Materials

January, 2000

Edited selections from the ASCA newsletter.

The original newsletter (pdf)

Contents

  1. ASCA Meeting Ongoing Education Moment: Guideline #5: We ask that no one attend our meeting under the influence of alcohol or drugs, unless the medication is prescribed by a physician.
  2. A New Book by Michael Lew: Leaping Upon the Mountains: Men Proclaiming Victory over Sexual Child Abuse
  3. Possible ASCA Meeting Topic for January: Looking Forward: Forming the Future

1. ASCA Meeting Ongoing Education Moment:
Guideline #5: We ask that no one attend our meeting under the influence of alcohol or drugs, unless the medication is prescribed by a physician.

We are all well aware that many survivors of childhood abuse have become chemically addicted or tend to abuse alcohol, drugs, and food. Alcohol and drugs, as well as food, work, etc., are often used by survivors to lessen and numb the pain. We sometimes use them to escape from the reality of the past and the discomfort of the present. Many have worked through and/or persist in working on their sobriety as they continue their journey of recovery from childhood abuse.

Attending an ASCA meeting under the influence of alcohol or a drug not prescribed by a physician is not helpful nor respectful to oneself nor to others attending the ASCA meeting. Even a single glass of wine or one beer can alter our mood and feelings. We should try to come to our ASCA meetings not only unaltered by chemical substances but also free from anything else that would tend to alter or numb our mood or feelings.

2. A New Book by Michael Lew:
Leaping Upon the Mountains: Men Proclaiming Victory over Sexual Child Abuse

As therapists, survivors, allies or simply caring humans, it is essential to contradict destructive ideas; we must search for messages that reflect the reality of human strength, caring, resilience, courage, creativity and love. I’m not suggesting denial; we cannot ignore grim realities of life. But there is far more to human existence than unhappiness. The world is richly beautiful, infinitely diverse—and so are we.

— Mike Lew, from Leaping Upon the Mountains

When the ground-breaking Victims No Longer was released in 1988, it challenged widespread misconceptions about male victimization. This revolutionary work continues to provide hope, understanding, and essential advice for healing to the millions of men who are survivors of boyhood sexual trauma and those who care about them.

Leaping Upon the Mountains, Mike Lew’s long awaited second book, focuses on the reality of recovery. Its information comes directly from the experts—male survivors who have engaged in a visible process of change—courageously, persistently, and triumphantly.

Presenting the first real investigation of what male survivors themselves identify as most important during various stages of their recovery, Leaping Upon the Mountains contains powerfully moving contributions from hundreds of men of all ages and backgrounds throughout the United States and 45 other countries.

This book is about the successes. Its contributors speak eloquently and persuasively of the reality of recovery. It is not a work of fiction but a compilation of many truths and many realities—a quilt, pieced together from men’s experiences—forming an impressively triumphant pattern. Taken together, they state, lucidly and forcefully, that recovery work produces changes that are real, important, and permanent. Leaping Upon the Mountains is a celebration of successful recovery.

For information about ordering Leaping Upon the Mountains and Small Wonder Books and the Next Step Counseling, visit their Web site at: http://www.abbington.com/smallwonder/index.html [update: no longer valid], or send $19.94 plus $4 postage per book for shipping to: Small Wonder Books, PO Box 1146, Jamaica Plain, MA 02130 [update: may no longer be valid].

3. Possible ASCA Meeting Topic for January:
Looking Forward: Forming the Future

Throughout the year, transitional dates like New Year’s Day, a birthday, an anniversary, or events like a graduation, geographic relocation, a birth, or death, provide us with events with which to pause and reflect, to assess, and dream. These moments encourage us to look forward and to imagine what the future can hold for us. In looking forward, in imagining our future, we initially lay the groundwork, the basic formation for tomorrow’s future, next month’s future, next year’s future...

Balancing between looking back, especially concerning our past childhood abuse, and looking forward to the lives that we would like and deserve to have and the kind of person we would like to be can be challenging. It is difficult, some would say almost impossible, to look forward to our future when we have not fully disclosed the story, the people, and events of our past abuse. Usually, the secret, the hidden, the closed, and the suppressed become the major obstacles to imagining and forming our future.

Looking ahead and shaping our future does not necessitate nor require resolving, healing, fixing, reconciling, or rectifying all the various elements of our past abuse. As long as we have thoroughly told our story, we no longer use our daily life energies to hide, suppress, or deny. Forming our future has more to do with the practical everyday scenarios of planting seeds, taking concrete steps, and doing.

Questions:
  1. What occasions or events tend to encourage you to pause, to reflect, to assess, to dream about your future?
  2. How do you negotiate the balance between looking back and looking forward?
  3. What are you doing to pause, to reflect, to plant seeds, to take steps to form your future?