FROM VICTIM TO SURVIVOR

To tell my story as a date rape survivor and communicate my message in a way that can help the most people.

Wednesday, July 30, 2014

Back to Counseling

...While all this was going on, meaning the anticipation of the Idaho trial and the preparation for the ABC News interview, I had begun to have that weird, can't put my finger on it feeling again similar to just after the preliminary hearing in 2006. I contacted my counselor Laura at W.O.A.R. to start regular counseling sessions again. There was a lot for me to talk about especially leading up to the next trial. I clearly wasn't done my treatment which I ended over a year earlier. She was happy to welcome me back and we picked up where we left off.

I had left my private flight attendant job the previous year. It had served its purpose and somehow got me to realize what it was I wanted for myself. Spending all that time traveling and having a flexible schedule was good for me. I had always worked in a corporate setting with the usual 9-5 schedule seeing the same people every day. At that time in my life I needed to have a different view when I looked out the window in the morning and needed to meet new people every day. When I had enough I knew immediately and began my next job search. What I also knew is that I wasn't going to fall back into marketing again and found something completely different. I stayed at that company until last Fall when I moved out to LA to be with my boyfriend and begin the next chapter in my life. 

Laura and I talked about the new job, about the opportunity to be interviewed for a respected national news program, the importance the Idaho rape trial held in my future and about my anxiety with dating which had not always come easy to me. I wasn't that "lucky in love" person. Exactly why I had tried Match.com some 6 years earlier. As a result I had decided to keep trying but used what I thought were more secure forms of dating. Most dating sites are set up by nature predatory. The men or women can seek out who they want and can easily lie on their profiles. I did try eHarmony and speed dating. I wasn't ultimately successful with those either but I was making the effort.

In several aspects of my life I had definitely evolved since our last round of counseling but Laura's approach to talk therapy was still good for me but the need for written therapy wasn't as necessary because of where I was at point in my life. Although there was a very important document she would be advising me on as a result of the trial outcome. I was feeling OK as April rolled around and the beginning of the trial...

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