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I’m Done Being Quiet with Darlene Lekowski · The Trauma Therapist

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Trauma Therapist podcast. My name is gimickperson
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: I interview incredible people who've dedicated their lives to helping
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: those who've been impacted by trauma. A big thank you
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: to our sponsors and our guests who are supporting this
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: show five four, three, two and one. Our folks, welcome
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: back to the podcast. Very excited to have as my
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: guest today, Darlene Lekowski.
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: Darlene, welcome, Hi, Nice to meet you today.
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: Awesome appreciate it. Darlene is a survivor, speaker, advocate, and
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  Speaker 1: business leader who transformed decades of silence into a platform
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  Speaker 1: for truth and healing. After fifty years of keeping quiet
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  Speaker 1: about the siblings sexual trauma and abuse she endured as
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  Speaker 1: a child, she broke her silence and successfully defended herself
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  Speaker 1: in a civil lawsuit brought against her by her brother.
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  Speaker 1: Her debut memoir, Shattering Silence, a story of survival, justice,
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  Speaker 1: and the power of telling the truth, chronicles her path
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  Speaker 1: toward resilience, accountability, and healing. Darling speaks publicly about her
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  Speaker 1: experience and collaboration with siblings sexual trauma and sexual assault
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  Speaker 1: organizations worldwide. There's awareness and support survivors all right, Darlene,
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  Speaker 1: just a little bit about you before we get going
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  Speaker 1: shore with the listeners. Where you're from originally and where
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  Speaker 1: you are currently.
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  Speaker 2: So I've moved a little bit. So. I was born
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  Speaker 2: in Connecticut, lived in Clarence, New York, which is just
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  Speaker 2: outside of Buffalo, for a couple of years, but basically
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  Speaker 2: grew up in a town north of Detroit called port
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  Speaker 2: Here On Michigan. And now I reside in the Charlotte,
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  Speaker 2: North Carolina suburbs.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, okay, So how did all this start?
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  Speaker 2: Oh my gosh. You know, I was seven years old
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  Speaker 2: and I was this fun, loving, tiny little girl, and
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  Speaker 2: I had a best friend and I'm walking down my
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  Speaker 2: hallway at seven years old. Mom is you know, I'm
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  Speaker 2: the youngest of five kids. So in the seventies, you know,
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  Speaker 2: Mom was running around driving all the other kids around.
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  Speaker 2: I walked down my hallway and my one brother, who's
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: between eight and nine years older than me, pulls me
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  Speaker 2: into his room and starts forcing me to witness him
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  Speaker 2: do things. And that's when the trauma started. That was
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  Speaker 2: in Clarence. We moved to port Here On Michigan and
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  Speaker 2: it happened again, and you know, lots of threats, lots
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  Speaker 2: of you know, you're going to be an orphan. No
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  Speaker 2: one will believe you, or if they do believe you, you're
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  Speaker 2: going to be shamed.
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  Speaker 1: So he took how how old is he at that time?
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  Speaker 2: If I was seven? So what's fifteen?
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  Speaker 1: Yeah? Okay, wow?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, So I mean a teenager, a dumb, hormonal teenager
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  Speaker 2: who I was, you know, willing to forgive later on
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  Speaker 2: in my life, he gets married, moves out of the house,
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  Speaker 2: and next thing I know, in nineteen seventy five, a
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  Speaker 2: second brother starts coming after me. He had carried me
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  Speaker 2: up to my bedroom and started old. My body throws like, yeah.
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  Speaker 1: How old were you at that point?
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  Speaker 2: I was nine, and that's when the rapes started with
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: the second brother. So it was actually I got raped
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  Speaker 2: about every year from ages seven, from nine to twelve,
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: but then the older brother was from seven to nine,
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  Speaker 2: if that makes sense.
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  Speaker 1: Guy, Okay, so what how are you managing this? If
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: at all? What eat.
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  Speaker 2: As a little girl? You know, there's a part of
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  Speaker 2: my book, and I don't want to really give it away,
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  Speaker 2: but it's a traumatic part. And I think that first brother,
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  Speaker 2: when he did that to me, in my brain said
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  Speaker 2: I'm never going to escape this, and this is always
• 4:07
  Speaker 2: going to have to be a part of my life.
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  Speaker 2: And so I developed a great deal of survival strategies.
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  Speaker 2: I was nine years old, and I took that trauma
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  Speaker 2: and I shoved it in a box. You know, my parents,
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  Speaker 2: I had a wonderful family, great parents. I lived in
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  Speaker 2: an upper class country club neighborhood. You know. Yes, assaults
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  Speaker 2: like this happened everywhere in the world. It's not just
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  Speaker 2: you know, certain classes. And I had an older brother
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  Speaker 2: and sister. But I just knew that if I said anything,
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  Speaker 2: it would be buried and I would be the one
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  Speaker 2: to blame. So I just said, they can take my childhood,
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  Speaker 2: they can steal innocence, but they're never going to take
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  Speaker 2: me and who I am, and they're never taking my family.
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  Speaker 2: And that's what I did as a little girl. I
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  Speaker 2: shoved out all in a box, thinking, well.
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  Speaker 1: A lot of people do have to do. So you
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  Speaker 1: progressed through your teens, still.
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  Speaker 2: Going on, no so thankfully. And it's weird for me
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  Speaker 2: to say, I feel like I'm one of the lucky
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  Speaker 2: ones because siblings sexual trauma and abuse is so common.
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  Speaker 2: People have no idea how common it is. But for
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  Speaker 2: me because I created strategies to stay out of that house.
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  Speaker 2: I was assaulted once a year. For five years, some
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  Speaker 2: young boys and girls were getting assaulted by their older
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  Speaker 2: siblings every single day after school. And it's so common, guy,
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  Speaker 2: And I think this is important for your listeners to hear.
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  Speaker 2: Statistics say, than a classroom of twenty children, at least
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  Speaker 2: one of them is getting sexually assaulted by an older sibling,
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  Speaker 2: and it's three to five times more likely than a
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  Speaker 2: parent abusing a child to have a sibling abuse a child.
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  Speaker 2: But nobody talks about it. We're afraid, we're shamed into silence.
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  Speaker 2: And I'm done being silent anymore.
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  Speaker 1: And it's not just the victims who are shamed into silence,
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  Speaker 1: it's general people. Just general public don't want to talk
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  Speaker 1: about it. And just as just to take a moment here,
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  Speaker 1: I just want to thank you for coming on the
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  Speaker 1: podcast and talking about it. I mean, it takes a
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  Speaker 1: lot of courage, There's no two ways about it. So
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  Speaker 1: how do things unfold into your teens and twenties? What happens? Well?
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  Speaker 2: And I'm sure you've heard this before, Guy, I often
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  Speaker 2: say to people I could have easily become a drug addict,
• 7:03
  Speaker 2: an alcoholic. That's what I used to cope. But for me,
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  Speaker 2: thank goodness, I didn't become addicted to the drugs and alcohol.
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  Speaker 2: I became addicted to people. The more people I was around,
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  Speaker 2: the more popular I was, the more friends I had.
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  Speaker 2: I was never alone, you know you were, and I.
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  Speaker 1: Was safe pretend.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, And the abuse stopped at twelve. I think he
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  Speaker 2: thought he was going to get me pregnant, you know
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  Speaker 2: what I mean, And so I think that's why he stopped.
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  Speaker 2: I don't know that for sure, but that is my assumption.
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  Speaker 2: And then he came back at me later on in life.
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  Speaker 2: You know, he stopped at twelve. At nineteen, he approaches
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  Speaker 2: me again and says we should do what we used
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  Speaker 2: to do, like I was a willing participant in any
• 7:55
  Speaker 2: of that. And that's when I finally stood my ground
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  Speaker 2: and said, no, you're ever going to talk to me
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  Speaker 2: about this again. We're never going to have this conversation.
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  Speaker 2: You leave me alone. And he did for forty years,
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  Speaker 2: but then my parents passed away.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, let's pause right there. So seventeen eighteen nineteen, what
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  Speaker 1: was going on for you? You're getting just being around
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  Speaker 1: all these people? How was how were you surviving.
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  Speaker 2: I was surviving through drinking a lot. I mean, I
• 8:29
  Speaker 2: don't I'm my teenageers and college years were not pretty.
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: I had PTSD like something fierce, and I had no
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  Speaker 2: idea I had it. I thought it was normal behavior,
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  Speaker 2: the little bouts of anger, the little I would be
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  Speaker 2: in a bar with my girlfriends and a guy would
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  Speaker 2: touch me the wrong way and I would flip out.
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  Speaker 2: I had many, many incidents, and I had vowed my
• 8:57
  Speaker 2: parents were never to know. My mom owned a Christian bookstore,
• 9:02
  Speaker 2: my dad was a huge person in the community. I
• 9:04
  Speaker 2: just knew that was not going to go well for me.
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  Speaker 2: But what I did count on was my girlfriends. And
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  Speaker 2: every time I had a PTSD moment, a big one
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  Speaker 2: like that, I was able to tell them and confide
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  Speaker 2: in my girlfriends. And they were the ones who said,
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  Speaker 2: you know what, you're at college, You're at Michigan State.
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  Speaker 2: It's free therapy. Why don't you just go? And I
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  Speaker 2: did for a little while.
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  Speaker 1: Did you tell them what happened happened?
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  Speaker 2: I did? I did. Yeah, just my girlfriends, not my parents.
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  Speaker 2: Because my behavior was so erratic. I didn't want to
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  Speaker 2: lose those friends.
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  Speaker 1: Was that the last time you shared it with people.
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  Speaker 2: The first time I shared it was somebody was actually
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  Speaker 2: at seventeen years old. It was my boyfriend of two years.
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  Speaker 2: It was the first time I had sex. I bawled
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  Speaker 2: and he thought he had hurt me. I'm like, I'm
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  Speaker 2: not the girl who you think I am. I'm not pure,
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  Speaker 2: you know, and all those things that the victim says.
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  Speaker 2: You take on that shame. And then, like I said
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  Speaker 2: in high school, in college, I just had different incidents,
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  Speaker 2: Like I had a girlfriend's brother who started kissing me
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  Speaker 2: in the hallway, and I flipped out and I started
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  Speaker 2: punching and hitting him. Well, that normally doesn't happen to
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  Speaker 2: someone who hasn't had that much trauma, you know. So
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  Speaker 2: I had to explain to her, this is why what
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  Speaker 2: your brother, just a little kiss in the hallway would
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  Speaker 2: flip someone like me out.
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  Speaker 1: So you go, you share this with your friends, you
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  Speaker 1: go to the mental health clinic at the college. What happens.
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  Speaker 2: So I ended up getting married in nineteen ninety two.
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  Speaker 2: I just move on with my life. It's like I
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  Speaker 2: created two different personalities. I had the little Darline who
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  Speaker 2: was traumatized, who a shove in a box, and then
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  Speaker 2: I had the growing up to adult Darlene, the overachiever,
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  Speaker 2: the perfectionist, always having to be in control, always having
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  Speaker 2: to win. I was never going to let those brothers
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  Speaker 2: see me fail. So that worked and I built a
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  Speaker 2: very successful career, a career that I'm still doing today.
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  Speaker 2: But behind the scenes, I was still this traumatized little
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  Speaker 2: girl that was hidden and buried.
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  Speaker 1: So what point, I mean there must have come a
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  Speaker 1: convergence and endpoint of yes, what does that look like?
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  Speaker 1: When does that happen? How does it happen?
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  Speaker 2: You won't believe the story. So as I said, I
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  Speaker 2: vowed mom and Dad weren't to know. They're in their
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  Speaker 2: nineties now, it's twenty twenty one, haven't talked about it
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  Speaker 2: in forty years, and Mom passed away. I don't think
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  Speaker 2: it's a coincidence that three months later after Mom's dad
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  Speaker 2: dad has dementia, so he doesn't remember anything. I get
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  Speaker 2: in an argument with the one brother who raped me,
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  Speaker 2: and it's a texting argument. I try to get him
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  Speaker 2: to pick up the phone and he won't pick up.
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  Speaker 2: He won't pick up, and it becomes a volcano explosion.
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  Speaker 2: I finally in the text say, look, I'm done with
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  Speaker 2: you treating me the way that you are, and if
• 12:29
  Speaker 2: you don't stop it, I could ruin you life if
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  Speaker 2: you will.
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  Speaker 1: Hold on a second. So during this time, were you
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: in communication with these brothers?
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  Speaker 2: I really was, But you know, it's a family of five.
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  Speaker 2: We're living all over the country, so it was mainly
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  Speaker 2: I was never alone with either one of the brothers,
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  Speaker 2: so it was thanksful.
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  Speaker 1: Giving him up, or say how's it going? No, no, no, okay.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, then we were just not that okay close to
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  Speaker 2: a family.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, So you can do this argument over the text.
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: Yeah I can't run your life.
• 13:09
  Speaker 2: Yeah, well, let me back it up a little bit. Guy,
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  Speaker 2: I apologize. I haven't given you full context. So I
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  Speaker 2: grew up in Michigan. Mom and dad are in their nineties.
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  Speaker 2: The one brother who five years older, who raped me,
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  Speaker 2: now moves to Charlotte. So there's two kids in Charlotte.
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  Speaker 2: We move mom and dad down here, and kind of
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  Speaker 2: we're trying to share in that responsibility modad. Mom dies,
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  Speaker 2: Dad gets moved to assisted living. The argument is about
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  Speaker 2: seeing dad and assistant lyvings, I just want to give
• 13:44
  Speaker 2: you that context, but I just basically said I'm done
• 13:49
  Speaker 2: stop treating me this way, and I could ruin your
• 13:51
  Speaker 2: entire life if you'd like me to, because the truth
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  Speaker 2: will come out. And I say rapist in the text,
• 13:58
  Speaker 2: and he tells me to go for it, and so
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  Speaker 2: a seven year old little Darlene starts going for it.
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  Speaker 2: It wasn't pretty. It's in the book too. But you'll
• 14:10
  Speaker 2: see how. You know, I was, I think fifty six
• 14:14
  Speaker 2: at the time. You'll see how that little girl was
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: coming out. And I wasn't yelling at my brother in
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: his late fifties. I was now yelling at teenage don
• 14:26
  Speaker 2: So that happened. I decide, you know what, that was messy,
• 14:30
  Speaker 2: That was ugly. That was you know, trauma coming out
• 14:34
  Speaker 2: of the box when I was doing the text. So
• 14:37
  Speaker 2: I wrote all three brothers a letter. I have two
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  Speaker 2: brothers who assaulted me. The third, one closest to me,
• 14:43
  Speaker 2: two and a half years older, didn't so I just
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: said he didn't know about it. He didn't hear anything
• 14:51
  Speaker 2: about it. But that text explosion, the one brother started
• 14:57
  Speaker 2: calling all the family members that night. Darlene, he's gone crazy,
• 15:01
  Speaker 2: Darlene's had a nervous breakdown. Darlene is insane. You know,
• 15:05
  Speaker 2: all the things a perpetrator will try and say about
• 15:08
  Speaker 2: their victim and get to everybody first. So I put
• 15:12
  Speaker 2: the email down and I said, guys, I'm done hiding.
• 15:15
  Speaker 2: I'm done having everything in a box. And I just
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: wrote it all in an email. I thought it would
• 15:20
  Speaker 2: be done. I'm like, okay, only the family knows it's done.
• 15:27
  Speaker 2: Six months later, I'm at my office and guess who
• 15:30
  Speaker 2: comes to my front door. I was hoping for an apology,
• 15:34
  Speaker 2: you know, validation. A sheriff set my front door, handing
• 15:38
  Speaker 2: me a lawsuit. He sued me for defamation over his lies.
• 15:46
  Speaker 2: Who I know. And that's so I was like, okay,
• 15:52
  Speaker 2: I'm not hiding, I'm not ashamed. Game on. And I
• 15:56
  Speaker 2: tried to negotiate and settle it out of court. But
• 16:00
  Speaker 2: I wasn't going to just stand for walking away anymore
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: and cowering anymore. And the negotiations didn't work. We went
• 16:09
  Speaker 2: to trial. I actually countersued him for defamation because, like
• 16:14
  Speaker 2: I said, he was telling everybody all these horrible things
• 16:18
  Speaker 2: about me. And on February fifth, twenty twenty four, a
• 16:23
  Speaker 2: jury of twelve in less than an hour said I
• 16:26
  Speaker 2: was telling the truth. And I won both cases.
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: Oh thank God, I know, I never hope it wasn't
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: going to go the other way. Oh my god, yeah,
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: please Jesus.
• 16:38
  Speaker 2: Yeah, tell me about it. I've gone through hell the
• 16:41
  Speaker 2: last couple of yards.
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: What happened? What were the consequences?
• 16:46
  Speaker 2: So it was a civil trial, So it's you know,
• 16:50
  Speaker 2: forty five years later, I can't sue him for the
• 16:53
  Speaker 2: actual you know, statute of limitations is up. I am
• 16:57
  Speaker 2: awarded over two hundred and tent though dollars. He'll never
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: pay it. He hasn't paid it, and that, you know,
• 17:05
  Speaker 2: for me, it's not about the money. It's about the
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: validation that no, I'm not crazy, but I won the trial.
• 17:14
  Speaker 2: I'm thinking I'm going to be all along. He denied everything, yes,
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: and he engaged his wife and all that. But remember
• 17:22
  Speaker 2: those girlfriends, those six girlfriends, they became witnesses for me
• 17:26
  Speaker 2: at the trial.
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: Wow.
• 17:28
  Speaker 2: Plus I had a therapist who had paperwork from two
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: thousand and five that talks about how I talked about
• 17:34
  Speaker 2: both brothers assaulting me. I don't know how my brother
• 17:37
  Speaker 2: thought he could win against that, but he is still
• 17:41
  Speaker 2: in denial. He appealed the case three times. He had
• 17:46
  Speaker 2: until Christmas Day last year to go to the North
• 17:50
  Speaker 2: Carolina Supreme Court and he chose not to. And you know,
• 17:56
  Speaker 2: I just I won the trial, and I kind of
• 17:59
  Speaker 2: felt flat. I still had all the anger inside me,
• 18:05
  Speaker 2: all the resentment. I was really pissed off, and I
• 18:07
  Speaker 2: felt like I had a write off at the fact
• 18:11
  Speaker 2: that he sued me, the fact that I was out
• 18:14
  Speaker 2: a couple hundred thousand dollars. But then I had to
• 18:19
  Speaker 2: come to the realization that every single thing I was
• 18:24
  Speaker 2: doing to survive, I was actually killing my relationship with
• 18:28
  Speaker 2: my husband and with my children, because if you always
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: have to win, then your husband becomes your opponent. You're
• 18:36
  Speaker 2: fighting constantly. And I had to look into myself and go,
• 18:43
  Speaker 2: what do I need to heal. I won the trial,
• 18:47
  Speaker 2: that is huge validation, But to heal I think I'm
• 18:51
  Speaker 2: going to write a book. I think I'm going to
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: help others. And that's really where I found my purpose
• 18:58
  Speaker 2: and really decided I've got to shed every negative thing
• 19:04
  Speaker 2: about what happened to me out of my soul that
• 19:08
  Speaker 2: I call it.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, So all during this time or leading up to
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: this time, did you feel that you were kind of
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: holding all this what negativity angst anger, because had you
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: been quote unquote healing. Were you getting help? Were you
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: doing any kind of healing work?
• 19:32
  Speaker 2: I was, and I you know, I started doing you know,
• 19:38
  Speaker 2: I went to therapy in nineteen eighty eight, nineteen ninety nine,
• 19:41
  Speaker 2: at eighty nine, I mean at Michigan State. But then
• 19:44
  Speaker 2: later in life, in two thousand and five, I had
• 19:47
  Speaker 2: been going to therapy almost every day from my trauma.
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: But what I believe happened is getting sued ignited my
• 19:57
  Speaker 2: brain and everything was exploding. I was. I was so
• 20:04
  Speaker 2: intense like this, and anyone around me I would just be,
• 20:09
  Speaker 2: you know, very stiff, very out of control, crying all
• 20:16
  Speaker 2: the time. I had nightmares every single night, and I
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: still have nightmares. They're not like they used to be,
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: but you can't live like that. I thought the trial
• 20:27
  Speaker 2: would release all of it. The trial just offended the truth.
• 20:32
  Speaker 2: What I needed to do was let loose of everything else.
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: That's interesting. You thought the trial was going to fix
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: everything or heal everything, but it just released the truth.
• 20:46
  Speaker 2: Yeah, which is great.
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: Right, you know that's part of it, part of the pie, right, right. Yeah,
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: So I love what I'm just going back to what
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: you said early on. You're like, I'm done, I'm done
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: staying silent. I'm done. Yeah, what does that mean to
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: get to that point for you? Because it's so powerful?
• 21:08
  Speaker 2: Thank you? Just it means the world to me that
• 21:14
  Speaker 2: I am no longer burdened by a secret, that that
• 21:18
  Speaker 2: little Darlene I was telling you was hidden and buried.
• 21:22
  Speaker 2: She's alive and thriving in me. Now the two people
• 21:26
  Speaker 2: have become one. It's just I had you talked to
• 21:31
  Speaker 2: me a year ago, I couldn't come on this podcast
• 21:33
  Speaker 2: without bawling and without crying. And writing the book became
• 21:39
  Speaker 2: incredibly cathartic. Talking to people is becoming a cathartic because
• 21:45
  Speaker 2: I was so focused on him. He did this to me,
• 21:49
  Speaker 2: He did this? How dare he?
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: Well?
• 21:52
  Speaker 2: As victims, I learned the hard way. That doesn't get
• 21:56
  Speaker 2: you anywhere. What I had to do was say what
• 22:01
  Speaker 2: do I need to be whole? What do I need
• 22:04
  Speaker 2: to be fulfilled? What do I need to have love
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: in my life? Because I didn't know what love was.
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: Love betrayed me. My brothers were supposed to love me,
• 22:15
  Speaker 2: and they betrayed me. And once I realized, shed it all,
• 22:23
  Speaker 2: shed the control, shed the shame, shed the bitterness, the anger,
• 22:29
  Speaker 2: and only open up joy in my life. That's when
• 22:33
  Speaker 2: the healing really began.
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: So how do you how do you go about doing that?
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: I think you have to have some self reflection. I
• 22:42
  Speaker 2: think you have to go I might be part of
• 22:46
  Speaker 2: the problem here too. I think that for me, it
• 22:51
  Speaker 2: was getting diagnosed with PTSD and what that meant. I
• 22:55
  Speaker 2: was fifty eight when I got diagnosed. Then I went
• 22:58
  Speaker 2: to more, I went to eat, to tapping, I'm working
• 23:01
  Speaker 2: to going to E. M. D R. Trying to realize
• 23:06
  Speaker 2: my behaviors were not normal behavior, they were reactionary. So
• 23:12
  Speaker 2: that was number one.
• 23:15
  Speaker 3: Number two, Well, when you say normal, if I may,
• 23:22
  Speaker 3: were they normal responses given your experience?
• 23:26
  Speaker 2: Yes? Absolutely?
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: Yes. When you say when you say, when you say normal,
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: you mean like what a quote unquote normal person would
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: react to, right.
• 23:38
  Speaker 2: Right right? I don't think most people are running around
• 23:45
  Speaker 2: in survival mode like I was. You know, if I
• 23:51
  Speaker 2: just controlled every single thing in my life and everything
• 23:55
  Speaker 2: around me, then I wouldn't get hurt. But when you
• 24:00
  Speaker 2: do that, you're pushing everybody away. And I was so
• 24:05
  Speaker 2: afraid of being alone. What was happening to me, guy,
• 24:08
  Speaker 2: is I was going to be alone if I didn't change.
• 24:12
  Speaker 2: It's really a change to me of the mental state
• 24:17
  Speaker 2: of how I had to look at life differently, and
• 24:22
  Speaker 2: when I said earlier, I also had to do some
• 24:24
  Speaker 2: self reflection and go, maybe I am a little angry,
• 24:29
  Speaker 2: maybe I am a little bitter, Maybe I do you know,
• 24:32
  Speaker 2: I'm very testy. And once I was able to open
• 24:38
  Speaker 2: up and talk about what happened to me, I think
• 24:41
  Speaker 2: that's part two. The more you talk about what happened,
• 24:46
  Speaker 2: the more it doesn't burden you anymore.
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: Did you remind me of apologies if you already said this?
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: But did you tell your husband everything that had gone on?
• 24:58
  Speaker 2: Yes? I had told both Usban and Z. Actually I've
• 25:00
  Speaker 2: been married twice. My first husband I was married to
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: for twenty one years, and then now my current husband,
• 25:06
  Speaker 2: I've been married to him for thirteen years. I told
• 25:08
  Speaker 2: them both before we got married, because again I didn't
• 25:12
  Speaker 2: think I was worthy enough to be married, to be
• 25:14
  Speaker 2: a wife to anybody. That was how bad you know,
• 25:17
  Speaker 2: my shame was.
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: So you decided to write this book. Had you written
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: anything before?
• 25:23
  Speaker 2: No, and I actually had you a ghostwriter. It helped
• 25:25
  Speaker 2: me with this.
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: Okay, when you say I want to write a book,
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: what did you want to say? What did you want
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: to do? What was a purpose? Who's it for?
• 25:35
  Speaker 2: Honestly, at the beginning, it was for me, you know
• 25:38
  Speaker 2: what I mean, Like, this is a crazy story. I,
• 25:43
  Speaker 2: you know, was a little girl who had this trauma.
• 25:45
  Speaker 2: I thought I was all alone, all alone. Until two
• 25:50
  Speaker 2: years ago, I thought I was the only one. I
• 25:51
  Speaker 2: thought I was going to be the first SSTA author.
• 25:55
  Speaker 2: I'm like the eighth one, and so for me, it
• 25:59
  Speaker 2: was he me. But the more I got into it,
• 26:02
  Speaker 2: the more I was like, if I just help one
• 26:05
  Speaker 2: other person get rid of their trauma and not go
• 26:10
  Speaker 2: through what I've gone through and heal and learn and
• 26:15
  Speaker 2: how to move their life forward, that's power. That's beauty.
• 26:20
  Speaker 2: And I just feel like I've found my purpose in
• 26:25
  Speaker 2: my retirement. So I'm working towards becoming a motivational speaker
• 26:30
  Speaker 2: to help victims of sexual assault and abuse when I
• 26:34
  Speaker 2: retire in about three to five years.
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: I'm kind of chuckling because you're already you don't need
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: to work towards anything. You already are so an incredible
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: inspiring persons. You already are that you're Yeah, it's not
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: just your story, that's what's the word horrific, It is horrific.
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: It's it's but you, you, yourself, are incredible now you
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: come on here and share this. And obviously there are
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: people listening to this who themselves have experienced something. But Darline,
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: if you know you could, it just has a kind
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: of an exercise. What do you wish someone maybe could
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: have said to you to help you get through this
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: to heal? Is that even possible?
• 27:34
  Speaker 2: You know, it takes so many years. I think part
• 27:38
  Speaker 2: of my purpose now and I hope that any parents
• 27:43
  Speaker 2: listening to this podcast they go back and have a
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: conversation with their children. They we tell kids stranger danger,
• 27:53
  Speaker 2: we tell them, you know, stop drop and roll when
• 27:56
  Speaker 2: there's a fire. But I really feel we need to
• 28:00
  Speaker 2: start talking about the possible danger in our own home.
• 28:05
  Speaker 2: And I wish somebody would have said to me, hey,
• 28:09
  Speaker 2: dar Lane, if anybody comes near you or tries to
• 28:11
  Speaker 2: touch certain parts, yell, run and tell. I didn't have that.
• 28:17
  Speaker 2: I didn't know that what they were doing to me
• 28:22
  Speaker 2: was you know, I don't even know how to put it,
• 28:24
  Speaker 2: but I just felt like, as a little girl, I
• 28:26
  Speaker 2: was threatened so much that I had to hide it.
• 28:29
  Speaker 2: But if someone had said, this is common vernacular, we
• 28:33
  Speaker 2: should open the doors. We should talk and have a
• 28:36
  Speaker 2: conversation about this. I don't know if I would have
• 28:38
  Speaker 2: hit it for fifty years. And I think if there's
• 28:42
  Speaker 2: any listeners out there too that are my age or
• 28:46
  Speaker 2: any age. One lesson learned is it's never too late
• 28:51
  Speaker 2: to tell your story. It's never too late to let
• 28:53
  Speaker 2: your secret out of the box, because the only way
• 28:57
  Speaker 2: to let hope in is to open the box and heal.
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: What happens to the anger in your in your situation.
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: Because I mean, anyone listening to this, I mean, of
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: course you're angry, furious, I mean right, blood curdlingly angry.
• 29:18
  Speaker 2: Oh you should me. He's a New Yorker. I mean
• 29:23
  Speaker 2: come on, yeah, yeah, oh he's pissed. Yeah, But again,
• 29:29
  Speaker 2: what happened to the anger is I had anger for
• 29:32
  Speaker 2: fifty eight years. I mean I was very, very ticked off,
• 29:36
  Speaker 2: and I had bouts of issues where I would just
• 29:41
  Speaker 2: throw a table or a set of cards when I'd
• 29:43
  Speaker 2: be playing games with my brothers, and I'd be like,
• 29:45
  Speaker 2: you have no idea why I'm so angry, But I
• 29:50
  Speaker 2: don't know how to explain it. Guy. It's more about
• 29:54
  Speaker 2: peace within for me that I just came to the realization,
• 30:01
  Speaker 2: who does the anger serve? Is it serving me? Or
• 30:06
  Speaker 2: is the anger making me stoop to his love?
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: All right?
• 30:10
  Speaker 2: And the anger was making me stoop to his level.
• 30:13
  Speaker 2: And I would have forgiven him. That's the crazy thing.
• 30:18
  Speaker 2: Had he just said sorry instead of suing me, I
• 30:23
  Speaker 2: had the power within to forgive because he had become
• 30:26
  Speaker 2: a decent adult. He had four children, you know what
• 30:30
  Speaker 2: I mean. He just would not when it came public.
• 30:35
  Speaker 2: He couldn't admit the truth to anybody about So that's interesting.
• 30:41
  Speaker 2: So the night of the explosion text the one brother
• 30:45
  Speaker 2: was calling everybody that guy is done. And then the
• 30:50
  Speaker 2: other brother, David, the ones nine years older than me.
• 30:53
  Speaker 2: I called him and I said, hey, can we talk,
• 30:58
  Speaker 2: knowing that probably hadn't gotten to him yet, and I
• 31:02
  Speaker 2: just said, listen, I've got something that's been bothering me
• 31:05
  Speaker 2: for years. Can you please tell me if it was real?
• 31:10
  Speaker 2: Did you assault me? And he admitted to it all.
• 31:13
  Speaker 2: He gave me the validation that I'd been looking for
• 31:17
  Speaker 2: and it felt incredible.
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: God.
• 31:21
  Speaker 2: But then once David found out it became public, he
• 31:27
  Speaker 2: said that I was lying and went to Don's side.
• 31:31
  Speaker 2: So yeah, neither one of them could face the truth
• 31:35
  Speaker 2: in public, and I'm okay with that. I don't need
• 31:37
  Speaker 2: them in my life anymore. I have my brother Dale,
• 31:42
  Speaker 2: who was basically forced to take sides, and he said,
• 31:45
  Speaker 2: you know what, I believe my sister. So it's me
• 31:49
  Speaker 2: and Dale. You know, we went from a family of
• 31:51
  Speaker 2: seven to me and Dale. And then you've got the
• 31:53
  Speaker 2: two perpetrators over here here lying and denying. But I
• 31:58
  Speaker 2: don't need that. That's how you get rid of the anger.
• 32:01
  Speaker 2: You just kind of like let them. Mel Robins says,
• 32:05
  Speaker 2: let them.
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: I'm not going to be very yeah. Yeah, yeah, And
• 32:10
  Speaker 1: it takes a lot of us a long time to
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: get that message, you know, to ask that question, who's
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: this anger serving? Yeah, because I'm feeling like crap for
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: years holding this anger in and no one could fault
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: you for that anger, but you're living with it.
• 32:32
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah. I've just came to the conclusion the people
• 32:37
  Speaker 2: that were left in my family, the ones that I love.
• 32:40
  Speaker 2: I have three adult children and a wonderful husband, and
• 32:43
  Speaker 2: a wonderful brother and his family, lots of nieces and nephews.
• 32:48
  Speaker 2: They were more important to me than the anger, and
• 32:54
  Speaker 2: I wanted them in my life and the only way
• 32:56
  Speaker 2: to keep them in my life is not be so
• 32:58
  Speaker 2: pissed off.
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: Yeah, wow, oh my god. Darlene. All right, so let's
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: talk about what you're doing. Your website is Darlene Hyphenlakowski
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: dot com. Will have that linked to peer at the
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: show notes page. But you got the book books that
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: tell us about where people can get the book and everything. Sure.
• 33:23
  Speaker 2: Sure. So the title of the book is called Shattering Silence,
• 33:28
  Speaker 2: A Story of Survival, justice and the power of telling
• 33:32
  Speaker 2: the truth. It is live on Amazon only on April second,
• 33:39
  Speaker 2: twenty twenty six, and you can get it in all
• 33:42
  Speaker 2: formats ebook, digital, and even audiobook with my voice, and
• 33:47
  Speaker 2: you can follow me on Instagram as well.
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: Okay, we'll have that linked top peer at the show
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: notes page at the Trauma Therapist podcast dot com. And
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: you're going to be doing speaking.
• 33:56
  Speaker 2: I am I'm going to launch my speaking endeavor. I
• 33:59
  Speaker 2: am speaking. Oh, this is a great point. The Five Waves,
• 34:04
  Speaker 2: which is one of the many organizations that I volunteer
• 34:07
  Speaker 2: for for SSTA, They're doing the first ever SSTA conference
• 34:13
  Speaker 2: in Brookville, New York on June twenty third this year,
• 34:17
  Speaker 2: and I'm going to be one of their key speakers.
• 34:19
  Speaker 1: Wow. Five age. We'll have that linked up as well.
• 34:22
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I can email you that. There's like five different
• 34:25
  Speaker 2: organizations that I volunteer for across the world. There's some
• 34:29
  Speaker 2: in Australia and the UK that I volunteer with as well.
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: Darlene, I'm so glad I've met you. You're just like
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: this force, this beautiful power. Seriously, you're just this force
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: of humanness and I'd love to have you back at
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: a later time and it's just it's really inspiring.
• 34:53
  Speaker 2: Oh, thank you. You make me feel great. It is
• 34:56
  Speaker 2: the scariest thing that I've ever done. So I appreciate
• 34:59
  Speaker 2: you having me because more people like you have validate
• 35:02
  Speaker 2: I'm doing the right thing. It keeps me going. So
• 35:05
  Speaker 2: thank you.
• 35:06
  Speaker 1: Awesome, Thank you so much.
• 35:07
  Speaker 2: Take care, Thanks you too,