Everyone Has a Story…
Tell Yours
& Heal.
Marie
At the start, we were hopeful and ambitious. We decided to create Our Silent Voice, an anthology of stories submitted by survivors of sexual assault, harassment, and domestic violence, as a means to speak out about an issue that so many endure in silence. And as our idea became a reality, we focused on our concept, collecting poems, essays, fiction, and how to create something with impact.
We spoke to people we knew about this and were both encouraged and chilled to find that so many said: yes, this is needed. We knew we could write and got excited about the idea of a collection of stories. We had great long talks about how freeing this might be for so many. This could be a key to undo the stigma and silence, and get to the victory of letting it out… letting it all go. We believe in the research that says, yes, writing your story can be healing.
Then the submissions started to come in. We talked about each piece. Moved by the extraordinary work, humbled by the strength and bravery of the human spirits who submitted their stories, we felt strongly that we could not ask anyone to do this if we did not go through the process ourselves. So, we wrote ours.
Janet
Especially shaken and rocked to the core by the 2018 testimony of Dr. Christine Blasey Ford during a Supreme Court Nomination broadcast, I was where she was, at the party, in the room, in California during the year 1964. I’d held what happened to me for so long, I knew my story had to be told.
It was hard to write. It was painful. All the pictures, memories, acrid smells, and physical pain arose and became part of the process. I wanted to quit. I couldn’t stop crying.
Then I hit print. When I read it out loud, in the bedroom, retching tears all by myself, something happened. I read it again, and the weight of the consuming silence was lifted, just a little bit. I read it again, my tears dried, and the story emerged. It was outside, on its own, standing separate.
Marie
As I began this project, memories and stories of my own began to float to the surface. They beg to be brought to light, somehow. They do show themselves in pieces I have revised and honed and submitted.
But I got caught up in something else too. As I told friends and family about the project I was working on, I got caught up in the reality that almost every person I spoke to about it said something like, “Oh. Yeah. I know…let me tell you about what happened when I…” and the chilling fact is that everyone has a story – but not everyone has a voice.
We worked on this website, to serve, to give people voice, more than just a request to submit. Our colors are chosen carefully to be soothing, our resources, listed for those who may genuinely need immediate help. Our writing prompts – a heartfelt reach for your virtual hand as you go over your own words, and feel those things all over again. And a suggested playlist just to add a twist of victory and a smile while you go.
As Janet says, we are humbled and awed again and again as we hear the things that need to be told, read about the moments survived and put into a creative form. It’s like watching a phoenix fly up from the ashes every time. This is Our Silent Voice #notsosilentanymore!
We are calling upon the bravery that resides in all of us.
Hit the button below, you are home.