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Thursday, February 16, 2012

My Letter to Survivors

Dearest Survivor,

I am sorry for what you have been through. It is not your fault; you are good and intelligent and beautiful and you will learn to live and be happy again. One of the best things you can do for your healing is surround yourself with positive, supportive people, including a counselor or therapist. What you have been through isn't something any of us can work past on our own, and it's OK to need help and to ask for it. You have a right to use your voice and to do whatever you need to do in order to heal. Find something that you enjoy- painting, riding a bicycle, reading a book- and take time to do it; you have a right to be happy. If there are people in your life who are negative, or who don't believe you, or who bring you down more than they support you, you have a right to not spend time with those people, or to do so on your terms. You have a right to be angry, upset, sad, and do deal with all of these feelings in a healthy way.

...unfinished? I'm not sure.

3 comments:

  1. Great work! You offer some really great advice. Validation and support are so incredibly crucial in healing - I sure wish I would have received your letter 10 years ago! Would have saved me a lot of anguish as I sought support in all the wrong places.

    I hope that these exercises are helping you heal. I really like Matt Atkinson's resources, though I decided to take a short break from them because they were bringing on too many emotions at once! Thinking of you! xx

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  2. thank you for this! i really needed it!

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  3. how are you doing? have not heard from you in a while, wondering how you are.

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