Aspire: The I Have The Right To Podcast
Join the I Have the Right to team and thought leaders as we Aspire to eradicate sexual assault. Inspired by Co-Founder Chessy Prout’s courageous voice and memoir, I Have The Right To- A High School Survivor’s Story of Sexual Assault, Justice and Hope, co-authored by investigative journalist Jenn Abelson, our mission is to create an ecosystem of respect, education, and support for all students!
Aspire is meant to be a beacon of hope and opportunity for growth -- by offering a forum for dialogue - about issues affecting our culture and the way we live, interact, love, learn and grow.
Real Men, Real Conversations: Aspire touches on both sides of the coin; Co-Founder of I Have the Right To and father of Chessy Prout, Alex Prout, and High School Student Leaders and Co-Hosts, Hugh Eastman and Gabriel Viscogliosi, share their voices with discussions about what it means to be a man- does it mean being aggressive, stoic, and not taking no for an answer? Or giving your buddy a hug and telling him you love him? Alex, Gabriel, and Hugh share how, across generations, common masculinity tropes impact us all, and how we can inspire the future to act with "aspirational masculinity". They interview guests to get their perspectives, while discussing how rigid gender norms can create harmful barriers for all. All this, and more, in “Real Men, Real Conversations”.
Survivor Advocacy: In the “Survivor Advocacy” segment, Co-Founder and mother of Chessy Prout, Susan Prout, and Executive Director of I Have the Right To, Katie M. Shipp, highlight the power of survivor voices in driving meaningful change. These episodes —deeply inspired by Chessy’s unwavering courage to speak out despite attempts to silence her— amplify powerful survivor stories, engage with experts, and explore the path forward in the fight for justice and safety. Listeners will gain insight into where we’ve been, where we need to go, and how we can collectively create lasting impact. Together, we’ll explore diverse perspectives to drive meaningful, lasting advocacy and build a safer, more just future for all.
We amplify survivors’ voices and address the root causes of sexual violence by creating open dialogue around its causes. Each episode features a variety of guests discussing survivor experiences, the aftermath of sexual assault, healthy masculinity, and the future we envision - free from sexual assault.
Let’s explore, learn, and aspire together.
Aspire: The I Have The Right To Podcast
E73: The Science of Healing | Peter Pruyn on EMDR, Trauma Therapy, and Emotional Literacy - Advocacy in Action
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In this week’s episode of Aspire - Advocacy in Action, hosts Chessy Prout and Susan Prout are joined by graduate student intern Meghan Boudreau and trauma therapist Peter Pruyn for a thoughtful conversation about trauma recovery, healing, and the importance of creating safe spaces for survivors. Peter shares how his journey into psychology and EMDR therapy was shaped by years of working alongside trauma survivors, and explains how healing begins with trust, collaboration, and empowering clients to remain in control of their own recovery. Together, they discuss why choosing the right therapist matters, how trauma therapy differs from other forms of care, and why slowing down is often an essential part of the healing process.
The conversation explores practical tools that anyone can use to support healing, including a simple grounding exercise, the role of emotional literacy, and the importance of setting healthy boundaries. Peter introduces his "No Game," an exercise designed to help people practice saying no with confidence, prompting a broader discussion about consent, survivor empowerment, and the need for society to become more comfortable both expressing and respecting personal boundaries. Throughout the episode, the hosts emphasize that survivors are the experts on their own experiences and that meaningful healing comes through collaboration.
They close by discussing the larger cultural changes needed to prevent gender-based violence, from raising emotionally literate boys to encouraging healthy allyship and challenging systems that perpetuate inequality. Peter reflects on the power of storytelling to reduce shame, normalize conversations about trauma, and inspire change, while sharing his hope that future generations will continue creating communities where every person feels heard, respected, and empowered. It is a conversation that offers both practical guidance for survivors and a hopeful vision for building a more compassionate and trauma-informed world.
To learn more about Peter Pruyn and his work, please visit www.emdrforwomenshealth.com
For resources on mental health that Peter mentions, check out: www.equimundo.org
www.whiteribbon.ca
www.coachescorner.org
www.maineboystomen.org
www.joinonelove.org
To learn more about I Have The Right To's mission and programming, please visit www.havetherightto.org
Aspire is produced by BenHudakProductions.com
Welcome to Aspire, an I Have the Right to podcast, where we amplify voices, share stories, and drive change in the fight against sexual assault. We explore the critical issues surrounding student safety, institutional accountability, and survivor empowerment. In every episode, our goal is to provide insightful conversations with survivors, experts, educators, and advocates, giving you, our listener, valuable information, resources, and actionable steps to create safer environments and cultivate a culture of respect and consent.
SPEAKER_04Hello everyone, and welcome back to the I Have the Right to Aspire podcast. I'm here with my co-host, Susan Prout, and my name is Chessie Prout. Aspire was created by the nonprofit I Have the Right to as a space for honest, meaningful conversations about survivor advocacy, prevention, and what it truly takes to create safer communities. This podcast is about learning together, leaning into courage, and uplifting the voices of people who show up every day to drive real and lasting change, especially the students we've met on our journey. How many interns do we have right now, mom? Oh my gosh, Chess.
SPEAKER_06We have about 19 this last semester. And when I asked how many interns we have for the summer, I heard, I will get back to. So that leads me to believe the number's quite big.
SPEAKER_04Wow. It's always so heartening to see young people feel empowered to get involved as well. Because I know that that sometimes there can be barriers to getting involved in activism, especially when you're still in school with the busy school schedule. So we're so grateful for all of our interns, including Megan Boudreau, who is our co-host today on the podcast. Megan is a graduate student at the NYU Silver School as a CHAMP Institute fellow studying social work. And Megan, can you give our listeners a little bit of a background as to how you got connected to I Have the Right To?
SPEAKER_03Absolutely. Hi everyone. As Jesse said, I'm Megan. I got connected to I Have the Right To through Katie Ship. It was the right place, right time situation. I uh went to the same undergrad as Katie and was actually working as a tour guide when I gave a tour to her nephew and kind of talked about my major and my journey as a uh psychology major, specializing in legal psychology in the realm of child welfare and uh our vision about how to help advocate for specifically youth uh in the in the United States was so aligned. She told me about I Have the Right to and recruited me as a student intern. Um and I've been working with I Have the Right To ever since, and it's been amazing, an amazing, amazing journey.
SPEAKER_06Oh my gosh. I don't know if I knew all the salient details. That is so cool, Megan. Um, I do know that you have facilitated workshops for us, talking to students in at a number of schools. You've researched and written blogs on topics like gender expectations given to children via toys, helped us create our Aspire guides, and you've done a deep dive into the work of our guest today, Peter Prine.
SPEAKER_04We're so excited to have Megan be a part of the Aspire team and to bring these her voice into these conversations. Today we're honored to welcome Peter Prine, a trauma therapist and EMDR clinician from Massachusetts, whose work helps survivors better understand healing, reclaim their voices, and navigate recovery with greater clarity and compassion. Welcome to Aspire, Peter.
SPEAKER_01Chessie, thank you so much. I'm so honored to be here.
SPEAKER_06Peter, I am so glad you're here today. Um, because we go way back. We can say that now, don't we?
SPEAKER_02Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_06Now, uh as I understand it, you're going to lead us in a brief grounding exercise. Is that right?
SPEAKER_01I'd be happy to, but before I get to that, I feel like just giving the quick version of how I came to know you folks. Would that be okay?
SPEAKER_06Fantastic. Yes.
SPEAKER_01So I was working as a psychotherapist in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Um, and I began to follow you and your family's story in the newspaper. Um, and there seemed just something iconic and elemental about it. Um and then I learned that Chessey's book was coming up. And um I just had it on my radar, and one day I was wandering through a bookstore, and there it was. It was the center display. And I was actually in the bookstore buying a gift for someone else. And I thought, oh yes, there's that young woman's book. I'll have to pick that up at some point. I started to walk out the bookstore, and this little boy said, Peter, buy the book. And so I did. And I read it in less than a week, and I was completely blown away by it. And an extraordinary thing happened, which is that week, Chessie and her co-author Jenna Abelson were doing book talks in Boston. And um, so I was able to meet them first at a book talk at Simmons College, and then there was another panel discussion put on by the Boston Globe. Um and I have to say that one of the things that Chessie's book did was it opened my eyes to the importance of writing for a general audience. That I felt a lot of pressure in my field to write for my peers and write about research. Um, but Chessie's book is really the inspiration for me, focusing my writing uh for the general public. Um and then I connected with all of you, and uh it's just been really special to have this relationship with Chessy and your family, um, both watching your journey, but also feeling like you were watching mine at the same time since. So I'm deeply honored to be here.
SPEAKER_06Oh, Peter, thank you so much for that, Jess. I I don't know if you knew of all of that part that Peter just said, how you changed your perspective about writing for the public versus peers.
SPEAKER_04I think everything you've said right now, Peter, I just brought me back to that common room at Simmons with the hot cocoa, marshmallows, cookies, um, donuts, and being able to sit in that environment with you and the students was so special for me and Jen. And I am just so deeply grateful for the work that you've done uh in throughout your career and what you've decided to do now. Because I I'm not sure if it's a specific, well, it it's definitely not specific to me that information and knowledge is power. And there's a lot of a barrier to understanding these psychological phenomenons when you're a young survivor. We haven't gone to college yet, we haven't taken um college psychology courses, and we might never take college psychology courses, but we should still we have the right to know what's going on in our minds and how we can live happier, healthier lives with the tools that exist. Um and these things that you help survivors with. So thank you so much, Peter.
SPEAKER_01Um, again, I'm just honored to be here. And yeah, I was chatting with um Susan before about what would you think if we began this conversation in the similar way I began many of my sessions with clients with doing just a brief grounding exercise. Would that be okay?
SPEAKER_04Okay. Absolutely.
SPEAKER_01So I'll tell you what, um, Chessie, how about I lead you through it? And then Megan and Susan and your listeners can just follow along as they wish. Would that be okay?
SPEAKER_04That sounds great.
SPEAKER_01Okay. So I'm going to invite everyone who's listening to simply take a moment to sit as comfortably as you can. And see if you can find a pace of breathing that is most soothing for you. See if you can find a depth of breathing that's most soothing for you. And then Chessie, in your own time, I'm wondering if you could just name out loud any three colors that you see anywhere around you.
SPEAKER_05Orange, teal, and brown.
SPEAKER_01Okay. Now name the next three sounds you hear, and it's okay if one is repeating.
SPEAKER_05Airplane, trees, fan.
SPEAKER_02Great.
SPEAKER_01So now Chessie, you can do the rest of this silently to yourself. Next, I invite you to notice any three physical sensations you notice anywhere in your body, either internal or external, such as how a piece of clothing or something near you feels. Just notice any three. Silent to yourself, and then look at me. Okay? Once again, silently to yourself, notice two other colors in the room, and then look at me.
SPEAKER_02Okay?
SPEAKER_01Now notice the next two sounds you hear, and it's okay if they're the same as last time, and then look at me. Notice two other physical sensations, and then look at me.
SPEAKER_02One more color. The next sound you hear. One more sensation. That's it. I call that 321. What was that like?
SPEAKER_04It made me extremely aware of my physical being, which is something that, you know, disassociation makes me forget sometimes. So even feeling the weight of my feet on the floor right now feels specifically grounding.
SPEAKER_01Beautiful. Beautiful. Okay. Well, I see my presence here uh as serving um what you need. So what would you like to talk about?
SPEAKER_04Well, first of all, we'd love to hear a little bit about what brought you to where you are today. What made you interested in psychology and the psychological experience specifically of women? And what brought you to your work in EMDR and trauma therapy?
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Um so my path really begins in the teaching, education, and organizational development and training space, um, where I had various roles for a number of years. And um when you do organizational development and training, which is basically sort of working like an internal organizational management consultant, one of the things I began to learn was that how much work you can do is really limited by the personality of the person in charge. That is to say that organizations over time tend to take on the personalities of those who lead them. And if the person in charge uh loves learning, um, enjoys being self-reflective and growing, then you can do a lot. But if they're not interested in being self-reflective or learning, it's like swimming upstream. And so suddenly a very large systems problem became uh an individual problem. And that led me to be interested in clinical one-on-one work. And then um gradually over time, what happened was uh all of my internships and jobs exposed me to populations that had um enormous trauma backgrounds. And simultaneously, all of my supervisors, except for one, by coincidence, were trained in this approach to psychotherapy called EMDR. And then the third ingredient is that for my entire career, the majority of my clients have been female. And I think there are a couple of reasons for that. First, women experience higher rates of um trauma and PTSD than men, and therefore are more likely to seek out therapy. Um, but I think the other piece is that I think conventional masculinity positions asking for help as failure. And so many men are socialized not to ask for help, including going to a doctor or therapist. And so over time, the majority of my clients were women. Um I felt it was my job to support them as best I could. I got trained in this modality called EMDR that I'm happy to talk about. And then these women gradually began to educate me about the relationship between trauma and women's health more generally. Um, and that's what really led me to this path.
SPEAKER_04And for our listeners, would you be able to um r explain what the EMDR means?
SPEAKER_01Aaron Ross Powell Yes, absolutely. So let's back up just a little moment and say that um EMDR is a form of psychotherapy that uh was designed to heal traumatic memories and also lessen triggers in the present and future. And it turns out it can also be used to lessen certain forms of chronic pain. So to do that kind of healing, we basically need to do two things. First, we need to somehow desensitize traumatic memories so they're no longer overwhelming to bring to mind. Once we do that, we're then in a position to revisit the experience from a place of safety in the present rather than the sense of overwhelm with which we typically experience those kinds of things to begin with. And we're able to make new meaning of or reprocess the experience from a place in the present. And it turns out that if you alternately stimulate the left and right-hand sides of the brain, there's something about that that facilitates this desensitizing and reprocessing. And there are a few ways to do that. You can do that with left and right eye movements, you can do it with alternately tapping on the left and right-hand sides of the body, or you can do it using headphones that have alternating left and right tones. And so this approach to psychotherapy is referred to as eye movement, desensitization, and reprocessing, or EMDR.
SPEAKER_03Thank you so much, Peter. Um, so one of the biggest approaches that I've loved about getting to know you and your writing is how accessible you make it for people in both a clinical and non-clinical background and setting. Um, and so you do a fantastic job about of making therapy and specifically the concept of EMDR more accessible and less intimidating. What do you wish more people understood about starting trauma therapy specifically for the first time?
SPEAKER_01Great question. Well, first of all, uh before I answer that, I just want to say, Megan, that I've really enjoyed getting to know you. Um I really appreciated your feedback on my book and respect so much the choices you're making to further your own education. Um, and it's just been delightful to get to know you. Thank you so much. You're welcome. Um Yeah, so let's take a step back from trauma theory in in particular and just think about the role of psychotherapy in general and how there still is enormous stigma around mental health issues and psychotherapy. Um I think there are lots of reasons for that. But um one of the things I want to say to you and to Chessie is I think your generation uh has normalized mental health treatment better than any other generation. And that gives me enormous hope for the future for all of us. Um and so it's really important, first of all, to talk about these things. And so I really value your question. I think one thing that's really important is to um encourage people to take their time in choosing a psychotherapist that feels like the right fit to them. Uh there's a lot about this work that is deeply personal and very subjective, and one size does not fit all. And so I really encourage people when they're looking for a therapist to have um brief phone consultations with more than one therapist and just get a sense of them as a person and ask yourself, you know, did I feel heard? Uh can I imagine myself working with this person? Um, really just go with your gut around that. And then likewise, it's okay to do an intake appointment with more than one therapist and then make that decision based on that one appointment. And when you do an intake appointment, you do not have to commit to working with anyone for any length of time. All you have to ask yourself is, do I want to come back a second time and take it from there? So I just think it's really important that everyone feel empowered to make those choices for themselves about the kind of therapist and personality they want to work with and to take their time at doing so.
SPEAKER_04That leads perfectly into the next question that I wanted to ask you about how, you know, not just choice is empowering to survivors or to anybody, but uh again, touching back on the idea that knowledge about your own mental state is extremely empowering. When you are working with survivors who have, you know, made through, made it through the first meeting, the second meeting, and have made the conscious decision to to continue doing the work, how do you help them feel informed, but not overwhelmed? Are there any sort of signs of overwhelm that you can recognize in a patient? And and yeah, how what how does that um express itself?
SPEAKER_01Mm-hmm. So a few things come to mind, Chessie. Uh, it's a great question. But I feel like starting in a place that may feel a little adjacent to that. And that is inviting any client to name the dynamics of power that exists in the room when working with me. So, in particular, if I'm working with um a female-identified client, uh, I will at some point ask, you know, have you ever had a male therapist? And they'll say, you know, either yes or no. And I'll ask, you know, well, what's that like for you? Um and I think that's really important to put on the table because I, as a white male, have lived with certain kinds of privilege that not everyone has. And I am very aware that privilege is a form of power and that power is a barrier to communication. So before you get to anything else, I think you need to set the stage for there being free-flowing feedback that the client can be feel free to give you as the therapist. And so consistently in intake appointments, you know, I will ask halfway through, you know, we're just halfway through, but I just want to check in with you. How has the session been for you so far? Um and I also like to make a distinction if they do choose to work with me, um, between psychotherapy, working with the psychotherapist and working with, say, a medical doctor. And that medicine uh has a tendency to rely on the expert model of treatment and that people expect that. They expect to go to the doctor and have the doctor tell them, you know, make me better, basically. And I explained to them that psychotherapy is different and that, you know, a doctor can theoretically set a broken leg even if you're unconscious, but I can't do my work if you're unconscious. And that means that psychotherapy is intrinsically collaborative in a way that not all medicine is. And then I bothered to add, you know, talking about the notion of expertise, that while I have some expertise that I hope is of use to my clients, I really believe the most important expertise in a psychotherapy relationship is the client's own self-knowledge. The client is the world's expert on them. And I may have done EMDR with a whole bunch of other people, but I've never done EMDR with them. And the goal is to do EMDR with them. And so I think starting from a place of creating a foundation uh and encouragement for free-flowing feedback to equalize the dynamics of power, both through common conversations around roles in society, but also around expertise in the room is where I try to start.
SPEAKER_04And how you described that, that, you know, people are the experts in themselves just reminded me of, you know, those were my favorite assignments in school. I didn't I had no stress for the creative writing assignments or for the story writing assignments or for, you know, but but having to remember history and facts, I would, I would anxiously be worried about. But it is, there is something comforting in processing your experience, whether it is in a therapeutic setting or if it's between friends, if it's at school, in a creative writing prompt. Um but it is so powerful to process your life, your emotions, and your story um through different modes of communication versus all of it being stuck in your head.
SPEAKER_02Absolutely.
SPEAKER_06One of my questions as someone who's a big supporter of survivors through our work and encouraging their choice. Um, is there ever a moment where you think that someone might not be ready for EMDR and you'd prefer that they stay in a psychoanalysis pathway or vice versa?
SPEAKER_01Absolutely. So I'm really glad you asked the question because to emphasize one size does not fit all. And um, there are multiple approaches to psychotherapy and healing. Um and I think that's just really important to put out there that uh survivors shouldn't just have a sense of empowerment about choosing a psychotherapist, but choosing even whether they want psychotherapy at all. Um, and if so, what kind of psychotherapy? Um so, yes, there's a broad range of approaches to psychotherapy. EMDR is just one uh that happens to focus on trauma as well as chronic pain and other stuck issues. But um again, I would really leave it up to um the individual. I think it's perfectly fine to um, you know, try different therapists with different approaches and see what works best for you, both personality-wise as well as um technique-wise. And, you know, I don't think there's um a rule around who's ready or not for different uh approaches. I think it really just needs to be an individual choice. I think it can be useful to uh learn about the different choices and get a sense of uh what your affinity might be for something. Um but uh and you know, maybe another way to put it would be um it is appropriate for people's psychotherapy needs to evolve over time. It might be that someone would start with a psychotherapist who's more focused on uh day-to-day counseling or um career counseling, you know, just sort of sorting out the day-to-day. Um, gradually over time, maybe explore the relationship between the dilemmas the person is facing and their history, perhaps their families. And at that point, perhaps begin to explore, you know, deeper therapies, um, including uh EMDR, if that felt appropriate.
SPEAKER_06Thank you. That makes a lot of sense. I really appreciate that.
SPEAKER_01Maybe another way to put that would be um the therapist that's perfect for you this year uh may not be the perfect for a therapist for you five or 10 years from now. And that is evidence of growth and healing.
SPEAKER_06I love that.
SPEAKER_03Peter, if I can just jump in too um to kind of piggyback off of that question. We're talking a lot about uh the importance of matching up the therapist with uh the person receiving therapy. So the client. Um to be completely candid in the clinical side of things, we're taught that EMDR can actually be almost dangerous for some clients uh if the therapist and the client isn't exactly the right fit. Um so I wanted to see if you can speak more into that and maybe kind of give feedback for people who are interested in EMDR and are pursuing it, but how are they able to tell whether the treatment is actually effective for them or if they should start looking into a different row?
SPEAKER_01Mm-hmm. Yeah, great question. Um I guess I would again take a step back from EMDR in particular and look at psychotherapy more broadly. And that um it's just incredibly important that the client be given space to self-reflect about whether they feel like they're making progress or not, whether they feel like this therapist is the right fit or not. And you really can't answer the EMDR question until you've answered those two questions first. Um I think very often, uh, as you're implying, EMDR will be effective only if um the relationship and the choice of therapist are right before you even get to the EMDR. Um and again, there's no, you know, specific checklist for that, but I would just invite folks to ask themselves: do I feel heard? Do I feel safe? Um, do I feel like the therapist's agenda is my growth and healing, or does it feel like there's something else? Um like, you know, some therapists like to talk a lot. And uh, you know, storytelling and uh psychoeducation has its place. But if you ever feel like as the client, um, you feel like you're censoring yourself in some way in front of the therapist, um, that's a red flag. Um if you ever feel like there's a part of you that you need to leave outside of the therapist's office, like your sexuality or your political interests or um spiritual or religious interests, that you get this sense from the therapist that they are either implicitly or explicitly censoring something, um, that's also a red flag. And my experience is that if you have that sense of safety, if all of you feel welcome there, then there's a very good chance that any modality you try will be more likely to be effective.
SPEAKER_04And Peter, just to follow up on that, in translating, you know, the way that you described how a patient should feel in a therapist's office is the way that I strive to make people feel in my life. And so as a as a as a psychotherapist and as a human being in the world, do you have any tips for our listeners on how they can become safer spaces for the people in their lives without overdoing it or extending themselves too thin? We always hear that analogy of, you know, you've got to put your own oxygen mask on first. But especially in the post-COVID days, it's been a lot of putting just putting our own oxygen masks on first, it feels like sometimes because of the isolation that we've had to be put into. So do you have any suggestions or tips for us?
SPEAKER_01So your question is how can you be a good support to a survivor? Is that your question?
SPEAKER_04Basically, yeah. How do we create those safe spaces that allow somebody to open up to us the way that they might do? Um, and of course, in a different way in the therapist's office, but how do we create those spaces in our families and with our intimate relationships?
SPEAKER_01Big question. Um So I guess maybe just being clear about the purpose of the interaction. Um, that if your goal is supporting another person, then um, you want to try and listen non-judgmentally, um, try and avoid offering prescriptive solutions, um, perhaps offering some boundaries around the conversation for both of you, like, you know, what feel what does the person want to talk about? What do you feel comfortable um talking about? Uh maybe offering physical boundaries like a confidential space or a temporal boundary, like, you know, I have an hour, half an hour for you. Um and then also to understand that um uh a friend or a parent uh is not a therapist. And there's this subjective line between, you know, supporting someone and actually doing psychotherapy with them, actually doing trauma work. Um and that's a subjective line, but I think to just name it uh is useful. Um and um Yeah, maybe something about um, and this is true for th therapists as well, but to not put pressure on yourself to be the other person's savior. Uh that mostly what people yearn for is simply to feel understood. Um and if you're doing that, that's a lot.
SPEAKER_06Thank you so much for that. I love that. That's beautiful, Peter. It's really beautiful, especially it's a good reminder for advocacy and advocates in our work too. Um, we want to provide understanding and support for their journey, but we don't get on the journey with them necessarily. And that's really important for everyone's well-being and mental health.
SPEAKER_01Nice.
SPEAKER_06You you made a point in your book that um slower can be faster in trauma recovery. Why is pacing so important?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, uh, I would go so far as to say that pacing is the meta task of all psychotherapy, particularly trauma therapy. And I'll offer another headline that I think is important, which is to a large degree, healing is about slowing down. So, you know, think of something as simple as having the flu. I mean, it's a time when you slow down, you know, uh you gather yourself together. Or recovering from grief, um, you slow down. Or when you've got a broken leg, you know, the crutches force you to slow down as frustrating as that may be. So I think there's something intrinsic about that, that um slowing down is often healing. Um and then in the case of trauma recovery uh in particular, um the reason pacing is so important is that one of the things you're basically doing in trauma therapy in EMDR is you're trying to teach the body and mind. And a colleague likes to use the term body-mind because you can't really separate the two. You're basically trying to teach the body-mind that the trauma is over. And the reason trauma can be triggering and destabilizing in the present is that the body mind is confused about that. And so if you go too fast, um, that confusion sets in and the person can re-experience the trauma as if it were still happening. And so one way to think about doing that as an alternative is um if you think about trauma as uh sort of like trauma to be healed, as sort of like a large banquet of food. And uh the goal is to metabolize or digest the trauma so it's no longer activating. You know, you don't eat Thanksgiving dinner all at once. What do you do? You go up, you get a plate of stuff, um, you sit down and eat. Um, you try and eat not too fast, otherwise you get a tummy ache. Uh and then you sit there like a lump for a little while, and you feel a little bit better, you sort of gather your strength and you go and get seconds. Then you get seconds, and then you feel like a lump for a little while, and then maybe you sit for an hour or two, and then you have space for dessert. And sure, you have some dessert. Maybe you even have a second slice, but you don't eat it all at once. And then the most important thing about this Thanksgiving is that you have ample takeout containers. So that you can put everything in takeout containers and then eat it slowly over the next two weeks, right? Um so it's just like recovering and healing from trauma. Uh, you don't want to do it ever once, so you're overwhelmed. You do it at the pace at which your body and mind can consolidate it.
SPEAKER_06Oh my gosh, that is so beautiful. I I really can relate to that in watching friends go through all kinds of trauma or our survivors that reach out to us go for go through it. Um there really is no prescriptive timetable, is there?
SPEAKER_01No. And actually, um, I wonder if I can add one more thing to the metaphor. Which is the importance of being able to say no. Um, I don't have to tell you what that means in terms of uh education around um sexual cell prevention, but um it's also true around doing psychotherapy as well as Thanksgiving. You know, the relative is forcing you more food when you don't want it. It's important to be able to say no, thank you. So actually, I'm wondering if Chesse would be open to something I also do with clients that I've developed over the years to try and bring this point home because I find on average, many women are socialized to be accommodating. And to help bring this point forward, I developed this thing that I call the no game. And it's very simple. I just simply ask the client three questions in a row, and the client is invited to say, no matter what I ask in response, no. Would you be open to doing that with me briefly, Chessie?
SPEAKER_04No, I'm just kidding, yes. Yes.
SPEAKER_01Okay, so just to clarify, I'm gonna ask you three very simple questions, and no matter what I ask you, you respond by saying no.
SPEAKER_02Okay?
SPEAKER_04Okay.
SPEAKER_02Okay. Chessie, can you tell me um what was what was one of your favorite television shows growing up? No. Okay.
SPEAKER_01Um let's see. Uh tell me about um the book that you wrote.
SPEAKER_05No.
SPEAKER_01Okay. Uh, you know, Chesse, I realized I need to put a quarter in my parking meter. Can you loan me a quarter?
SPEAKER_05No.
SPEAKER_01Congratulations. You just completed the no game. So, Chussie, what was that like?
SPEAKER_04Uh that first no was so hard to get out of my mouth without laughing or or saying just kidding, or offering platitudes. Um, I almost had to to stop listening to the questions that you were asking me, just remembering to say no. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02So what do you take from that?
SPEAKER_04It makes me understand that my body needs more practice in saying no and seriously and not in a joking matter. Um and that I I need to be received as well and respected in my nose more often. And my sister Lucy, she did a self-defense course um through her program at NYU, and they did have everybody practice just yelling and and saying no, like go away, or and and it might seem silly at first, but the instructors were so dead serious. Your body needs the practice. You need to have the the pathways prepared for you to to to say these things. And it is true, we sp we practice speeches, we practice piano playing, we practice music, we but we don't practice standing up for ourselves, which is to the detriment of many people, I think.
SPEAKER_02Exactly.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_06We actually do a workshop, and it was suggested by a student called Hearing and Saying No. And it was a young man who actually suggested it for us. And um, we we delve into both perspectives of saying no and hearing no, and how do you respond to hearing no?
SPEAKER_01Yep. One of my colleagues liked to say, no can be a complete sentence.
SPEAKER_06Absolutely.
SPEAKER_01And it's just one little word, but uh it brings up a lot. There's a lot there. I would say easily half the survivors, I do that with um tear up in the course of that game.
SPEAKER_04Do any laugh? Like I said, Oh, sure. That happens too. Okay.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. But but the laughter, as you said, is is also trying to uh it's another way of coping with the extreme discomfort.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. It it is extremely uncomfortable. And I think like my mom mentioned, the flip side is just as important. We also need to learn how to receive no, not as some mortal um ending of a friendship or relationship or or um a a great offense, but take it as somebody setting the boundary that they need to set at that moment in time and and accepting it, which is important as well. Now that we've seen an example of what might happen, you know, in a in a therapy session, what would you say to anybody listening or to survivors or people who have experienced deep trauma um in their lives, who might be afraid of facing that trauma, who think that therapy might feel too vulnerable or painful or might take too much out of them?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, great question.
SPEAKER_01Um and let's just emphasize that um, you know, I think the first time someone walks into a psychotherapist's office is one of the most vulnerable things you can do. Um, you know, at least when you do things like uh skydiving or give blood, you know, you have some image in your mind of mechanically what's gonna happen. But society and Hollywood movies do us no favors in um giving us accurate representations of psychotherapy. Um so it is scary. And we should acknowledge that. Um and one of the ways we make it easier is to have conversations like this. So more appreciation to you and your family. Um I think uh I may be repeating myself, but I I feel like the main thing is just to coach people on um seeing psychotherapy as being about them and their needs. Um and to have examples in society of um people who've done psychotherapy um and you know, their positive stories of what it's been like, um, whether it's trauma therapy of any kind or EMDR in particular, um so that we can demystify it. It's going back to what you were saying before that knowledge is power. And um once we normalize these stories, then you know, we take the mystery away. Um and what's really scary is the unknown. And once you make them concrete and uh relatable, then I think that goes a long way. And then to set people up in the way we've been talking about that, you know, you get to be picky about your therapist, you get to say no, uh, you get to change therapists, um, you get to choose the pace.
SPEAKER_02Um yeah, I guess that's what I would say.
SPEAKER_03Oh, Peter, thank you so much. Um just a wealth of information and knowledge that was absolutely liberating in everything you've been saying for the past few minutes. So thank you for sharing the exercise and the power of no and also the importance of stories, especially when it comes to uh gender-based violence or uh just gender inequality as a whole. Um, and in your book, you write specifically about women's journeys when it comes to the healing of trauma. So I have a twofold question, um, if you can bear with me. The first part is how do you adapt the treatment when a person's trauma is tied to gender-based violence specifically or other experiences of inequality?
SPEAKER_01So we can start with that one and then I can ask the second one after the Well, first of all, Megan, um I'm honored that you're here because uh you're one of the few people in the world who's read a draft of my book, and I'm really grateful to you for that and your feedback. And for listeners, um maybe I should just explain that the book that Megan is referring to has the working title of EMDR Stories: Women's Journeys of Healing, Health, and Hope. And it's a collection of 10 EMDR stories based on actual psychotherapy sessions I've done with women on a variety of diverse issues, combined with smaller sections on psychoeducation relating to each particular story. And I'm currently looking for a publisher, so keep your fingers crossed about that. Um I think for gender-based violence, um, for me doing the work, I would go back to what I said before of starting with asking them what's it like to do this work with a male therapist, and to just sort of lay out the larger um dynamics of privilege and oppression in society that are surrounding our work together, even if it's only two of us in a room. Um and I think to uh normalize their experience, um, that so many survivors um blame themselves. Um, and there are lots of reasons for that. But to just name that, and um just one person who I think is doing an enormous service to this, um. Is, and someone tell me her name. Uh, the the French woman who just wrote the book um about uh recovering from uh her abuse of her parent.
SPEAKER_06Giselle Giselle Pellicot.
SPEAKER_01There we go. So do you happen to remember the subtitle of her book? I know the title is Hym to Life, but I think the subtitle is something like Um Reversing the Direct Direction of Shame.
SPEAKER_04Shame Has to Change Sides.
SPEAKER_01There you go. Shame has to change sides. That is such a brilliant subtitle. And it it makes so concise a lot of the trauma recovery process for so many survivors that because there's so much stigma around it, they think they're the only one. They blame themselves, and that carries shame. Um and part of trauma recovery is to see that, you know, it's the perpetrator's shame. And um, this woman has done an enormous service to the world by including that concept as uh subtitle of her book. Megan, I don't know if I answered your question.
SPEAKER_03No, I really, I really do think you did. So thank you, Peter, for that. Um and then the second part of the question that I had was you were talking about power earlier and specifically how therapists or clinicians and their clients have to work in this collaborative framework together when it comes to trauma healing specifically. Um so I was wondering if you could speak to the responsibilities that therapists have when working with trauma survivors and kind of identifying the larger social systems uh that are kind of working against survivors currently in place.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, absolutely. Um so building what I said before, I think it's very important to name the networks of power and privilege in society and how multifaceted they are. Um so that's true of gender, it's true of race and ethnicity, it's true of um uh um, you know, whether someone is native-born or an immigrant, it's true in different ways of religious affiliations, um, sexuality. And uh all those layers of oppression and pyrodynamics um can make things worse. So, for example, um it's well documented that uh one demographic that consistently has very high rates of trauma is the transgender community. And that um within the transgender community, transgender individuals of color have even higher rates of abuse and trauma. And so to be able to look at that and say, well, actually, um this isn't your fault. This is a layering of power structures that are outside of you and create very powerful barriers to you being seen and appreciated and valued as a human being, um is definitely part of the work. And uh I guess I go back to this word normalizing. Um so many survivors feel alone uh in what happened to them and don't have the opportunity to talk these things through. Um, and particularly when there are dynamics of increasing misogyny in society or transphobia, you know, it's made even worse that they may not have peers to feel a sense of support with. Um so yes, I think it's absolutely crucial that we do that. And in session. And then there is what each therapist can choose to do um in the larger world uh through more public advocacy, um, whether it's through writing or um supporting wonderful organizations like yours, um and trying as best you can uh to be a helpful ally in these causes.
SPEAKER_03Thank you so much, Peter. Um, I can go ahead and ask one more question on my end, if that's all right. Or I guess second to last question that I have, we got a few more. Um so if young people, especially boys, are listening, what would you want them to understand about silence, complacency, and speaking out?
SPEAKER_02Great question.
SPEAKER_01Um So I think where it start actually is something that would apply to everyone, and then we can go from there. Um as a society need to do a better job of teaching children in schools what I would call emotional literacy. So if you think of verbal literacy as the capacity to read and understand words, um, emotional literacy is the capacity to read and understand emotions, both in ourselves as well as others. And verbal literacy is well accepted as an important part of schooling. Math and science literacy is increasing in its importance, but I've never heard emotional literacy made explicit on par with verbal and math literacy, and it should be. Now, good schools are doing that implicitly, but I think it should be done explicitly. There are millions of men in the world who can only identify four feelings being hungry, angry, tired, and sexually aroused. Now, they experience far more emotions than that, but they can only name, they are only literate of those four, and that is an impoverished way to live. There is no way to be healthy as a human being with that limited vocabulary of emotions. And so we need to start there with everyone.
SPEAKER_06Peter, could you please write an article about that? No, I'm serious. What is the basis of our workshops with uh students in schools? It's their emotional literacy, getting them to think and feel and break away from what all the um tropes and all the um social media and other forms of media tell our children what they should be doing. And honestly, um we need you, we need you to spread the word. And that that also begs the question, which I think I have an answer for, but I want to hear what your answer is. How can stories from real survivors and real people helped shift the systems you were talking about and our culture um and not just create individual healing? Or do you? Do you think survivor stories can shift our culture?
SPEAKER_01Mm-hmm. Well, um, you'll be delighted to know, Susan, we're on the same page. And before I answer that specific question, I just want to give a shout out to a few organizations who absolutely are doing this work with boys. Um and if you have a resources section of this podcast, I hope you can include a link to some of them. But uh one is an organization called Equamundo. Uh, there's a Manhood 2.0 program. Uh, there's a Canadian nonprofit called White Ribbon. Um, there's a beautiful uh organization called Coaching Boys into Men. And in the state of Maine, um there is uh an organization called Maine Boys to Men. Um and then as far as relationships, healthy relationships goes, there's a beautiful organization called the One Love Foundation, which I'm sure you've heard of.
SPEAKER_06Um We are. We actually just spent a week with them organizationally with Equimundo this past week in Brazil at then in Boys Conference.
SPEAKER_02Awesome.
SPEAKER_06Really honest with you. Um, we have some great takeaways from the week with with um all of those people that you mentioned, actually. All except for one organization were there. And um I think we're we're right up with them, Peter, as an organization with our work with Aspire and men. So um, yes, thank you for that. I really appreciate that.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_06We need out there.
SPEAKER_01And then to your question, uh I absolutely think storytelling is um an incredibly powerful tool to move the needle on all these issues. You know, storytelling is a universal form of communication. Um uh one of my colleagues likes to say organisms organize, human organisms organize meaning. And the way we've done that for millennia is through storytelling. And what's so beautiful about storytelling is that it can be passed on from person to person. Um and the other thing that's beautiful about stories is that they come from someone in a particular context, and that that context can serve as a beacon for everyone else in that context. So, you know, if you are a uh first-generation South Asian female living in Southern California, um, and some of your demographic tells a story that you relate to, you're gonna relate to it more because you share that identity. Um, and that's true of every single parameter of identity you can imagine. Uh so I think, you know, personal stories and narratives are possibly the most powerful tool we have uh for social change.
SPEAKER_06Thank you. Thank you. I really appreciate hearing that. I agree. I really believe that, you know, times when Chesse goes out and speak or our wonderful facilitators facilitate, quite often you can hear a pin drop and the kids are so um, you know, enrapped with what's happening. So we're engrossed.
SPEAKER_01So I want to go back to um your question about, you know, what would I tell boys? Um, in addition to this piece around uh emotional literacy, um, that I think we as a society need to do. I think there's this question of what does it mean to be a healthy ally? Um and I'll share a few reflections on that. And after I do, I would love to hear from Chessie uh what have you found helpful in male allies and when have they not been helpful? Um But I think the main message we need to give uh men and boys is that ally work has to be done relationally and in context, that every context is different, every context will have different needs, and that doesn't that means you can't do this work with a checklist. Uh it needs to be done relationally. Um and I'll never forget a female friend reflecting on this, and she said something I'd never have gotten. She said, her experience is that when men try to help, they end up just taking over. Um and how off-putting that is and how damaging it is because it then serves as a reason for women not to ask for help because they don't want the man to take over. They just want to help. Um and I think it'd be extremely easy if you're a caring man, uh, to um inadvertently try and take on the role of male savior. Um and that's understandable, but it's ultimately not helpful because it's not relational. And just as one tiny example of that, um, and again, I had to learn this too. But uh another dynamic I would want boys and men to understand is the notion of virtue signaling. That is very often when you're in a conversation with a group of men around these issues, um, men will sort of try and position themselves as, well, I'm not the problem. Uh, because, you know, when I um find myself walking behind a woman on the street, uh, I move to the other side of the street. And, you know, that's great. Um, but there's a way in which that is distancing the man from the systemic issue that he will live in for the rest of his life. Uh, and that takes a lot of humility. Um I think just naming those things, uh, trying not to take over, proceeding relationally, understanding that context matters, trying not to be a savior, and um that is an antidote, I think, for virtue signaling. And I'd be delighted to hear anything Chesse might have to add to that.
SPEAKER_04Absolutely. I think the example of virtue signaling that you just mentioned just reminded me of, you know, instead of crossing the the, or the antidote to that would be instead of crossing the street, examine why it might be uncomfortable for a woman to be followed closely behind by a man and examine the ways that you enforce that in your life, not just in that one single scenario, because we do exist within a system of isms and injustice and um harassment and abuse. And so examining your part in different or your shortcomings in different areas is really important and doesn't make you a horrible person to acknowledge where we fall short and where we've hurt people. And so my number one thing that I like to share with male allies that's helpful for me as a survivor is acknowledgement. I've spoken to so many survivors, and all we truly wanted, and many survivors who have gone through really harrowing legal battles, both criminal and civil, we start with we just want acknowledgement of the harm that they caused. We just want them to recognize that they hurt us so deeply. It's it's something, too, that our our legal system is not set up to promote either. We you are innocent until proven guilty. The flip side of that feels like, as a victim, you are guilty until you prove your innocence. There is no both and in that scenario. And maybe I need to do more therapeutic work to see the gray. But to me, it's so clearly written in our laws that, you know, like the the group of boys from my school signed their emails with that denying till you die is the way to win. But what is that winning? Who are you when you've won that game at the end of the day? I I definitely not a person that I would like to have in my life. So I think accepting and acknowledging, and for for women to also hold the men in their lives accountable and not and not put up with the bad things that they're doing. There's a there's a social media bit um going around from a comedian's stand-up special where she talks about how she intervened on a subway when she saw uh a man obviously harassing a woman that she didn't that he didn't know. She didn't know the woman either, but they she, you know, said, Hey, how are you? I it's funny running into you here. And the guy said to both of them, oh my God, this happens all the time to me. Like people that I talk to on the subway just always run into their friends. And and of course, it's it shouldn't have to be the girl's job to say, that's this is a defense mechanism that we have in place because you're bothering us and we don't feel safe enough to say, please stop talking to me. I don't feel comfortable giving you my personal information. So there's a lot of work that needs to be done so that we can all be a little bit more honest to each other. And I think that'll make us a much healthier society. But with that sort of hopefulness in mind, is there anything that is giving you hope right now about the future of trauma care, about survivor advocacy, and in seeing a world where we can say, hey, you're making me feel uncomfortable and not be afraid of violence?
SPEAKER_01Well, the first thing that's given me hope are the three people who are sitting in front of me. Uh and particularly when I look at Jesse and Megan, the idea that younger people are being raised with these issues. You know, for many of us who are over 50, uh, it took us until now to even know these issues existed. And you're you are the vanguard of a new culture that is going to normalize these conversations. Um and uh I just have so much admiration, Jesse, for uh the work you've done and the filmmaking that I know will grow into bigger things and um Megan's choice to, you know, go into the mental health field. Uh there's just no question in my mind that um you will make a contribution in ways that uh um Susan and I just weren't positioned because of the decade we grew up in. So that gives me hope. Um and then I also have to say uh the EMDR community in particular um is inspiring. EMDR is now practiced in pretty much every single country around the world. And the average EMDR therapist is very engaged in these issues. And one of the things that I'm very interested in is um the EMDR community has focused to date mostly on writing research for each other. And I just think it's important, it's been around for 30 more than 30 years, that we spend more time writing for the general public. Um, because it is still not widely known. And that's what I hope my book will make some difference in.
SPEAKER_02Um so those things give me hope.
SPEAKER_06Megan, I know you've got a question for Peter. What would that be?
SPEAKER_03Thank you so much. So at the end of every podcast episode, we ask our guests, what is your I have the right to statement? So, Peter, if you could, what would your I have the right to statement be?
SPEAKER_01Well, I'm delighted to answer that question, Megan, but I'm wondering if I could um say something first, just as sort of a last word. Um, I've just really enjoyed this conversation. We've covered so much ground. And I feel like ending with uh two quotes from two women that I just deeply, deeply admire. Um one is a researcher named Valerie Hudson, who I would say is the global authority on um gender equality on a global basis. She has researched this for decades. And for people who want to learn more about her, um, the book you need to read is The First Political Order: How Sex Shapes Governance and National Security Worldwide. If you'd be okay, I'd like to read two of the final paragraphs from that book after empirically analyzing 176 countries around the world. Uh Valerie Hudson and her authors conclude with this. This research tells us something very important. The subordination of women is not an idiosyncratic cultural or religious or regional phenomenon. Rather, it is a universal political order, a first political sexual order that exists prior to and molds what we perceive to be cultural and religious differences across countries and regions. The true clash of civilizations is not West versus East or North versus South. The true clash is subordination of women versus non-subordination of women as the first political order upon which a civilization is built. That clash is occurring within nations just as much as it is between nations. In a sense, is a great test given to each and every people to choose security, stability, prosperity, health, and resilience, or to choose the sea quelli of male dominance that offer the opposite. And I like to pair that with a quote from another extraordinary woman, Eleanor Roosevelt, who, in addition to being First Lady of the United States, was in many ways first lady of the world, uh, and among other things was a key architect of the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights. And as early as 1958, Eleanor completely intuited these dynamics and once famously said, Where, after all, do universal human rights begin? In small places, close to home. So close and so small that they cannot be seen on any maps of the world. Yet they are the world of the individual person, the neighborhood he lives in, the school or college he attends, the factory, farm, or office where he works. Such are the places where every man, woman, and child seek equal justice, equal opportunity, equal dignity, without discrimination. Unless these rights have meaning there, but they have little meaning anywhere. Without concern, citizen action to uphold them close to home, we shall look in vain for progress in the larger world. And if anything comes from this conversation, if uh Jesse and Megan's generation learns a little bit more about Eleanor Roosevelt, this conversation won't have been worth it. But to answer your question, Megan, I think my I have the right to for today is um I have the right to choose when to be an ally and when to choose not to be an ally.
SPEAKER_06Wow. Thank you so much, Peter. That's very powerful, Peter. Um and you've given us so much to think about today. I have not heard that Eleanor Roosevelt quote before, and you can uh bet money that I will be purchasing um the first political order as soon as we um conclude our podcast. As always, you've given us so much to think about, Peter. I am so proud. Now say we've known each other for eight years.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_06Gosh, how does that seem possible? Um so thank you. Thank you, thank you, thank you for sharing your insight, your compassion, as always, and your thoughtful approach to trauma healing and to EMDR with us today. We're so grateful for the work you do to help survivors feel informed, supported, empowered, and for reminding us that healing is not only personal, but deeply connected to the culture we build around one another. To our listeners today, thank you for being part of this conversation and for helping create a world where survivor voices are heard, believed, and valued.
SPEAKER_04Thank you so much, Peter, for this conversation. I know that your work and the things that we've been able to talk about today have meant so much to me and will help guide me in the days and years to come. So thank you. And to our listeners, if this episode resonated with you, we invite you to share it, continue the conversation, and support. You can learn more about Peter's work and Peter Prime's new book in the show notes. And if you're looking for ways to bring these conversations into your school or community, I have the right to partners with K-12 schools, colleges, and universities to provide trauma-informed programming on consent, healthy relationships, and leadership. You can reach us at takeaction at iathheight to.org. Thank you for being part of the Aspire community, for listening, learning, and showing up for a world where everyone has the right to safety, dignity, and their voice. Until next time, keep aspiring towards change, and remember, you have the right to be heard.
SPEAKER_00Thank you so much for listening. Like and subscribe to the podcast on all platforms. And if you enjoyed today's episode, please give us a five star rating and tell your friends about Aspire. Follow us on social media at I Have the Right To. Learn more about workshops and programming available for students, educators, parents, and community members at Ihatheright2.org.
