Labor Day
by Guest Blogger Jean Riseman
This blog is reprinted from the August 2023 Grassroots Collective Newsletter with permission. It was written by Jean Riseman in August 1999 for Survivorship Notes. Grassroots Ritual Abuse / Mind Control Survivors’ Collective began in 2020 as a group of RA/MC survivors who have joined together to help each other create support groups, art and writing groups, workshops, and more. I am delighted to welcome Jean, her writing, and the Grassroots Collective to this blog!
It's the last part of summer, those changing days just before Labor Day and the opening of school. The groups that abused us seem to be particularly active over long weekends like Labor Day. Thus we have three days' worth of reminders and flashbacks to contend with. And since Labor Day could fall on any of the first seven days of September, there is a stretch of ten days when we might have anniversary reactions.
In much of Europe, Labor Day isn't on the first Monday in September. It falls on May 1 - Beltane. The observance of Labor Day is probably folded into the observance of Beltane.
I never saw much to celebrate on Labor Day; it seemed a manufactured holiday, an excuse for a long weekend. Since I have started healing, however, I find I am viewing it differently.
It is indeed labor - hard, hard work - to heal from ritual abuse. The little details of life that most people don't even think about come with an incredible amount of baggage from the past. To do the simplest thing can take hours of effort and can feel like slogging through molasses.
Instead of looking at all the things I can't do, or the things I do slowly and with agony, I am trying to recognize that there are many things I can do easily and confidently. When I have difficulties, it is because I was badly hurt as a child.
It is hard emotional labor to write a letter or pay a bill. More labor to address the envelope. Still more to put on a stamp (and I actually had to enter a public building to get that stamp.) Then I have to leave the safety of my apartment to put it in one of those big scary blue mailboxes.
I know why these simple things arouse such fear in me. Believe me, most people don't want to hear the reasons.
Year after year, I have done the things that needed to be done despite all the fear and anxiety. Before memories, during memories, and after memories, the bills were paid, letters were answered, and the mail I generated got put in a mailbox. Sometimes late, but they always were taken care of.
So I think I deserve a Labor Day of my very own. Actually, I think I deserve three hundred and sixty-five of them. I think all of us do!
It feels wonderful to tap into that defiant anger that often motivates me. I can see myself as a child, gritting my teeth and saying to myself, "You can't stop me. When I grow up, I'm going to do it anyway. I'm going to do what I want even if you forbid it. So there."
I couldn't then, of course, because they outweighed me, outnumbered me, and had legal authority over me. But now I am as big as anybody, and I am free to make my own decisions. I do what I want, even if it is hard.
I was a stubborn little girl, a stubborn young woman, and now I'm a stubborn old woman. Yes, I'm doing what I want to, despite them, and I will celebrate my freedom three hundred and sixty-five and a quarter days a year.
The DW Anthology is Waiting for YOUR Writing!
We’re waiting to receive YOUR writing for our third annual Creative Healing Anthology. Send you writing and/or artwork by September 16 to gabby here. Include the completed Guidelines and Agreement to Publish which you can find at Groupeasy/Documents/Anthology 2024. Email gabby if you have questions. We can’t wait to see your writing!
DW Writes On!
In the first three days of our fundraising initiative, DW Writes On! received five donations totaling almost $360! To support our effort to become a 501(c)3 nonprofit, click here. Thank you!
Quilted on Sale Now!
Quilted: Piecing Together My Dissociated Selves by Suritaplus, an active subscriber to Dissociative Writers. Available today at Bookbaby and on preorder at Amazon where release is September 5th. Support our Dissociative Writers!
September Workshops & Events
Tuesday, September 5, 1 pm Eastern: Writing-in-Place
Monday, September 11, 3 pm Eastern: Memoir Class, By Registration Only
Monday, September 11, 6:30 pm Eastern: DW Business Meeting
Tuesday, September 12, 1 pm Eastern: Traditional Workshop
Wednesday, September 13, 8 pm Eastern, Writing-in-Place
Monday, September 18, 3 pm Eastern, Memoir Class, By Registration Only
Tuesday, September 19, 1 pm Eastern, Writing-in-Place
Wednesday, September 20, 2 pm, Social Hangout
Monday, September 25, 3 pm Eastern: Memoir Class, By Registration Only
Tuesday, September 26, 1 pm Eastern: Traditional Workshop
Wednesday, September 27, 8 pm: Writing-in-Place
🕊️
Peace demands … greater fidelity to the truth and a much more perfect purity of conscience.
~ Thomas Merton