Quotes & Sayings About Abuse Recovery

You're too sensitive' victims of sexual abuse are told over and over by those whose reality depends on being insensitive. Most adults who have been in the victim role cringe when anyone tells them they are sensitive. In fact, sensitivity is a lovely trait and one to be cherished in any human being. — Renee Fredrickson

That night, when the creature sleeps, when he sleeps, the mother escapes into her daughters' room. She tells her daughter that the creature's afraid of her having too much love, too much heart. She takes a tube of lipstick and drags it across her finger like a knife, marking it across her daughter's cheeks, red, blood, war paint. — Elijah Noble El

Christy isn't a case, he's a person. — C. Kennedy

All humans at some time experience injustice, assault, disqualification, invasion and betrayal. No person is completely shielded. We need not trace our family trees very far back or study for long what life was like for our forbears to uncover humanity's abusiveness. The inherited scars of our multigenerational families exist in our family systems as we know them today. The abuse of the past often exists as the shame of today, and the shame is perpetuated through our patterns of interaction. — Merle A. Fossum

It is important to learn about being multiple, and what works for their healing, from your client. To work with the alters, rather than trying to get the ANP to control the rest of the personality system. — Alison Miller

Some of the most effective segments are interviews with various staff members, including Aila, who works for the center's legal department. She explains the difficulties of rape prosecution, concluding that "only the survivor" can truly define justice. - Kirkus Review — Robert Uttaro

I can't remember the words she spoke when they finally opened the garage door and yanked me inside, but I was petrified. It wasn't sound Mom's screams or the jolt of her grabbing me by the shoulders and shaking me like a rag doll that plagues my memory, but the look of her eyes- wide, wild, and unrecognizable. — Maggie Young

As we move away from the old role in which we were helplessly entrapped as a victim, we make friends with the people who affirm us. Their enthusiasm about us mirrors the positive experience we are having. — Maureen Brady

I want everyone that has been abused by someone in their childhood to know that you can get past it. Having DID is not the end of the world; it's the beginning of your new life. DID allows the victim of exceptional abuse the ability to "forget" the abuse and continue living. Without it, I may have gone crazy as a teen and spent my life in a as a teen and spent my life in a psychiatric hospital. — Dauna Cole

Sometimes we self-sabotage just when things seem to be going smoothly. Perhaps this is a way to express our fear about whether it is okay for us to have a better life. We are bound to feel anxious as we leave behind old notions of our unworthiness. The challenge is not to be fearless, but to develop strategies of acknowledging our fears and finding out how we can allay them. — Maureen Brady

Honey, I usually get $300, but I like you, so I'll just take $200. — Dianne Harman

Although healing brings a better life, it also threatens to permanently alter life as you've known it. Your relationships, your position in the world, even your sense of identity may change. Coping patterns that have served you for a lifetime will be called into question. When you make the commitment to heal, you risk losing much of what is familiar. As a result one part of you may want to heal while another resists change.
Courage to Heal Workbook by Laura Davis — Laura Davis

Your body, mind and soul are sacred space. Your happiness is sacred. — Jan Porter

Childhood trauma does not come in one single package. — Asa Don Brown

Psychological and emotional wellness is an ongoing process for everyone. — C. Kennedy

One way [to recovery] would be by creating the best possible romance book or happy ending scenario for you ... out od your own experience. Another way would be to look at it as it is: a wake-up call to action to create a more humane world, without discrimination and sexism. — Elina Juusola

Writing therapy is my form of healing. Try and detach yourself from painful memories by infusing characters and then stepping back. — Phil Wohl

Recovery can take place only within then context of relationships; it cannot occur in isolation. — Judith Lewis Herman

It is a childish notion that once established, our boundaries will never be transgressed again...We shall have to stand for ourselves repeatedly for the rest of our lives. As we practice doing this, we come to greater ease...Eventually it may float over entirely into the positive realm - becoming only another chance to demonstrated our worthiness. — Maureen Brady

To forget and to repress would be a good solution if there were no more to it than that. But repressed pain blocks emotional life and leads to physical symptoms. And the worst thing is that although the feelings of the abused child have been silenced at the point of origin, that is, in the presence of those who caused the pain, they find their voice when the battered child has children of his own. — Alice Miller

For change to occur in us, we must be willing to enter the wilderness of the unknown and to wander in unfamiliar territory, directionless and often in the darkness....We do not need to keep every little thing under control. In fact, we find ourselves only by allowing some falling apart to happen. — Maureen Brady

Forgiveness is giving up the hope that the past could have been any different. — Oprah Winfrey

Your instincts may tell you that you can't survive if you experience feelings. But they are leftover child instincts. They're the ones that first told you to freeze your feelings. They themselves are frozen and haven't grown with the rest of you. These instincts don't know that you're far more capable of learning to cope with overwhelming emotion now than when you were a [child]. — Maureen Brady

You cannot make yourself have a flashback, nor will you have one unless you are emotionally ready to remember something. Once remembered, the memory can help you to face more of the truth. You can then express your pent-up feelings about the memory and continue on your path to recovery. Think of the flashback as a clue to the next piece of work. No matter how painful, try to view it as a positive indication that you are now ready and willing to remember. — Beverly Engel

There's talk he's become emotionally unhinged. — Dianne Harman

Don't try to be brave all at once. Take it in steps. — C. Kennedy

If I were free, as a physician, to say what I pleased, I would tell every abused person I see that there is an entire world out there that is nothing like the one you're living. Go discover it. — C. Kennedy

We are all damaged. We have all been hurt. We have all had to learn painful lessons. We are all recovering from some mistake, loss, betrayal, abuse, injustice or misfortune. All of life is a process of recovery that never ends. We each must find ways to accept and move through the pain and to pick ourselves back up. For each pang of grief, depression, doubt or despair there is an inverse toward renewal coming to you in time. Each tragedy is an announcement that some good will indeed come in time. Be patient with yourself. — Bryant McGill

In addition to reaching out for help, you will also need to reach within yourself. Your biggest ally will be your emotions. Through them, you will learn more about what really happened to you, how the abuse affected you, and what you need to do in order to heal. Your emotions will enable you to reclaim the self you long ago hid away. — Beverly Engel

We know that you don't want to be a drunk and you don't want to be hooked on addictive drugs. You do it because you can't cope with your life without some sort of support, even if that support is damaging. — Chris Prentiss

For anyone who wonders what it's like to have a tragedy shatter your existence, this is what I would tell them: it's like going through the motions of everyday life in a zombified state. It's having outbursts of anger for what seems like no apparent reason, for even the smallest of offenses. It's forgetting how to be your once cheerful, perky self, and having to relearn basic social skills when mingling with new people (especially if those people are ignorant, or just plain terrible at showing sympathy). It takes a while to re-learn all those basic skills. Maybe...it's possible. Maybe you have to want your life back first, before it can start repairing itself But then you also have to accept that the mending process may take the rest of your life. I don't think there's a set time limit for it. — Sarahbeth Caplin

Dissociation leaves us disconnected from our memories, our identities and our emotions. It breaks the trauma into digestible components, so that different aspects of the trauma get stored in different compartments in our brain. What happens as a result is that the information from the trauma becomes disorganized and we are not able to integrate these pieces into a coherent narrative and process trauma fully until, hopefully, with the help of a validating, trauma-informed counselor who guides us to the appropriate therapies best suited to our needs, we confront the trauma and triggers in a safe place. — Shahida Arabi

A dear friend best expressed, in a few words, the aim of this book. When she reflected on my recovery from Alzheimer symptoms she stated: "You came back to life." She was right. For me, losing the ability to think, talk, and feed and clothe myself would be the same as dying. If you (or someone you know) suffer these symptoms, I want to bring you back to life." "Avoiding certain foods can reverse the many conditions caused by nerve damage - including damage to the nerves of the brain. The nerves of the brain can recover from years of abuse. — William E. Walsh

This is the part they don't tell you about in the movies. Or in On the Road. This is not rock 'n' roll.

You are not William Burroughs, and it doesn't make a damn bit of difference if Kurt Cobain was slumped over in an alleyway in Seattle the day Bleach came out. There is no junkie chic. This is not Soho and you are not Sid Vicious. You are not a drugstore cowboy and you are not spotting trains. You are not a part of anything - no underground sect, no counter-culture movement, no music scene, nothing. You have just been released from jail and are walking down Mission Street, alternating between taking a hit off a cigarette and puking, looking for coins on the ground so you can catch a bus as you shit yourself. — Joe Clifford

I know you're in a world of pain, but that pain will lessen. At the beginning you can't see that. You can only see your pain and you think it will never go away.
But the nature of pain is that it changes - it changes like a sunset. At first, it's this intense red-orange in the sky, and then it starts getting softer and soften. The texture of pain changes as you work through it. And then one day, you wake up and realize that life isn't just about working through your incest; it's about living, too.
- survivor of child sexual abuse — Ellen Bass

You survived the abuse, you're going to survive the recovery. — Mariska Hargitay

They got drunk and high on a regular basis, but this is a vestige of youth that you either quit while you're young or you become an addict if you don't die.
If you are the Old Guy In The Punk House, move out. You have a substance abuse problem. — Bucky Sinister

I love like a beaten child and I trust like an addict. — Kris Kidd

Everything you need to heal is inside yourself. You only need support and encouragement to listen to yourself - to your thoughts, feelings, imagery, and inner spiritual urgings. A book, like a therapist or group, can only guide you, helping you to say out loud what you dared not say even to yourself. — Renee Fredrickson

Having one's mother or father or past abuser admit to their crimes or even apologize for them changes nothing
certainly not what they did. Rather, such an apology would give you the psychological permission to "move on" with your life.
But you do not need anybody's permisson to move on with your life.
It does not matter whether or not those responsible for harming you ever understand what they did, care about what they did, or apologize for it.
It does not matter.
All that matters is your ability to stop fondling the experience with your brain. Which you can do right now. — Augusten Burroughs

Toxic relationships are dangerous to your health; they will literally kill you. Stress shortens your lifespan. Even a broken heart can kill you. There is an undeniable mind-body connection. Your arguments and hateful talk can land you in the emergency room or in the morgue. You were not meant to live in a fever of anxiety; screaming yourself hoarse in a frenzy of dreadful, panicked fight-or-flight that leaves you exhausted and numb with grief. You were not meant to live like animals tearing one another to shreds. Don't turn your hair gray. Don't carve a roadmap of pain into the sweet wrinkles on your face. Don't lay in the quiet with your heart pounding like a trapped, frightened creature. For your own precious and beautiful life, and for those around you - seek help or get out before it is too late. This is your wake-up call! — Bryant McGill

It appears that DDNOS is the intentional goal of these abusers, but DID sometimes results from a failure of programming.
In DDNOS, the ANP is always present, even when another part is in control of the behavior and feelings. — Alison Miller

If I were to create a word that more accurately describes alcoholism and addiction, I would say it was dependencyism. Sounds silly, doesn't it? Yet it's no sillier than the word alcoholism. The reason alcoholism no longer sounds silly to you is because you're used to hearing it, reading it, and thinking about it. — Chris Prentiss

The most important thing in defining child sexual abuse is the experience of the child. It takes very little for a child's world to be devastated. A single experience can have a profound impact on a child's life. A man sticks his hand in his daughter's underpants, or strokes his son's penis once, and for that child, the world is never the same again. — Laura Hough

It is only when we feel deprived that we resent giving to others. Self-care does not mean you stop caring about others; it just means you start caring more about you. Start thinking about yourself more and others less. Since you have a choice between taking care of someone else, or giving to yourself, try choosing yourself sometimes. — Beverly Engel

Eating disorders are prevalent among women who were sexually abused as children. They seem to have components of other symptoms such as obsessions, compulsions, avoidance of food, and anxiety, and they primarily include a distorted body image and feelings of body shame.
For some women, eating disorders are related to the loss of control over their bodies during the sexual abuse and serve as a means of feeling in control of their bodies now. Eating disorders can also be indicative of the developmental stage and age at which the sexual abuse began. Women with anorexia and bulimia report that they were sexually abused either at the age of puberty or during puberty, when their bodies were beginning to develop and they felt a great deal of body shame from the abuse. By contrast, women with compulsive eating report that the sexual abuse occurred before the age of puberty; they used food for comfort. — Karen A. Duncan

'My problem was comparatively simple,' Marcus said. 'One kiss was enough to solve it. But that doesn't mean one kiss is enough to wake everyone up and end every nightmare. [ ... ] That's okay,' Marcus whispered to him. 'One kiss doesn't need to be enough to let you know that the nightmare is really over.'
Liam swallowed rapidly, the world around him becoming embarrassingly misty.
'I'm not going anywhere,' Marcus promised. 'There'll be as many kisses as you need.'
Tilting Liam's head back, Marcus dipped his head and brought their lips together one more time. Liam sighed softly into the kiss and, very slowly, woke up just a little bit more. — Kim Dare

It is time to embrace mental health and substance use/abuse as illnesses. Addiction is a disease. — Steven Kassels

Adversity is neither friend nor foe. It is a common acquaintance that is desired less and rewarded most when embraced. — Carolyn Wells

To heal from child sexual abuse you must believe that you were a victim, that the abuse really did take place. This is often difficult for survivors. When you've spent your life denying the reality of your abuse, when you don't want it to be true, or when your family repeatedly calls you crazy or a liar, it can be hard to remain firm in the knowledge that you were abused. — Ellen Bass

Some people stand and move as if they have no right to the space they occupy. They wonder why others often fail to treat them with respect
not realizing that they have signalled others that it is not necessary to treat them with respect. — Nathaniel Branden

Sam groaned. A warmth on her face alerted her to the new morning. She opened one eye and peered at the fuzzy daylight streaming in through the window. Her head throbbed like a bitch. Her mouth felt like a carpet. She pushed herself off the couch and stood up shakily, kicking bottles as she stumbled to her small kitchen. Every movement was painful and slow. She was a sloth tight-roping through time. She held onto the basin for a moment to steady herself. She grabbed a plastic cup and opened the tap, letting it flow as she filled and refilled it, gulping down as much water as she could. She splashed her face, neck and chest with water, then refilled the cup and dumped the contents over her head. She stood there, unaware of the moments passing by, as the water dripped down her body. Willing herself to wake up and feel better. Willing the nausea into oblivion. — Adelheid Manefeldt

There are tons of kids out there who endure chronic abuse and suffer in silence. They can't trust anyone, they can't tell anyone, and they have no idea how to get away from it. — C. Kennedy

Healing isn't just about pain. It's about learning to love yourself. As you move from feeling like a victim to being a proud survivor, you will have glimmers of hope, pride and satisfaction. Those are natural by-products of healing. — Ellen Bass

In order to break free from the chains that bind, one must take whatever action they can to disconnect internally from the larger systems of oppression, of which the family unit is merely a microcosm. — Sil Lai Abrams

Trauma does not have to occur by abuse alone... — Asa Don Brown

Recovery unfolds in three stages. The central task of the first stage is the establishment of safety. The central task of the second stage is remembrance and mourning. The central focus of the third stage is reconnection with ordinary life. — Judith Lewis Herman

When we feel like giving up, like we are beyond help, we must remember that we are never beyond hope. Holding on to hope has always motivated me to keep trying. I have found this hope by connecting with others. I've found it not only in individuals who have dealt with eating disorders but also in people who have battled addictions and those who have survived abuse, cancer, and broken hearts. I have found much-needed hope in my passions and dreams for the future. I've found it in prayer. Real hope combined with real actions has always pulled me through difficult times. Real hope combined with doing nothing has never pulled me through. In other words, sitting around and simply hoping that things will change won't pick you up after a fall. Hope only gives you strength when you use it as a tool to move forward. Taking real action with a hopeful mind will pull you off the ground that eighth time and beyond. — Jenni Schaefer

Sounds of depression
remembering rejection
Hope turns to despair
black roses everywhere

Keep hearing echoes
voices in my mind
repeating endless lies
evil in disguise — Diana Rasmussen

No matter what, the day didn't feel like Christmas to her.

She remembered years ago, when she had been just a little kid, and the word had been enough to make her happy. Nothing stirred in her now. Her childhood felt like it had been in another life. As she sat alone in her room with tears drying to her face, she resolved that no matter what the calendar said, it wasn't Christmas.

If it was, she'd feel happy, not depressed. — Kayla Krantz

A learning curve isn't a perfect arc. — C. Kennedy

Out of all the piles of dirt, garbage, and shit we have been handed, we can grow a patch of daisies. — Patti Feuereisen

When you push someone's head under water for 5 minutes, they will drown. It doesn't matter if the person is a sinner or a saint. It's just a natural process. If their head is under water, the lack of oxygen will make them drown. That rule applies to everyone, good or bad, equally. It doesn't matter if the drowning person has strong moral fiber.
And it doesn't matter if you're a good or a bad person, once you become addicted to drugs. What happens next is inevitable. It's a natural process that happens in everyone's brain, once the drugs take over. So don't ever fool yourself into thinking that only weak or bad people get addicted. — Oliver Markus

This book is dedicated to those who have died as a result of mind control and/or ritual abuse, and those who have lived when they would rather have died. — Alison Miller

It is not possible to be truly balanced in one's views of an abuser and an abused woman. As Dr. Judith Herman explains eloquently in her masterwork Trauma and Recovery, "neutrality" actually serves the interests of the perpetrator much more than those of the victim and so is not neutral. Although an abuser prefers to have you wholeheartedly on his side, he will settle contentedly for your decision to take a middle stance. To him, that means you see the couple's problems as partly her fault and partly his fault, which means it isn't abuse. — Lundy Bancroft

Memories demand attention, and these memories will have teeth. — C. Kennedy

In a condition of struggle and of failure we must be able to say "I must try harder" or "I must try differently." Both views are essential ... A change in either makes for a change in outcome.
When we say "I must try harder" we mean that the most relevant variable is something within us - intention, will, determination, "meaning it" .
When we say "I must try differently" we mean that the most relevant variable lies in the situation within which intention is being exerted, that we should look to the environment, to the ways it pushes and pulls at us, and in this study find the means to alter that interaction. — Allen Wheelis

Because of you, Michael, my heart begins to grow wings. — C. Kennedy

I let go of false hope. I let go of the hope that they would transform in favour of working on my own transformation. I let go of the hope that they would HEAR me. I let go of the hope that they would SEE me. Instead of my hope being in THEM, I listened to me. I heard me, I saw me, I validated my own pain and I began to emerge from the broken life I had been living. — Darlene Ouimet

stars are the scars of the universe — Ricky Maye

An engaging examination of a painful subject, with a focus on healing and forgiveness. - Kirkus Review — Robert Uttaro

your abuser tried to map your life for you. But he does not own you, and you have the freedom and the power to overcome and transcend the (negative) associations. You deserve to be happy, to be free of any feelings of shame or guilt or fear. You have the right to a completely satisfying sexual life. You are a righteous young woman. If you can get in touch with the feelings and consciously change the awful associations, you can re-map your life. — Patti Feuereisen

So often survivors have had their experiences denied, trivialized, or distorted. Writing is an important avenue for healing because it gives you the opportunity to define your own reality. You can say: This did happen to me. It was that bad. It was the fault & responsibility of the adult. I was - and am - innocent. The Courage to Heal by Ellen Bass & Laura Davis — Ellen Bass

I am small.
So are stars from a distance. It's all a matter of perspective. — C. Kennedy

There was a moment of hesitation in which Joe looked into her eyes, and she looked back without flinching. Many a time, he had been at the same game with her, and she had always crumbled, bowing to his will. Now, he must have realized he was looking into the eyes of a stranger. She was someone he could not recognize, a foreigner inhabiting the body of that old Clairey, the girl he had abused, intimidated, and broken. Clairey decided then and there she would no longer cower before him. It was almost as if she were daring him to strike her in their unspoken exchange. — Tracy Winegar

It is strange ... the reasons one feels he doesn't deserve things. — C. Kennedy

Denial protected us, screening out certain experiences & feelings until we grew strong enough to relate to them...Yet it also dropped a curtain over our experience, obscuring it, leaving us with a sense of missing pieces. For instance, when we achieved something, we felt like an imposter. Or, though we had a relationship with a significant other, we often felt alone and unrelated to anyone. — Maureen Brady

no one can recover if they won't admit the wrongdoings.
i won't recover if i pretend it was all sunshine.
i have to remember his vindictive temper and realize that sheltering the house from the storm wasn't actually going to make a difference if i still got damaged in the process. because then it's just another broken house with no one to tell its story. — Taylor Rhodes

Someone once asked me how I hold my head up so high after all I have been through. I said it's because no matter what, I am a survivor NOT a victim. — Patricia Buckley

See it for what it is and own it, rather than rethink it so you don't have to deal with the trauma of the abuse. This is the only way to move on--through acceptance. — Shannon L. Alder

Don't judge yourself by what others did to you. — C. Kennedy

When a man starts my program, he often says, "I am here because I lose control of myself sometimes. I need to get a better grip." I always correct him: "Your problem is not that you lose control of yourself, it's that you take control of your partner. In order to change, you don't need to gain control over yourself, you need to let go of control of her. — Lundy Bancroft

As survivors, we've been conditioned to be victims sexually. Many of us have never learned to say no or to set limits on our sexual activities ... To heal, it's important that we take control, that we make active choices concerning if, when, and how we want to explore sexuality. Especially in the beginning, you need to put your own needs about sex ahead of anyone else's. — Ellen Bass

Addiction does not cause partner abuse, and recovery from addiction does not "cure" partner abuse. — Lundy Bancroft

As you heal, you see yourself more realistically. You accept that you are a person with strengths and weaknesses. You make the changes you can in your life and let go of the things that aren't in your power to change. You learn that every part of you is valuable. And you realize that all of your thoughts and feelings are important, even when they're painful or difficult. — Ellen Bass

I moonlight as the greatest actor. I smile. I choose the comedy mask every time. I tell those who worry that I am fine, that I always will be. There is nothing to gain from these lies. I win no awards, yet I bow. On that stage I tell my life story with the lightest of words, the heaviest of hearts. I bleed for the people who stay and watch. Behold: the comedy, the tragedy. They smile and cheer. They clap for this. And I bow, and I bow, and I bow. — Elijah Noble El

Isms' are described as transference of addictive patterns of dysfunctional behaviour, passed down from generation to generation. For instance, if a mother was an alcoholic who never made it into recovery, her behaviour would leave a mark on her children, husband, etc. Unless her adult children join some sort of recovery programme and adopt the mindfulness practice, they will have very similar behaviour traits to their mother but minus the alcohol abuse. There is a strong possibility that they will become codependent and form relationships with other codependents or alcoholics. — Christopher Dines

There is life after abuse. This is mine. — Lindsay Fischer

Always know there are friends somewhere rooting for you. There are people you don't know, always praying for you and lifting you before God. - Jenee, from "To the Survivors". — Robert Uttaro

Clairey tasted the bile rising up in her throat, could smell the pathetic fear she was giving off, and they
were as familiar to her as waking and sleep, as hunger and thirst. In her time of peace there with Ellis, she had nearly forgotten the taste and smell of it, how her joints became liquid and her mouth became sour. That was what violence did to her. — Tracy Winegar

Often times, people don't realize how much their childhood still affects them when they are an adult. Or other people don't realize the affect things still have on those they know. Other people might even say, "Get over it" or "Move on." But it's usually simply not that easy. — Lisa Bedrick

Bit by bit, Dr. Driscoll helped me to peel away the layers of protection I had built up over the years. The process was not that unlike the peeling of an onion, which also makes us cry. It has been a painful journey, and I don't now when it will end, when I can say, "OK, it's over." Maybe never. Maybe sooner than I know. I recently told Dr. Driscoll that I feel the beginnings of feeling OK, that this is the right path. — Charles L. Bailey Jr.

Another question I am frequently asked is, "What do you mean by recovery?" It has taken me a while to answer that one. I had been depending on other people's definitions of recovery until I developed one that worked for me (just as you must come to one that makes sense for you.) Mine is simple. For me, it is about freedom.
Recovery is the freedom to make choices in your life that aren't determined by the abuse.
The specific choices will be different for each of you; the freedom to choose is your birthright. — Mike Lew

But no matter how much evil I see, I think it's important for everyone to understand that there is much more light than darkness. — Robert Uttaro

Though our childhood abuse left us feeling someone ought to make reparation to us, if we wait a lifetime for that, we may never receive what we need. We choose instead to face the idea that from now on, we are going to take responsibility for caring for ourselves. — Maureen Brady

Is a few hours of hell-raising, or respite from life's toil worth this every morning? — Catherine Lockwood

and tonight we held each
other, one last time,
like a dance to a
slow song
on an empty
floor,
underneath a single
disco ball
in front of
no one
at all — Phil Volatile

I think I just said it, but I think it's worth repeating. They gave me hope that there is good in the world out there. There really is. It really does exist. Regardless of how bad things can be, and how down on your luck you can be, or how bad your trust is broken when it comes to warming up to people and all that stuff, I know that there's people out there that genuinely wanna help. Putting yourself in that position is a huge step, and it's a very risky and fragile step, but it's also a step that needs to be taken because there is help. And you can get through something like this. You really can. - Jim, from To the Survivors — Robert Uttaro

All victimhood is ego and is not spiritually inspired — Frank Healy

It is therefore perfectly plausible that memories of childhood sexual abuse could be buried for years and then recalled, and that motivated forgetting, dissociative amnesia, or some other mechanism could account for some of the allegations in cases that Loftus has testified in. But because of the way in which the entire debate has been framed around the issue of "repression" and "recovery," these nuances have been largely ignored. — Moheb Costandi