Audio versions of our monthly articles
April 2025 audio newsletter. Visit us at www.louderthansilence.org for more info about our organization or to donate.
This is the second episode in our new series, Meet the Team. Over the next few months, I am going to be interviewing members of the staff, board, and key volunteers to get a feel for who's doing this work and what they bring to the organization. I'm excited to introduce these amazing people and the impact they've had on the work we do at LTS.This month, we are talking with Christi Bragg, the LTS social media manager.
We are starting a new series this month: Meet the Team. Over the next few months, I am going to be interviewing members of the staff, board, and key volunteers to get a feel for who's doing this work and what they bring to the organization. I'm excited to introduce these amazing people and the impact they've had on the work we do at LTS.This month, we are talking with Jo Lloyd Johnson, the LTS program manager.
We are in the middle of our Survivors Have Paid Enough series, and today, we are taking a little side quest in this journey. Typically, we've been exploring eight areas of health and dive into how survivors of sexual violence have all areas of their lives impacted by the trauma they've experienced. We also learn about ways to improve these areas of health and see the life transformations we want.We started this series by exploring how mental health is affected by sexual violence and taking a deep dive into PTSD. We then began unpacking emotional health and what it looks like to field big emotions and practice good emotional hygiene. The last few episodes, we started the talked in depth about relationship health, how to identify safe relationships, and a whole lot about boundaries.This is episode 11 of the series, and it felt appropriate for me to take some time to give a little more insight into the reality of what this process is like. Though I try to demystify the healing process and what this work looks like, it's something to hear about a topic and yet another to hear a person's story of what we're really doing here and why this matters. For today, I am going to dive into the seven biggest lessons I've learned from healing from sexual violence.
We are in the middle of our Survivors Have Paid Enough series, and right now, we're talking about Relational Health. This is episode 10 of the series, where we explore eight areas of health and dive into how survivors of sexual violence have all areas of their lives impacted by the trauma they've experienced. We also learn about ways to improve these areas of health and see the life transformations we want. We started this series by exploring how mental health is affected by sexual violence and taking a deep dive into PTSD. We then began unpacking emotional health and what it looks like to field big emotions and practice good emotional hygiene. Recently, we started the conversation about relationship health and how to identify safe relationships. For this episode, we are continuing our exploration of relationship health, specifically setting boundaries and identifying some things that get in the way of connecting well with others. Last month, we started talking about boundaries. And, by popular demand, we decided to expand on that topic a bit more this month.
We are talking about Relational Health in our Survivors Have Paid Enough series. This is episode 9 of the series, where we explore eight areas of health and dive into how survivors of sexual violence have all areas of their lives impacted by the trauma they've experienced. We also learn about ways to improve these areas of health and see the life transformations we want. We started this series by exploring how mental health is affected by sexual violence and taking a deep dive into PTSD. We then began unpacking emotional health and what it looks like to field big emotions and practice good emotional hygiene. Last month, we started the conversation about relationship health and how to identify safe relationships. For this episode, we are continuing our exploration of relationship health, specifically setting boundaries and identifying some things that get in the way of connecting well with others.
Today, we are talking about Relational Health in our Survivors Have Paid Enough series. This is episode 8 of the series, where we explore eight areas of health and dive into how survivors of sexual violence have all areas of their lives impacted by the trauma they've experienced. We started this series by exploring how mental health is affected by sexual violence and taking a deep dive into PTSD. We then began unpacking emotional health and what it looks like to field big emotions and practice good emotional hygiene. For this episode, we are exploring how our relationships have been impacted by surviving sexual violence. We are going to look at how survivors end up in a situation where they don't have many (or any) healthy relationships, the feelings of isolation, and how to tell if a person or a community is safe.
This is episode 7 of the Survivors Have Paid Enough series, where we explore eight areas of health and dive into how survivors of sexual violence have all areas of their lives impacted by the trauma they've experienced. For this episode, we are taking some time exploring what good emotional hygiene looks like and how to build emotional resilience.
This is episode 6 of the Survivors Have Paid Enough series, where we explore eight areas of health and dive into how survivors of sexual violence have all areas of their lives impacted by the trauma they've experienced. For this episode, we are taking some time exploring the big emotions that many survivors experience, specifically anger, shame, and grief, and learn what it looks like to sit with these emotional experiences.
This is episode 5 of the Survivors Have Paid Enough series, where we explore eight areas of health and dive into how survivors of sexual violence have all areas of their lives impacted by the trauma they've experienced. For today's episode, we are going to explore how our emotional health is impacted by surviving sexual violence. We are looking into how the emotional window of tolerance almost completely disappears and how our ability to understand and express emotions gets limited after surviving sexual violence.
This is the 4th episode of the Survivors Have Paid Enough series, where we explore eight areas of health and dive into how survivors of sexual violence have all areas of their lives impacted by the trauma they've experienced. We started this series by exploring how mental health is affected by sexual violence. We started by taking a deep dive into PTSD. We followed up with last month's episode, where we explained what some symptoms of PTSD look like. This episode, we are specifically looking at another facet of impact to mental health through two PTSD symptoms—anxiety and depression. We'll look at how these manifest, the interplay between the two, and what it looks like to take steps to address them.
This is episode 3 of our Survivors Have Paid Enough series. For now, we are looking at how mental health is impacted by surviving sexual violence. We're going to look at some additional ways mental health is impacted as a result of PTSD. We're going to look at the prevalence of nightmares and flashbacks, catastrophizing and feeling an impending sense of doom, and harmful or unsettling fantasies. We're going to chat about how these things directly impact a survivor's everyday life and how a person can manage in a healthy way.
Our second episode of the Survivors Have Paid Enough series, exploring what PTSD is, how a survivor of sexual violence gets PTSD, what that looks like in day to day life, and how a survivor can address it.
Kicking off our new series--Survivors Have Paid Enough, where we explore what the true cost of surviving sexual violence is.
This is our last episode of the Understanding LTS Workshops series. Each month, we are going through the topics that we discuss in our workshop sessions as a way to help supporters understand our experiences and survivors of sexual violence to feel heard. For this episode, we are discussing the concept of restoration and what it looks like to have a good life. We'll look at why many survivors struggle to navigate what it is that they want for themselves and don't have a clear picture of what the end state is that we are working toward. We will explore what it means to keep taking these steps and what we can hope for along the way.
We are in our eleventh episode of our Understanding LTS Workshops series. Each month, we are going through the topics that we discuss in our workshop sessions as a way to help supporters understand our experiences and survivors of sexual violence to feel heard. These episodes are released in the same order that we go through them in the workshops, each one building on the last. For this episode, we are looking into love, loving, and being lovable. We are going to discuss why something that so many people would view as a positive can be a real struggle for survivors. We will chat about what we mean when we say love to begin with, how loving and receiving love can be challenging, and what it means to be worthy of love.
This is our tenth episode of our Understanding LTS Workshops series. Each month, we are going through the topics that we discuss in our workshop sessions as a way to help supporters understand our experiences and survivors of sexual violence to feel heard. These episodes are released in the same order that we go through them in the workshops, each one building on the last. For this episode, we are exploring forgiveness and releasing resentment. We sift through what forgiveness is and what it isn't, how forgiveness often comes in layers, what reconciliation looks like, and some practical steps to let go of resentment.
This is our ninth episode of our Understanding LTS Workshops series. Each month, we are going through the topics that we discuss in our workshop sessions as a way to help supporters understand our experiences and survivors of sexual violence to feel heard. These episodes are released in the same order that we go through them in the workshops, each one building on the last. We've touched all sorts of topics up to this point, but the most recent ones were boundaries, understanding anger, and anxiety. For episode nine, we are exploring isolation. We will look at what isolation is and how survivors end up feeling this way, how to take steps to move toward connection and away from isolation, and some ways to tell if a person or community is safe.
This is our eighth episode of our Understanding LTS Workshops series. Each month, we are going through the topics that we discuss in our workshop sessions as a way to help supporters understand our experiences and survivors of sexual violence to feel heard. For this episode, we are exploring fear and anxiety. We will chat about what the differences are between them, what healthy responses to fear look like, why it is common for survivors to have anxiety, what living with anxiety looks like, and what we can do to incorporate more peace in our lives.
Episode 7 of our Understanding LTS Workshops series, going through the topics that we discuss in our workshop sessions as a way to help supporters understand our experiences and survivors of sexual violence to feel heard. This episode focuses on addressing anger. We'll be exploring why it's a challenge to acknowledge anger, what common reactions to anger are, why we need anger, and approaching anger in a healthy way.
In our sixth episode of the Understand LTS Workshops series, we are taking a deep dive into boundaries. We are looking at how some people end up with few, if any boundaries, codependent relationships, and what it looks like to start incorporating boundaries into our lives.
The 5th episode in the Understanding LTS Workshops series--a series designed to help survivors of sexual violence feel understood and for supporters to better understand the survivor experience. This month's episode is about setting healthy habits instead of having goals and using our ability to control our input in the healing process to shift focus away from being outcomes-driven.
The 4th episode in the Understanding LTS Workshops series--a series designed to help survivors of sexual violence feel understood and for supporters to better understand the survivor experience. This month's episode is about coping mechanisms, why they become part of the survivor experience and taking the next step forward toward health.
This is the third episode in the Understanding LTS Workshops series--a series designed to help survivors of sexual violence feel understood and for supporters to better understand the survivor experience. This month's episode is about perfectionism and shame cycles.
Month by month, we are going through the same topics as discussed in our workshop sessions. This month, we are exploring what it looks like to recognize our patterns, how they are created, and how we can create new patterns.