Sexual Assault: There is Hope

Dear Body Buds,

This blog post was written by one of my sweet, sweet clients who I have been working with for nearly 5 months. It has been a privilege and an honor to watch her progress, and I am so pleased she accepted my challenge to write this post. I will keep her identity anonymous and hope she knows just how incredibly proud of her for daring to take these steps to begin seeing herself in a new light.

And now, here is her article.

Love your bud,

Kristy Jo

"1 in 4 women are sexually assaulted in the USA each year.

It’s common, ever present in society and you may have experienced it.

I have.

Sexual assault is a very terrifying thing that can rob your life if you let it. There will be times when you feel so afraid, shut everyone and everything out and keep to yourself. It damages our self worth and self esteem severely. Sometimes we feel we may be scrambling for something in our life to hide our pain, fix our pain or to simply make it go away. This can be expressed through sexual activity, controlling how much we eat or do not eat, alcohol and/or drugs or staying away from men/women (sex of abuser) at all costs. While these things may make us feel good for a short time, they usually leave us feeling just as empty and afraid. I would like to focus on two things through this blog post:

• Feeling good about yourself despite what you have gone through

• Taking care of our bodies leads to self confidence and strength

I want you to know that it is okay. It is NOT your fault. Darkness will try to tell you over and over again that you did something to make this happen.

You didn’t.

Point blank, it is NOT your fault, nor will it ever be.

Someone took advantage of you and hurt you.

I want you to know it is okay to cry. It is okay to scream. It is okay to hurt. It is okay to be angry. It is okay to feel frustrated and empty, but you are not allowed to feel alone. Because you aren’t alone; and it’s important to realize that Body Buddies loves and helps people who have experienced things like you. How do I know this? Because it helped me overcome a lot of fears I had regarding my self worth and food.

It is easy for us to translate our trauma into how we take care of our bodies and how we eat our food. We may feel our bodies are degusting because of what happened.

Following my rape I didn’t have an appetite at all. I would make something or buy something yummy and just weep because I didn’t want to eat anything. I felt numb and I didn’t want to feel anything. I had a prior passion for running and exercising that soon disappeared after my rape. I felt guilty for any source of happiness I felt, even if that meant eating something yummy like a cookie or going for a nice run.

I lost a significant amount of weight and had no energy. I slept most of the day in order to make up for my lack of energy. I simply was not eating enough to release dopamine into my brain (feel good and motivation hormone). Did you know food contains dopamine? I didn’t! Pumpkin seeds, lima beans, almonds, apples are all high in L-dopamine. If you have experienced similar feelings, please know that these feelings are normal to have and that there is nothing wrong with you!

Take baby steps. Each day will be different in your journey to overcome such a tragedy but baby steps will turn into toddler steps, which translate into giant steps along the road.

A baby step you can take to help you is to get your mind out of the negative gutter. Fill your walls with positive statements and quotes. I started saying positive affirmations twice a day out loud; 5 in the morning when I woke up and 5 in the evening before I went to bed.

• I am beautiful.

• I am strong.

• I can overcome hard things.

• I love my body.

• I love myself

While at first these affirmations felt extremely awkward and untrue, they translated into power statements that I still use to this day. I sometimes create them in a different way to cater to what I’m struggling with but there is power in your hearing your own voice. Our brain feeds off of anything we put into it whether it is positive or negative. I encourage you to be positive so that your brain only brings in positivity and love.

Kristy Jo has designed the Power Foods Lifestyle to be full of education, knowledge, and love. Learning about food and what it’s made out of helped me not feel afraid but confident about what I was putting in my body. The confidence that came from eating good food that was healthy led me to have confidence in myself.

Kristy Jo also educated me about lifting. I found so much power in lifting that translated into mental strength. As I watched my body get stronger, I felt stronger as a person. Lifting has now become one of my favorite hobbies. I found that as I took care of my body, self-love started to grow.

Not only was I educated, but I was also loved. Kristy Jo kept my story private and let me express myself in coaching calls when I needed to. Not once did she judge me for the way I was feeling or the way I was seeing food. Instead, she listened and encouraged me to keep moving forward and helped me find strategies to see food as not so scary.

Kristy Jo also gave me tools to use when triggers came up. I have met some of the other Body Buddies coaches and follow them on Instagram and I feel their love as well. I would trust any of them with my story and know that they genuinely want to help me and be my friend.

Body Buddies is a safe place.

I want you to also know that THERE. IS. HOPE.

You CAN overcome this. This can be a chapter of your life that you move forward from. You can experience love from women or men (based on sexual orientation). You can be in a healthy relationship(s).

Looking back, I didn’t ever think I could date someone again. It takes time, patience and forgiving yourself. Start with baby steps and don’t give up. Your abuser doesn’t get any more of your life. Be brave because you are the master of yourself."

#psychology #mentaldiscipline #clientsuccess #trauma #sexualassault