Life, Reinvented Quotes

“Sexual trauma is an action. It’s something that happens to you, not something that you are. What happens to us does not define us. What defines us is so much more than that. We are defined by our values, our actions, our attitudes, and our relationships. Although trauma can throw us and make us feel like we are not ourselves, that’s only the self in transition. Just as we previously struggled a bit to incorporate new experiences into our lives, such as losing a loved one or changing a career, healing from trauma implies a measure of struggle. Who you are, however, has not changed.”
― Erin Carpenter, Life, Reinvented: A Guide to Healing from Sexual Trauma for Survivors and Loved Ones

“Being sexually assaulted does change you. It’s impossible to have such a traumatic experience and not be altered. We need to mourn what we have lost because of the assault. It may be our innocence or a sense of trust in others. It may be that we grief over our past self. There is always loss when sexual violence is experienced.”
― Erin Carpenter, Life, Reinvented: A Guide to Healing from Sexual Trauma for Survivors and Loved Ones

“Even if you do not remember having a strong emotional response at the time of the assault, as is the case with dissociation or numbing, the very need to dissociate from the moment implies intense fear in the feeling of being overwhelmed.”
― Erin Carpenter, Life, Reinvented: A Guide to Healing from Sexual Trauma for Survivors and Loved Ones

“I firmly believe that dissociation keeps traumatic events at bay until we have the resources to deal with them. That is why events from the past may be repressed entirely, seemingly forgotten, or they may appear hazy to us. Sometimes past trauma can simply appear strange rather than traumatic, and not trigger any emotional reaction in us. Trauma can lie dormant for days, months, or even years. This has to do with dissociation and our own inner wisdom about our readiness to cope with the reality of our trauma. If the past trauma has resurfaced for you, you may feel overwhelmed and not sure where to begin in coping. However, the very fact of its arrival in the forefront of your mind is a signal that you are resilient enough to heal.”
― Erin Carpenter, Life, Reinvented: A Guide to Healing from Sexual Trauma for Survivors and Loved Ones

“Sometimes when a client struggles to grasp the reality of what has happened to them, I direct them away from their intellect towards their feelings. When sexual violence occurs, you feel as if something very wrong has just happened. Your boundaries are violated. You feel dirty, used, confused, and unsteady. You feel intense blame and shame. You feel alone and isolated. It feels like you can’t tell anyone. These are all clues that something truly destructive has happened. The beginning of healing usually starts here, by letting go of the myths and misconceptions. We begin by accepting a very sad truth.”
― Erin Carpenter, Life, Reinvented: A Guide to Healing from Sexual Trauma for Survivors and Loved Ones

“The overwhelming majority of survivors were assaulted by someone they know: a friend, acquaintance, relative, or someone they dated. This fact can lead to survivors feeling guilty that they should’ve “known better” or somehow seen “red flags” in their perpetrator’s behaviour before the assault. In reality I think the opposite is true. Our guard is down when we’re around people we know and trust. Friends, family members, colleagues, boyfriends, or girlfriends who commit sexual assault have violated the victim’s trust. This sense of betrayal can lead survivors of sexual violence to have difficulty trusting others.”
― Erin Carpenter, Life, Reinvented: A Guide to Healing from Sexual Trauma for Survivors and Loved Ones

“Sexual violence is ultimately not about pleasure; it is about power. Perpetrators like to be in control and have power over others.”
― Erin Carpenter, Life, Reinvented: A Guide to Healing from Sexual Trauma for Survivors and Loved Ones

“Women can also be abused by other women, and this happens often. These women often feel guilt, shame, and confusion because their experience does not match the stereotypical male-on-female sexual assault. This experience is real sexual violence, and is made all the more painful because the survivor feels alone and misunderstood.”
― Erin Carpenter, Life, Reinvented: A Guide to Healing from Sexual Trauma for Survivors and Loved Ones

“The “comparison monster” is nearly always with us. We are constantly comparing our experiences with others’, or what we believe their experiences to be. This allows us to gauge if we are “normal” or not. Everyone in our society understands a basic template about sexual violence. Unfortunately, the widely understood definition of sexual violence is at odds with the real world. Survivors are often comparing their experience of sexual assault, rape, or molestation with their ideas garnered from movies, TV, books, news reports, etc. When someone’s experience doesn’t “match up” (and it most often does not), they are left feeling confused. They often believe their trauma-related difficulties are somehow invalid. It’s as if what happened to them wasn’t “real rape” or “legitimate abuse”.
As people work through their trauma and heal, they tend to compare less and less. Survivors begin to accept their experience for what it is, and learnt to validate their own thoughts and feelings.”
― Erin Carpenter, Life, Reinvented: A Guide to Healing from Sexual Trauma for Survivors and Loved Ones

“The first step toward recovery is the choice to face reality. In many ways, the symptoms that survivors experience are the body and mind’s way of forcing you to look at what happened. Memories of sexual trauma seem to rocket around the brains of survivors, refusing to be at rest and constantly putting themselves at the forefront of the survivors‘ minds. The body also holds trauma that expresses itself in many ways. The body of mind work together to force survivors to relate directly to their past experiences. That is, to have a relationship to the past that is free of denial, repression, or distortion. This is a painful process, but it’s the only way forward.”
― Erin Carpenter, Life, Reinvented: A Guide to Healing from Sexual Trauma for Survivors and Loved Ones

“We are natural meaning-makers. Everything that happens in our lives is usually integrated into a long narrative about ourselves, others, and the world we inhabit. If we don’t have the capacity to make sense of our lives, we would be forever in confusion. Sexual trauma throws a big wrench in the system. We try in vain to make sense of what happened, and of the feeling and thoughts that are left in its wake.
It is very difficult to weave an incident like sexual assault into the rest of our experience, and, as a result, we have a hard time seeing it for what it really is. We forget it, repress it, or minimize it. We justify it or blame ourselves or outright deny it. And every time we think it has found a place to rest, it brings up again. It comes screaming at us, and we can’t look away.”
― Erin Carpenter, Life, Reinvented: A Guide to Healing from Sexual Trauma for Survivors and Loved Ones

“No matter what happened, when it happened, or with whom, there’s one thing that remains the same: it’s hard to believe. Sexual trauma is an event that shatters your world, sense of safety, and implicit trust in others. Your boundaries are violated in the most intrusive way imaginable. It interrupts you of a sense of control over your body and calls into question your entire sense of who you are.”
― Erin Carpenter, Life, Reinvented: A Guide to Healing from Sexual Trauma for Survivors and Loved Ones