Monday, January 16, 2012


Healing a Long Process Sexual Assault Victims

Stairs leading to SF Women Against Rape's office, where victims of rape can seek counseling and support.
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A Mission resident who was brutally assaulted earlier this month, has begun to heal physically. However, the emotional scars remain, a close friend of the victim said.
“Psychologically, it’s absolutely impossible to tell at this point how she’s recovering,” Arie Jongejan said.
Advocates for rape victims said the healing process can take years, and for all rape victims, the on-going criminal investigation and later judicial proceedings can be both helpful to the healing process and a negative reminder of the trauma.
While attention has focused on the three sexual assaults in the Mission District that began another stage earlier this month with the arrest and arraignment of 32-year-old Frederick Dozier, recovery from sexual assualt is a challenge many women face. While citywide police statistics, show 127 rapes reported in 2011 compared to 140 in 2010, more than 60 percent of rapes go unreported, according to the FBI. New York Times health columnist Jane Brody began a recent series on rape, “Nearly every woman I know can recall one or more instances in which she was sexually assaulted, harassed, threatened, inappropriately touched or even raped.” Brody went on to acknowledge three instances of men acting toward her in inappropriate ways.
The only free counseling centers specifically for victims of rape in San Francisco are SF WAR and the Trauma Center.
The call to a hotline is often the first step in dealing with rape or sexual aggression. Locally, SF Women Against Rape and the Trauma Recovery Center at 727 Mariposa Street, provide 24-hour hotlines for victims who do not want to visit a hospital or are suffering from past assaults.
Most people who call the 24-hour crisis line have not reported the assault, said Janelle White, Executive Director of SF Women Against Rape at 3543 18th St. They call because they’re suffering; they may be having nightmares or flashbacks or suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder or depression. Sometimes that leads to counseling.
White said the healing has to start somewhere and the most important thing to do is to talk to somebody about what happened. If not, she said, “It does just eat away at you.”
Immediately after a sexual assault, Jon Dean Green of the Trauma Recovery Center urges victims in San Francisco to call 911 and have the police transport them to SF General Hospital for examination.
Seeking medical attention is important to prevent pregnancy and in treating and preventing sexually transmitted diseases, including HIV. To be effective, it’s important to be treated within 72 hours.
Any hospital can treat victims, but SFGH is the only place in San Francisco to have forensic evidence collected. Police and prosecutors said DNA evidence helped lead to the arrest of Dozier.
If the victim is not sure about filing a police report, the hospital will hold the evidence for up to 90 days.
At the hospital, the patient will be set up with a social worker from the Trauma Recovery Center or an advocate from SF WAR to discuss next steps toward psychological and emotional healing. “A lot of times, what people want is a friendly, non-judgmental ear,” Green said. “Some are angry or upset with themselves,” and they need to be told that what they are feeling is normal.
SF WAR offers both one-on-one and group peer counseling, and the Trauma Recovery Center, employing psychologists and psychiatrists, provides 16 sessions of free trauma-focused therapy.
While White says that there is no official waiting list for individual counseling at SF WAR, there is for group counseling.
Lisa Thomas-Adeyemo, Director of Counseling, said SF WAR has the capacity to run three cycles of group counseling per year, which run anywhere from 8 to 12 weeks and are closed, meaning people must be place in the group by Thomas-Adeyemo. People from the waiting list are called as a new group is being formed.
Thomas-Adeyemo completes assessments to decide if people are a good fit for the group — for instance, in terms of race and age. “We have a real commitment to our groups being accessible and safe,” she said.
When the Fair Oaks sexual assault victim went to the Trauma Recovery Center for an initial visit in early December, she was told that it would take a month for follow-up counseling, according to her friend, Jongejan. Eventually they found an opening earlier in January.
Green wasn’t sure why Jongejan’s friend had such a long wait because that’s not usually the case and it may have been a result of lighter staffing during the holidays.
Usually, Green said, the time from calling the center to intake is less than two weeks with a follow up visit the following week.
At SF WAR, the first intake appointment happens within a week. According to Thomas-Adeyemo, the first of the 10 sessions of peer counseling they offer victims “may take one to three weeks.” Timing depends, she said, on volunteer availability, level of demand and finding a good counselor to pair with the client.
While some people who decide they want counseling may want it to begin immediately, others don’t mind waiting a week or more. “Every survivor is different in terms of how they’re going to experience [treatment centers]; some want to jump in, and some want to ease into it,” White said.
Though funding plays a role in waiting times for counseling, if SF WAR was to get an infusion of money White says they would be very strategic in spending it. The resources may be better spent on prevention than making sure people have same-day counseling.
We do not want to “bring people in, help them heal and then send them back out” into a world where they will be raped again, White said. SF WAR’s goal is to prevent rape.
Shame and self-blaming are big barriers to victims reporting crimes to the police. It’s hard for people to talk about it because of it’s sexual nature.
“To talk about even consensual sex in our culture is difficult. Think about trying to talk about something that is not consensual,” White said.
Jongejan, the victim’s friend, sees how important it is for victims to have a case manager who can coordinate services and keep victims informed and getting what they need.
His friend has been in touch with the District Attorney’s Victim Services Division, which provides case workers who help victims navigate the criminal justice system, find resources and complete the paperwork required to get reimbursements for relocation, lost wages, medical treatment, counseling and other needs.
His sense however, is that the advocates don’t have enough time. “If she needs something specific, she can call them,” he said, but it’s not enough attention for me.
Last year alone the Victim Services Division served more than 5,000 victims, a number that’s remained stable for the last few years, according to Stephanie Ong, Director of Communications for the division.
Caseworkers are assigned to the victims in every police report. These advocates are then required to contact the victim within 24 hours.
Although some victims miss a lot of work, Jongejan said that his friend had already returned in late December, maybe wanting some normalcy. Still, he says, “I think it’s a very real possibility that at some point down the road she could have to take time off work for the healing process.”
Her boss told her that she can take time off, with no advance notice, if she needs. “He’s been very supportive,” he said.
His friend, he said, seems to be doing better each day, but Jongejan knows her psychological recovery will be a long, difficult process. And it isn’t linear; there will be triggers that cause her set-backs.
White agreed, saying healing might be a lifelong process.
“I don’t know what fully recovering means. I think it’s more of a process,” she said. “And the sooner you start acknowledging that there has been a trauma and that you want to heal – to do something to feel better – that’s a huge step.”
“I do think healing is possible, because I am a survivor,” she said.
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