Help free Sara Kruzan!

Photo courtesy of Change.org

 As some of you may have seen, a lot of people are working hard to save Sara Kruzan, free her from being a prisoner--all for protecting herself. I recently joined the Faces For Sara group and want to ask you lovely readers to take a minute to get to know the situation and join! It's simple. You'll send your headshot/photo to FacesForSaraKruzan@gmail.com 

Our photos will be put in a book-style petition and delivered to Gov. Brown. This is a fantastic way to go about this. Sara will be able to see all of the faces of the people who are on her side and asking for her freedom!


You can also sign a petition to help free Sara by going here.

There are a few easy rules that are asked to be followed if you're going to participate. These are copied and pasted directly from Elizabeth Ohara.com. 

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"1) Send 1 to 3 pictures of yourself that are clear, HIGH-RESOLUTION PHOTOS (over 500k, preferably 1MB or higher). Also No photoshopped images or otherwise doctored images. [No exceptions on the image size]. If you do not have a computer or much internet access, please email me for my mailing address to snail mail me your picture.

2) Send a statement of a few words to a short sentence or two stating your feelings about Sara's case, desire for her release or condemning her imprisonment. You can send me a sentence of what you'd like me to quote along with sending your photo. Please do not photoshop the statement into the photo. Pictures with you looking into the camera are stronger for this project.

3) Group photos are absolutely not accepted without my direct permission. Each person must be individually photographed.
Got it?

Three Simple Rules: Large Photo, Something to quote & no group photos."

So all you have to do is send your photo, leave a brief sentence or two asking for her freedom. I left a few sentences saying something along the lines of trafficking and how her body should be her own, she's a woman, a human and not a sexual object... You can go with something simple like "Please free Sara! No human deserves this." Anything you'd like.

Email your photo and quote to the address provided above. You can also learn more about the project here.  Remember, you're free to join on Facebook to keep up to date! Also, join our group Anti-Pornography to keep up to date on how to take action for Sara as well as hundreds of other cases! 

Finding the closure I've needed to get past rape

I have recently started speaking up about what I usually call "my experience" some of you know what I'm talking about. The past couple of years I've started dealing with the whole thing & trying to get past it. I've done so many things to try and get closure, but after 4 years I still didn't have it. It helped to finally start speaking about it. I still wasn't where I needed to be. I ended up writing a little about it here & although it was scary to publicly admit it, it helped. I still didn't have that last bit of closure I needed to move on. I was stuck in that little area of falling back into the fear and self loathing and moving on. I just couldn't make it.

I honestly, began to think that this was the only closure I would have and the rest was just meant to be there to kind of randomly torture me. That's what I thought for the past year. I thought I just needed to accept that every once in a while, I would be tormented. I was so wrong!

A lovely and very strong woman Named Jessica Brant contacted me & helped me to have the courage to take a big step and tell my story... publicly on her site. It was so empowering, but in the beginning I was scared. The fear and paranoia was getting to me a little again, but I KNEW it was something I needed to do and I knew it would help. What I didn't know, is that I would actually be moving further and finally getting real closure.

When the lovely Jessica Brant who has dedicated her own site to helping people find their way, put the story of my rape "Living This Side Of Hell" up on her site. Jessica's site is called Finding One's Way I was scared to even look at the comments that were left.

My boyfriend of 4 years has been extremely supportive and was the person who got me to confront the experience. After the rape, I never EVER used the word rape. I would not think about it and would not deal with it. I pretended it didn't happen, but was still terrified for my life. At that point, the only person who knew besides police, were the rapist, the girl who watched it, and my best girlfriend. I ended up telling my boyfriend and things were bad, I mean bad when I first started dealing with it. I honestly hated myself. I hated to look at my stomach because it was where he bit me. I hated my chest  because he left a scar from biting me. I wanted to change how I looked completely all because of that. I guess I thought if I didn't look like the girl who was raped, I wouldn't be that girl? I also wanted to change my looks because I didn't want him to ever recognize me if he came looking for me. So, I changed everything.

My point of this post is to tell what Jessica Brant and the amazingly supportive people who read my story have done for me.

I read the comments and expected to see things like "You deserved it." Or "Girls who get raped, must have asked for it." because that's what I've always been told. Even some of my closest friends told me that.

The people at Jessica's Site didn't blame or judge me. I cried when I read their comments. I was so happy and I couldn't believe how much power was in those comments. I have never in these few years not felt fearful at the thought of my rapist. When I read the comments, I felt empowered and I honestly feel that if I do see him out somewhere, I won't even flinch. I don't know how those comments touched my heart so much & I don't know how they were able to give me real closure, but they did. I have taken another step to not pushing it back in my head, but truly not being tormented by it any longer. I don't feel yucky about myself anymore and the people who were nice enough to support me & give nice words are to thank for that.

I guess I just needed to have a little bit of support from others. I mean, the BF has been more supportive than imaginable, but I thought it's because he had to. I thought it wasn't possible for others to think anything good of me and they did. They said I was strong and brave! I think I might just be.

I just cannot believe what those people have done for me. I can't believe how it made such an impact and gave me the hope and courage I need to fight. I will not let myself be tormented anymore by it. I REALLY won't. I guess until now, I kind of thought I deserved to have torment.

I will be forever grateful to these people and my BF and God of course. Every time I see him out, their words will be in my heart. I will remember them forever. Everytime I start to feel scared, those words are what I'll remember and I honestly think that the fear is over now. I don't think it's there anymore.

So, words are EXTREMELY powerful. Even I didn't know just how powerful they were.

I believe the courage, hope, etc. that I was lacking is gone. I never knew how much words could change a person, but I am benefiting so much from the words of:
Kriti Mukherjee at: http://kriti-howaboutthis.blogspot.com/

Rhyme Me A Smile at: http://www.blogger.com/goog_222468968

http://www.jidhu.blogspot.com/

Mari at: http://www.blogger.com/goog_222468962

Lisa at: http://howdoigetwhiterteeth.blogspot.com/

Tj Lubrano at: http://tjlubrano.blogspot.com/

Charlie Nitric at: http://charlienitric.wordpress.com/

Louise at: http://poeticdelusions.wordpress.com/

Kelly Lewis

Swati Bhattacharya

http://irfanurs.blogspot.com/

Corrine at: http://www.everydaygyaan.blogspot.com/

Stuart Nager at: http://www.bornstoryteller.com/

Alpana Jaiswal at: http://www.motifsonthewall.blogspot.com/

These are only SOME of the people who have been so amazing. I was unable to post them all at the moment because the findingonesway site keeps giving me an error message. I WILL add the rest of the names & blogs when I'm able to access the site again.