Outskirts Press, INC.

Healing Childhood Sexual Abuse, An Art Therapist's Journey explores family secrets. The hidden truths are so powerful, so damaging it took years to discover. Slowly, my lost reality flt together, like pieces in a giant puzzle, revealing childhood sexual abuse. The path took fierce courage to find, to speak aloud, to describe with pastels what happened. These paintings may be helpful to some children even though many are scary. Sexual abuse is scary. Talking about the images can help some children or adults find their own voice and may give people permission to create their own expressive art. The book includes creative ideas to explore. The art can say "This is how it was for me:' With or without words, art can speak truth. This book offers survivors, parents, families and therapists visuals that speak powerfully and offers material for discussion.
- Ann Owen, MA, MFA - ann.healingjourney@gmail.com and healingjourney123.com

Ann is what we might call a 'therapist's therapist'. In her powerful book HEALING CHILDHOOD SEXUAL ABUSE, Ann gives us tools for discovering and resolving our own wounds and the wounds of others for whom we may serve as guides and counselors toward healing and wholeness.
- Dr. Rebecca A. Martin

The book invites you into a place of healing and spunky raw truths where you can explore your own experiences by writing or making art encouraged by Ann's ideas and open questions.
- Marjorie Isaacs, Psy. D. Psychologist

You are invited to be your own hero, reclaiming your own power to heal.
- Anne Conkin, M. Psy.

Ann's ability to find her truths gives the reader the hope and belief that they too may discover and release their own source of pain.
- Arleen Carr, M. Ed

During my late fifties, I had a problem with my right eye rolling up into my skull. For a while I had double vision. Later, I could only see with my left eye. I wore a black patch, stumbled a lot, and had trouble driving the forty-five minutes back and forth to work and home. I was very tired all the time. Of course, the right eye got worse. During that time I began losing teeth and my body seemed to be falling apart. I paid a friend to grade papers at the college where I taught art. Finally, since doctors were not able to find a diagnosis for what was happening, the school offered me early retirement—perhaps because I had never taken a sabbatical where they paid for time away from teaching. With my husband’s support I had the time and motivation—no, it was desperation—to begin therapy again, looking deeper into the secrets of my childhood. My eye problems became a metaphor for understanding my early childhood with more clarity. I had to see what my heart knew, yet my eyes were previously not able, or not willing, to see. This was a time of tears, writing, working with dreams, making the pastel paintings in this book, and talking with another excellent therapist. I began healing: mind, body, emotions, and spirit, which continues to this day.

The time was right because my three children were grown and successful in their own careers. I began to realize that I had been affected for most of my life by what had happened when I was a baby. Suddenly, without my career, there was time and motivation to return to the source, through the tears and fears. The paintings would sometimes scare me; yet, I continued making art. Images flowed in and I did not censor them. They were both mine and seemed to be more than my remembrances. They might have come from sisters and brothers, now or in the past, or someone next door. I opened my heart, cried over the images and memories, and gave voice to them in color, shape, texture, and in relationship to each other. I did not understand all the symbols; their meanings are magical and they grow, change, and continue to develop. Voices from the images came later to help me decipher the symbolism. Today, I understand more deeply. I still feel twinges of fear and anxiety seeing the paintings; yet, I am not overwhelmed, encased, or smothered by them. The paintings help me now by showing me how far I have come.

I accept that I can’t “delete” the past! Unfortunately, in the last move of downsizing, I burned diaries and journals, tapes, and even the black robe I wore as a professor going down the aisle in many graduations. I was clearing out the past, ready to be lighter and begin anew again. I did not destroy the black portfolio that held the paintings. They were an important part of my therapy, and the portfolio moved along with my other collections of baggage. Even now, many years later, the power of the images comes through and brings tears as I recall difficult times. Looking at them these days, sometimes my stomach gets tight and I need to break away from the intensity. Other times, these paintings seem like children calling out for help. I send love to them, to myself, to “the little girl within,” and all who are still suffering and have suffered. These paintings have helped me move through the old fears.