Accommodation Is Not a Shield From Criticism
On the occasion of the one year anniversary of the release of my book, I was able to conduct some interviews with the women who came to my support. It’s been a very special time for everyone who has been given the opportunity to come together with me in this space. It is my hope it will continue to be an enriching experience for all those who have been affected by sexual abuse.
The first of these is with the woman who, when I first wrote my book, became one of the women who would share their own experiences that helped me see a much different meaning to sexual abuse. The interviews were conducted last summer, and I will release the full interviews with the women in the future. But for now, I want to share the key moments.
Thank you so much for being part of our community, and for contributing your stories to the book.
(Opening Statement)
My name is Tracie. I’m 42 years old. I’m from Atlanta, Georgia. I was sexually abused as a child until I was in my early to mid teens. I moved around a lot with my family and grew up in various suburbs in Atlanta and in a military facility in South Carolina. I was never able to make anything of myself so I left the military and was basically a street person for a few years before I found myself back on my own again two years ago. I spent the majority of my life making very little that I could only afford through my own self discipline and self sacrifice. I graduated from Atlanta University with a degree in Sociology. I worked all the way through college as a clerical assistant, before becoming a server at a hotel. This paid very little, very slowly, and I had to choose to work where I wanted to, but never had to choose to stay where I was. In my mid 30s I finally decided to move to a more stable and secure job. It took me more than a year to finally find a position as a manager in a retail store that made a lot more money than my previous job, but was also still fairly unstable and short-lived. After two years of this job, and having a good income, I decided to leave the job I had been in for about 10 months. I went