It has been an insane and incredible 61 days since I gave up active use on Facebook. One of my practices from my first 40 days is standing up for myself for the first time in my life. Since I returned to Spokane a little over a week ago and decided to take my power back from the people who have abused me in the past, so many things have changed in my life. For the first time in years I am no longer feeling a constant state of terror from threats from a past partner. This release from this state of fear has led me to finally opening up about my past traumatic experiences. I share these with the world to help others see the signs(red flags), understand boundaries, and also heal from their hurts. I launched HealHurt.org and that is where I will be sharing most of my domestic violence and sexual assault experiences. I want to keep a clean division between my healthy lifestyle and my personal challenges but from time to time I will share on this site what I have been dealing with.
Today I stand up!!! I have written the following article which gives a quick overview of the sexual assaults that I experienced during my short 8 month marriage. I received an annulment from the marriage on January 23, 2020 which was the first stepping stone to helping me open up and share. Annulment is challenging in Washington State because you must prove that the marriage was formed out of fraud and if it was not for the fraud, the marriage would never have happened. My former wife did not divulge her mental health disorder before our marriage and so I was released of the marriage. I am so grateful to the lawyers and everyone who helped me get out of the situation mostly unscathed.
Here is the article I wrote. I am wanting to warn you, this is not an easy topic to read and if you have experienced any sexual trauma and are still healing from it, you may not want to read it. I did not share much of what happened but I gave a good overview of the sexual assault I experienced during my previous marriage.
Heal Hurt is being developed to help people heal from domestic violence and traumatic situations. We want to help make people and especially men feel less alone when they face these challenging circumstances and share resources on how to receive help and heal.
Thank you for reading.
Love,
Joshua
