"Silenced" 10x10 acrylics on canvas board
$95 without framing
$115 with framing
For anyone who has been sexually abused, we learn to stay silent. Whether we were threatened, knew instinctively to keep our mouths shut, or were shamed by those we tried to open up to, we allowed ourselves to be silenced. Silenced by fear. Silenced by shame. Silenced by the feeling that talking about it isn't going to change what has already happened. Silenced by the lie that to be quiet about our abuse is what we should do.
This painting took me some time. First I drew with pencil, depressed and anxious, unsure how to draw it out. How do you draw the scooped out and voiceless feeling of surviving sexual abuse?
For me, I had to reach inside and figure out what it was I felt. To be able to put the words "scooped out and voiceless" to what I was feeling helped me be able to draw what was happening in my head. The reality of being sexually assaulted again after the number of times I've had it happen in my life felt like being slapped upside the head.
Honestly, I don't know how long it's going to take me to get through this. It is devastating. I feel lost and angry and sad and scooped hollow and there is this level of self-loathing I haven't felt in a long time. I am working through this with my art, my therapists, and writing in my journal regularly. Whether or not I am in the mood to write or paint or draw, I buckle down and give it a shot anyway. It is the way I pick myself back up from the ground, dust myself off, and work on moving forward.
Sometimes we have to take that step to move forward whether we want to or not. We definitely don't want to stay stuck in our rut. It's okay to get in a rut. Just don't furnish it. Don't get comfortable there. Stand up. Climb out. Take the tiniest step forward, which will lead to another step, which eventually leads to a forward momentum that will fuel your fight. Find your voice. Use it. Do not allow them to silence you again.
Healing and a Voice,
Jenny
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