By: Josie Nelson I’ve always loved the quote, “Throw kindness around like confetti.” It just brings a smile to my face thinking about how simple kindness and inspiring others can be. World Kindness Day (WKD) occurs each year on November 13th, with its primary goal to “help everyone understand that compassion for others is what binds us all together” (Inspire Kindness). World Kindness Day is observed in countries around the world, including the United States, Canada, Japan, and Australia. It was first introduced in 1998 and has consistently launched in many places as part of the World Kindness Movement group....
Love Bombing: A Case Study In Irony
By: N.M. Bialko The term “love bombing” has become a part of our everyday vernacular and is often used to describe the beginning of what will ultimately become a toxic or emotionally abusive relationship. Moving too fast in a relationship has always been regarded as a potential “red flag,” but love bombing takes that idea to a whole new level. Love bombing is a form of control and abuse. It turns love into a weapon, and the grand gestures are, in reality — manipulations. What is love bombing? The action or practice of lavishing someone with attention or affection, especially to...
ARO’s Guide For Peace During The Holidays
By: Josie Nelson The holidays can bring such a whirlwind of emotions and expectations that can be difficult to manage. On one hand, you could be feeling excited about traditions and upcoming family gatherings. On the other hand, you could be nervous and even fearful of being hurt or triggered by past experiences. These seemingly contradictory feelings can make it that much harder to navigate the celebrations to come and can leave you doubting the joy of the season. At ARO, we want to help create more PEACE than dread this upcoming holiday season. We’ve made an acrostic poem for...
Catching Butterflies: The Metamorphosis Of Kim Carpenter
By: N.M. Bialko Just before Christmas in 2019, I was home for the holidays but in the throes of a toxic and emotionally abusive relationship. I was feeling like a shell of my former self, and my mind was fixated on negative thoughts. I found myself thinking of a woman who had made the local news because her ex-boyfriend set her on fire in a bank parking lot. She survived for a short while from a hospital bed but later succumbed to her injuries. I was thinking of her and the varying degrees of abuse when I had an idea. What...
Stand Up To Stalking
By: N.M. Bialko One in six women will experience stalking and 66.2% of the time, it will be by a former partner. What is Stalking? The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines stalking as: I am part of that 66.2%; I represent the 1 in 6. Will you stand up with me? I met with Prosecutor Mary Lynn Caswell, the Director of Domestic Violence Division and Stalking Unit for Franklin County, Ohio, and Advocacy Coordinator Julienne Long to gain insight on stalking and the steps one could take to be free from the fear of stalking. During our meeting, I posed the following...
Are We Living In An Overly Medicated Society?
By: Whitney Derman Mental Health awareness has made great strides in the past few decades. It is becoming more common to talk about mental health issues and increasingly more common to seek treatment. Despite the normalization, evidence has found that modern approaches to mental illness are not as effective as initially believed. Antidepressants and other psychiatric medicines are the most common way of solving psychiatric issues. Yet, they do not solve the problem: they are band-aids that temporarily dull the symptoms, but they do not cure the disease (Sober Nation, 2014). I would never argue against taking medications for the...
Raising Healthy Children Despite Former Personal Abuse
By: Mandie Schreck Being a survivor of abuse, especially throughout childhood, creates a common fear of raising children and the need to be the best parent or caregiver you can be. We may think of ways we can create a do-over of sorts. If we grew up in an unsafe, abusive, or neglectful home — we would wish for nothing more for our own children than to have safety and security. Focusing on not recreating the past or putting our own children in those circumstances becomes our utmost wish and priority as they grow. How can we as a society...
The Power Of Sharing Your Story
By: Eileen Shea It’s not uncommon for abuse victims and survivors to stay silent, even after they’ve escaped their tormentors because of the layered fear that exists in sharing their stories. Will they be seen as weak to have allowed the abuse to happen? Will they be seen as needy for asking for help? Will they be dismissed because what they experienced isn’t “as bad” as someone else’s experience? Will people tell them how it’s just the world we live in and they need to be stronger? Will their abuser return and inflict worse torment? All of these thoughts go...
Organizational Abuse
By: Mandie Schreck What happens when we are in a work environment or even an institution for medical or mental health care and suffer from abuse? This is where education on what qualifies as Organizational Abuse can help us recognize and bring awareness to this unique type of abuse. We often work in conditions that may not be suited for our mental or physical health but are left with no way to escape. Individuals who suffer from Organizational Abuse may see a lack of communication with higher management, poor or dirty work conditions, lack of proper supervision, or an unsafe...
The Dangers Of Self-Neglect And The Importance Of Listening To Your Needs
By: Whitney Derman The Department of Health and Human Services defines self-neglect as “the behavior of an older adult that threatens their own health or safety and generally manifests itself by failure to provide themselves with adequate food, water, clothing, shelter, personal hygiene, medication (when indicated), and safety precautions.” (Godfrey, 2019). Although self-neglect is very common in older adults, it applies to any adult unable or unwilling to care for themselves (Social Care Institute for Excellence, 2018). This can apply to mentally ill people; however, people can self-neglect even if they are mentally healthy. The major causes of self-neglect are:...