Resources
The Gatehouse
An organization in Toronto, Ontario devoted to helping survivors of CSA, in person and via online peer-facilitated groups. Healing is deeply personal, but cannot be done alone. Help is available.
Horse Discovery
In Millbrook, Ontario, this beautiful farm is a safe and welcoming place for those healing from trauma and loss. The healing by the horses feels like magic, but is the most natural thing in the world. Group and individual sessions.
Book Reviews -- memoirs
“The Village That Betrayed Its Children” by Karen Lee.
https://www.karenelee-author.com/index.html
https://www.amazon.ca/Village-That-Betrayed-Its-Children/dp/1990496717
This book is a thorough investigation into a whole community that, during the late 1950s and early ‘60s, allowed its children to be sexually abused by the village school teacher. Even after disclosure, girls were sent to the suffocating circumstances of the school house, ever at the mercy of their teacher’s hands and gaze, never knowing what indignities awaited in the classroom, but absolutely knowing there was no one at home or on the school board or in the church or anywhere, who was willing to put a stop to it. Karen Lee lays out problems unique to her own family that left her in harm’s way, and problems endemic to the community–poverty, the harsh treatment of animals and children, reticence to “meddle” or disturb the status quo–that let the abuse go on for over ten years. It takes a village to destroy a childhood, and while Karen Lee unearths with precision the forces at work in her village at a certain time in history, the dynamic she writes about applies today: in schools, families and communities, the powerful are often protected while the vulnerable are abused, ignored and denied help. There are always reasons, but there is no excuse. A heart-wrenching, eye-opening and relevant book.
“All We Knew But Couldn’t Say” by Jo Vannicola
https://joannevannicola.com/memoir-writing
https://www.amazon.ca/All-Knew-But-Couldnt-Say/dp/1459744225
Jo Vannicola has written a vivid, honest, and heart-breaking account of their experience of physical and sexual violence by their father and mother, and later, of abuses of power perpetrated within the entertainment industry. An eminently successful actor, Jo has now brought their gift of portrayal to the page, showing complicated, believable people behaving in deplorable ways, sometimes ignoring the plight of those around them, and sometimes actively crushing innocents. My understanding of my own mother came into greater focus as I followed Jo’s unflinching depiction of mother-as-pedophile. The mother who cannibalizes children for pleasure has rarely been explored like this in books, or even spoken of, and Jo has had to fight for their truth in a world which often only acknowledges male violence. How did Jo Vannicola survive the betrayals and silencing? Through wit and wits, courage and wisdom, integrity and activism, Jo not only survived, but created a life of inspiration and influence. The story would be almost too painful to read if you didn’t know that the clear, strong voice on the page is that of the one who suffered… and went on to become a voice for the LBGTQ community, for CSA survivors and anyone who has experienced cruelty. Jo Vannicola’s lucid and compassionate book is the very light at the end of the tunnel it describes.
“Wild Boy of Waubamik” by Thom Ernst
https://www.dundurn.com/books_/t22117/a9781459750876-the-wild-boy-of-waubamik
https://www.facebook.com/reelthomernst/
Thom Ernst is a brilliant storyteller, and every chapter of this unforgettable memoir has its own rhythm, pace and authority. Scenes leap off the page with the exuberance and innocence of youth, yet the undercurrent of seething darkness–the diabolical urges of Thom’s adoptive father–is never far, tugging at the life that would be free. The isolation and cruelty Thom experiences are extreme, and further injuries occur as he tries to get help. His world becomes a house of mirrors in which every effort to be heard, to be seen, to be healed, only folds the pain and shame back onto him as he is blamed or ignored. This book is a masterful shedding of the rules of self-negation that Thom was forced to absorb and live by. A finely honed clarity and sanity lights up every page, evidently sharpened against a millstone of pain, and in the end, he finds his own way, to a life that is truly his own. When he is faced with an opportunity to forgive his father, I cried because he chooses something far more transcendent–his own wild boy self.