Dear sisters,
After the devastating results of the presidential election in November, I saw a sudden uptick in new clients. Women were seeking out connection and support as they processed the news that, once again, people in their families and communities had chosen to elevate a mob of proudly racist, misogynist, ignorant, xenophobic egomaniacs to the highest positions in government.
Just as suddenly, six months post-election, contacts from my website have gone quiet. The daily onslaught of news items detailing the gleeful destruction of our constitution, civil rights, natural spaces, and basic human dignity has become overwhelming. I believe that many of us women have entered a state of protective dissociation or have become stuck in one of the basic trauma responses—fight, flight, freeze, or appease—and no longer believe that a feeling of safety is even available to us.
You may not be used to hearing therapists speaking in such plain terms about politics. That’s because we’re taught to leave our “biases” outside of the office and to present a practiced facade of neutrality to clients. I disagree with this approach; in fact, I believe that pretending to be neutral about the harm being done to people—especially the women it is my job to support and care for—is its own form of doing harm.
I’m not going to gaslight you, sisters. The world is a deeply unsettling place for women—and all marginalized groups—right now. Funding for research into diseases that shorten our lives is being cruelly withheld. Our access to reproductive healthcare is being stripped away so as to return us to a state of dependency on the same despicable men who show so little regard for our health and well-being. For those of us—that is to say, just about all of us—who have been victims of sexual abuse, sexual assault, harassment, or gender-based bullying, current events may be re-traumatizing.
Even the best therapist in the world can’t change the facts of our current situation. What we can do—what I can do—is offer companionship and community in hard times. I can offer a safe space in which to think clearly about the parts of our lives that we do have control over and how we can grow small moments of safety and goodness into a life that continues to be full of meaning and connection. This is medicine for women’s souls. In fact, it is nothing short of revolutionary to refuse to capitulate to those who seek to terrorize us. Instead, we must persist in cultivating deeply supportive, strong, and creative networks of women as a form of resistance.
If you feel that formal therapy is not in the cards for you right now, I encourage you to seek the company of like-minded women as often as possible. Let’s be there for each other, sisters.
We’ve hit a bumpy patch of road, fellow travelers. If you’d like some good company along the way, please reach out.
With love and solidarity,
Sheryl