“Heal­ing may not be so much about get­ting bet­ter, as about let­ting go of every­thing that isn’t you — all of the expec­ta­tions, all of the beliefs — and becom­ing who you are.” ~ Rachel Naomi Remen

Today I have a very spe­cial guest here (she’s from Wis­con­sin — we could be neigh­bors…), dis­cussing a topic that is all too often shoved under the cov­ers.  Please help me wel­come Mag­gie, who has cre­ated a won­der­ful resource for any­one out there suf­fer­ing from the hor­rors of domes­tic vio­lence, sex­ual abuse, and rape. 

Mag­gie has a per­sonal blog, Okay, Fine, Dammit, that she has had for some time.  About a year ago, after writ­ing a local piece on domes­tic vio­lence, Mag­gie felt the deeper need for cre­at­ing a place where peo­ple could share their own per­sonal sto­ries — and to bring some peace and heal­ing in the process.  From that, she cre­ated the Vio­lence Unsi­lenced website.

Vio­lence Unsi­lenced (VU) is that place where peo­ple can share, in their own words — from their per­sonal expe­ri­ences from domes­tic vio­lence, sex­ual abuse, and rape.  Please note: read­ing the VU site can be emo­tion­ally chal­leng­ing and all the sto­ries are very real. It’s in these sto­ries, though, that the vio­lence, pain, and suf­fer­ing can find some pos­si­bil­ity of heal­ing.  It’s also a place where each of us, through the voices of those who have been there, can more deeply see how heinous these acts are.  And in that, per­haps we can all take a few more steps towards a heal­ing and mean­ing­ful com­pas­sion for all our broth­ers and sis­ters in this world.  

Please read along, as Mag­gie shares a more in depth look at who she is and what she has created.

1.  What led to the cre­ation of the Vio­lence Unsi­lenced web­site?
Back in 2008, I wrote an arti­cle pro­fil­ing seven domes­tic vio­lence sur­vivors for a city mag­a­zine — and the expe­ri­ence changed me. Then one night, right around that same time my arti­cle ran, there was a domes­tic vio­lence death in my com­mu­nity. In a fit of sad­ness, I vented on my per­sonal blog (Okay, Fine, Dammit) — and the response was very intense. There were clearly a lot of peo­ple impacted by abuse. On top of that, I knew how cathar­tic the mag­a­zine expe­ri­ence had been for the sur­vivors I pro­filed, and decided I wanted to keep that momen­tum going. I was well aware by then in the power of the blog­ging com­mu­nity, and I had a lot of con­fi­dence in my fel­low blog­gers. I knew we could do this together. In writ­ing the arti­cle I learned that one in four women will be a vic­tim of abuse in her life­time. I thought about how small each of our blog­ging com­mu­ni­ties can be, and how well we think we know each other. The assump­tions we make, the things we don’t see. I thought, why don’t we show the blo­gos­phere just how pro­lific and encom­pass­ing abuse is?

From the very start, VU was a col­lab­o­ra­tive process. My blog read­ers con­tributed their input, their sto­ries, helped choose the name, and helped spread the word — so much so that on the very first day VU went live, there were sev­eral thou­sand vis­i­tors. That was over a year ago, and I believe it’s still a very col­lec­tive effort.  I’ve said this before, but I hope when peo­ple think of VU, they don’t think of me — they think of the sur­vivors and the sup­port­ers. It’s a good day when I over­hear some­one talk about the “peo­ple over at VU,” rather than the “person.”

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  Mag­gie, I find much hope in what you have cre­ated.  And for me, per­son­ally, I really believe it touches upon love and compassion…in the hear­ing of these stories. 

I think about that fig­ure, 1 in 4 women will be the vic­tim of abuse.  And as I think of the women I know in my life, I really hope that it’s way off (although real­ity tells me it’s prob­a­bly not).  Proof of that made it’s appear­ance just yes­ter­day — as I read the words of a blog­ger friend, Jill (who gave per­mis­sion to link to this — thank you, Jill) who just hap­pened to share her own story of sex­ual assault on her site.  Jill — know that I see you as a brave and coura­geous soul.

2.  Mag­gie, I look at what you have cre­ated, and find such great hope in the mes­sage that you are cre­at­ing.  As this has evolved over the last year, what has this whole project meant to you?
Even though I knew there were a lot of peo­ple with these types of sto­ries, I was still shocked by the sheer vol­ume of responses. I’ve had a 4–6 month wait list from day one, and here it is a year later with no signs of slow­ing down. So many sto­ries wait­ing to be told… it’s both ter­ri­bly sad, and incred­i­bly hope­ful. I am bowled over every day, both by the strength of the sur­vivors and the com­pas­sion of the read­ers. I feel blessed that I get to watch this human­ity in action right here on my screen.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  Your com­mu­nity is such a sup­port­ive one, and what a gift that is to everyone. 

3.   Tell us about these shared sto­ries that you post  — and have they touched you per­son­ally?
To be hon­est, it’s very dif­fi­cult to be reg­u­larly exposed to so much trauma and suf­fer­ing. I admit I have had to learn to limit my time with the project, and to take care of myself emo­tion­ally. But yes, every sin­gle one of them touches me per­son­ally, because these are not just auto-posted—there is a process I go through with each sur­vivor to make sure he/she is absolutely cer­tain he/she wants to be pub­lished, and is accord­ingly sup­ported and aware of the risks. After­ward, I feel very bonded to each sur­vivor. It’s a very per­sonal and hum­bling expe­ri­ence, and it hap­pens twice a week. Ulti­mately, despite the sad con­tent of the posts, it’s always a pos­i­tive thing for me. Speak­ing the truth out loud seems to make these sur­vivors even stronger, and I get to bear wit­ness to that miracle—which makes me a bet­ter per­son, I believe. I can’t even remem­ber my life before VU.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  As sad as it can be to read these sto­ries, I also find much hope in the shar­ing of them.  I very much get a sense that there is a heal­ing in the shar­ing.  I also believe that I, myself, feel an even deeper level of com­pas­sion for the world around me after read­ing a story on VU.  So, as dif­fi­cult as these sto­ries are — the pub­lic shar­ing of them really is so good for everyone.

4. Tell us one unex­pected thing that has hap­pened since cre­at­ing Vio­lence Unsi­lenced.
I didn’t know that it would be so widely and uncon­di­tion­ally sup­ported. I thought it might be a project inside my read­ing cir­cle, but I didn’t expect the wide-reaching, con­sis­tent pro­mo­tion that so many peo­ple (like you, for instance) feel com­pelled to do. I am so grate­ful to you, and to all of them. We are seri­ously doing this together.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  Mag­gie, know that I believe that you have cre­ated a won­der­ful gift in VU, and it’s an honor to have you here.

5. Out­side of VU, what’s a typ­i­cal day for Mag­gie look like?
My daugh­ters are 10 and five, so they go off to school now. I have a writ­ing stu­dio I rent to do my work, which is free­lance writing—I write mag­a­zine arti­cles for a liv­ing. My fam­ily and my per­sonal time are the most impor­tant things to me, so I build my sched­ule around that. I do quite a lot of run­ning around, but ulti­mately my favorite thing is to hold very still as often as I pos­si­bly can.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  I’m guess­ing that guy in the pic­ture with you is the guy you call hus­band!  And it sounds like you have a won­der­ful fam­ily life — savor all the moments!  And in that still­ness, much clarity.…

6. Any­thing new you have com­ing up?
I’m speak­ing at BlogHer ’10 in New York City this year, on a panel about uti­liz­ing com­mu­nity for change. I’ll also be speak­ing at the Type A Mom con­fer­ence (Asheville, NC) in Sep­tem­ber.  I really feel deeply that there’s a lot of power out there in the blo­gos­phere to be har­nessed for good, and I’m also very rev­er­ent of writ­ing. I think some­thing is lost in the chaos of the social ladder-climbing, pop­u­lar­ity, and pro­mo­tion in abun­dance in blog­ging today. It’s so dif­fer­ent from the way it was when I first got started, and though there have been very pos­i­tive changes, it can also be very dis­cour­ag­ing. There’s a whole lot of little-known blogs out there where incred­i­bly good writ­ing is going down, and I guess I’d love for peo­ple to widen their viewfind­ers a bit.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  Your mes­sage is such an impor­tant one — so that’s great about you get­ting out there and spread­ing the word.  You will touch many more lives, in amaz­ing ways, and

7.  Deep down, what makes you uniquely “you”? 
This is prob­a­bly a very tough ques­tion for any­one to answer about him/herself. I don’t know what makes me me, but I know what I value most in the peo­ple I care about—integrity and com­pas­sion. I may fall down a lot, but I try to emu­late those traits as much as I can. I also love how dif­fer­ent we all are, and per­son­ally I’m glad we’re not all try­ing to be like each other.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  I fall down a lot too.  And per­haps that is all part of the jour­ney we are each on.  There will be moments when we are mak­ing great strides, and then oth­ers where we slip and fall.  And in those moments when we fall, the beau­ti­ful part is that we CAN get back up.  And that’s not any more evi­dent than in the VU web­site, and the peo­ple who share so openly their sto­ries.  And in that unsi­lenc­ing of the violence.…they can get back up.  And per­haps we can get back up, too.…touched by com­pas­sion and love.

Clos­ing Com­ments:  Mag­gie, it is an honor to have you here and shar­ing a bit more in-depth look at what Vio­lence Unsi­lenced is all about and what is has come to mean to you.  I know you don’t feel like this is just you out there cre­at­ing this.  I still want you to know, though, that you shine your amaz­ing and beau­ti­ful light into our world…and that does make it a bet­ter place.  You have given sur­vivors of some really bad things a place to safely share and move fur­ther down that path of heal­ing.  What a won­der­ful gift you are! 

Thank you, once again, for being here.

You can keep up with Mag­gie by vis­it­ing the Vio­lence Unsi­lenced site or her per­sonal blog, Okay, Fine, Dammit.  Keep up with her on Twit­ter, @maggiedammit .

Note that I have also added a badge to my side­bar in sup­port of what Mag­gie is doing.  If you are inter­ested in join­ing in sup­port of this, you can Take the Pledge right here.