these experiences. This work has already been happening. I have many Ancestral Lineage Healing clients who, in our first call, say something to the effect of “I don’t why I feel compelled to tell you this, but… this violation is a thing in my family.” To which I say: welcome, that is exactly why we are here, working together.
My Dharma sister Shelby Valentine (mentor, healer, guide) and I are devoted to creating safe spaces for women to process and heal from sexual abuse. Together, we hold the spectrum of experience from childhood sexual abuse to violent adult sexual assault. This is what we've been doing for a nearly two years now at Rewild and in the Lightworker Lounge monthly membership. We’ve never explicitly invited survivors in, but as survivors in recovery ourselves, the energy of safety is felt.
Something feels different now. Elemental fire offers transformation which is a form of purification. We are able to burn away what is no longer needed, and what no longer serves. In order for this to happen, there is a certain level of intensity, or heat, that is needed. In the fiery, tumultuous energies animating many forces on the planet, we must go in to get though this. The fire of transformation is here. While there is no urgency, there is a call to action.
We would love to invite you, if you are a survivor of sexual trauma or abuse, to our first event for survivors.
This work cannot be done alone. It is relational trauma and therefore must be healed in community.
This is a free 2 hour gentle somatic breathwork journey + confidential women's circle on the Full Moon, Tuesday, April 23rd at 7pm ET.
Somatic Release Breathwork is a breathwork modality centered around somatic expression and freeing / unwinding energy, emotions, or trauma stored in the body. It is a "down and in" approach to breathwork, allowing the nervous system to dysregulate (activate) itself, express and complete cycles, and re-regulate to repattern old patterns, beliefs, and behaviors. It is a liberatory experience and a powerful modality for clearing, purification, and grounding into the soma.
We would love to have you and to hold space for you.
If you have any questions, please feel welcome to reach out directly.
If you know someone who would benefit from this type of free support, please invite them and send this their way.
Thank you for reading.
In grief and gratitude,
Ashley