When I first graduated from college with my bachelors in psychology at the age of 31. It turned out that my first job was as a child abuse investigator. This was in 1980. I was a single mother raising two wonderful children and didn’t have any idea what I would later see as the most profound experience of the family and the love of a child.

In the eighties, incest and sexual abuse was still hidden and a family secret. Families, the legal system, the mental health system and society saw incest as a figment of a child’s imagination. Children were looked at as their parents property and responsibility, not societies. Laws set up for children’s protection were superficial and meaningless. As I did this job, I saw first hand, the struggle to protect a child from what the child looked at as normal behavior and to expose this abnormality was a betrayal of their love for their parents. The alternative at that time was just as extreme and abusive. Taking a child away from the only environment they knew, putting them in a scary environment of a hospital examination by a medical examiner, a sterile dormitory environment with other frightened children, a stoic judicial system, who gave the accused the right to be innocent before proven guilty and the child no rights at all. The Department of Child Services had the sole responsibility of developing proof with no resources or expertise to do so. It was known at the time that with the low pay, excessive hours Child Abuse Counselors would be burned out within 2 yrs. I stayed 3 yrs. I was really burned out by then, but if you care, it’s hard to leave and turn your back on the children. It was not until years later that I was able to appreciate my experience and come up with a way to share my experience as a part of the healing of victims. Ironically, by the time I left the Department, I was considered an expert in this field, because I had read the three books written on this subject. I continued to pieced together family dynamics, social systems and collective behaviors that showed up in every situation. This is the way I came to be involved with the process of healing. Where I get my real expertise is through the victims I see in my practice. Kim is an example of that. I can only sit in awe and respect as I witness the courage and strength of a survivor as I see them take back their soul and spirit back. I am the fortunate one to be able to see the truth about love.

The way I see the reason and the need to heal is because I see the survivor as a person that was stripped of their God given human rights to live their lives developing their talents, gifts and their purpose. I remember a client of mine who put this in perspective for me. We used her artistic talent to express her the pain in her soul. She brought in a series of four drawings. Each one represented the experience of loss and betrayal. The first was so frightening an abstract of black, reds, purples and browns. A reflection of her inner terror. The second was a picture of an ice cream cone representing her loss of her childhood. The third was of people with distorted bodies and faces, representing her confusion and lack of trust. The last was of a cute little girl with a dress, hair, a bow, shoes, socks and gloves; but no body. That’s how she saw herself with no soul or substance. I am so grateful for her and her gift to me. It instilled in me a desire to be part of the healing. I want to be a part of the people who have the courage and strength to heal.

I thank each one of you who read this as I see in you the power of love and the human spirit. You are the one’s seek the truth and have the courage to struggle to gain back what someone took from you. If I can help with your journey, please contact me through Kim.

Thank you Kim for creating a Safe Place for us all.