Survivor Haven

April 2001

The Heart of The Matter

Do you know me - really know me?
Can you tell me what you see?
Do you see inside my soul,
to the very heart of me?

How can you perceive
what you think you find within,
if you haven’t suffered with me,
never been where I have been?

Have you walked beside my shadow,
known the secrets I have kept?
Have you hidden in the darkness,
seen the tears that I have wept?

Have you felt my loneliness,
prayed for just a loving touch?
When you ask me how I’m doing,
do you really care that much?

Have you felt complete betrayal,
longed for someone you could trust?
Do memories haunt your days and nights;
a sentence so unjust?

How can you say you care
if you do not realize
that a tiny child within me
is forever paralyzed?

(c) 2001 Susan Maree

Many thanks to Susan Maree Jeavons for the above poem.

As some of you may know, April is Child Abuse Awareness month. Let us all hope that the additional attention to the horror known as child abuse will make the difference in the lives of those who suffer it on a daily basis.

For those whose stories are featured this month, I want to thank each of them for having the courage to speak up and take a stand against abuse in all its evil forms. It will be because of people like you that changes will be made in the way abuse is looked at and treated by the world in general. Because you tell your stories, placing not just a name but also an actual person behind the horror, I believe it makes the abuse more personal to those who read. They see that it isn’t a terrible thing in the abstract but something abhorrent that happened to you. That happened to a young child, wife or mother. To all of you I applaud the courage you show in telling your stories.

For those reading, our featured authors come from sites other than just Themestream this month. Each site has a comment section for the articles so if the work touches you, please take a moment and let the author know.

With the unannounced closing of Themestream on April 13, 2001 many of the links below became "dead" ones. We are working with the various authors to creat individual pages for their work. Thank you for your patience and please check back soon. May is looking to provide an entirely new format at Survivor Haven plus new subjects. We are hoping to have at least one self-defense/rape prevention article per month as well as start a listing of book reviews.

If you have read a book on child abuse, sexual abuse, domestic abuse, rape or the recovery and healing of these subjects and would like to submit a review, please contact me. Submissions should be sent in the body of an e-mail.

POETRY

Carol Huber’s poem reaches out and grabs the reader, making them know what it is like to be a survivor who feelsContaminated!

Chantel Marker gives a glimpse of the hell an abused child goes through in her heartbreaking In The Corner

Tenna Perry (yours truly) attempts to describe the struggle of the survivor’s soul in Soul Song

***POETRY CONTEST*** The 3rd Annual Child Abuse and Recovery Poetry Contest is underway at Suite 101. It is hosted by Susan Maree Jeavons, Editor of Child Abuse and Recovery

PERSONAL STORIES

Heidi Kaminski brings the effects of domestic abuse up close and personal in her Where Was The Tunnel Of Light?

INFORMATIVE ARTICLES

Susan Maree Jeavons offers an excellent article about the perpetrators of child sexual abuse in Profile of a Pedophile.

Chantel Marker offers another excellent article that deals with just what constitutes child abuse in Children Should Be Seen and Not Hurt!

Carolyn McBride touches on an often overlooked and unacknoweldged form of domestic abuse in Stone Walls Do Not A Prison Make

David Perry tells of what it is like living with a survivor of child sexual abuse and rape in Rape:A Four Letter Word

True Crime Stories

While I would normally not add a humorous article into such a serious topic, I came across the following from an ex-cop. He has several articles concerning the “stupid criminals” he has dealt with or heard of over his many years of service and his latest concerning a would be rapist was too good for me to pass up.

The author is Lem Jackson and he has graciously agreed to let me add Thank Goodness For Stupid Criminals #5 to this month’s newsletter.

**Warning**

Do not drink or eat while reading this article. Survivor Haven is not responsible for spewed coke or food on keyboards or monitors**

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Resources

National Clearing House On Child Abuse And Neglect
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
Date Rape Drugs
Child Abuse & Sexual Assault Prevention Page

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