A Candid Conversation on Childhood Sexual Abuse, Radical Self-Responsibility, & Kink with Jagger Waters
This is one of the most intimate and refreshing conversations I've ever had on childhood sexual abuse. As my guest and long-time best friend of 15 years, Jagger Waters, says, societally, "We tend to treat it like it's a disease rather than an experience." As a comedy writer, she brilliantly sheds light on this topic by intentionally using humour to alchemize one of the most traumatic experiences one can have. We muse on what it's like to not just heal from the experience to the point where it's nothing but a tiny blip in our life story, but to also use it as a catalyst to become an even more powerful, communicative, confident, sex-positive, and self-aware human.
In this very different episode than any I’ve done on the Depth Work Podcast, we discuss childhood sexual abuse.
This is an intimate conversation between one of my best friends of 15 years - we have a common lived experience of being molested as children and we get very honest about what it looks like and what it takes to come out the other side of it as healthy adults.
While we don’t go into graphic detail, we also intentionally don’t treat this topic with fragility. Please care for yourself if this is a topic close to your heart, listen to your body and honour your own experiences.
You can listen to the whole episode on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.
“Be inextinguishable. Be so committed to having the best experience, that is what it becomes. You have to author that. You have to be a creative agent in making that possible.”
What you’ll learn about in this episode - A Candid Conversation on Childhood Sexual Abuse, Radical Self-Responsibility, & Kink:
Ways in which the impact of childhood sexual abuse is more about betrayal/attachment than the physical/sexual aspects
The kinds of horrible (and hilarious) responses we've gotten from therapists and others
How age, gender, and power are deeply interrelated
Whether adult sexual kinks have anything to do with trauma and making a commitment to healthy relationships and sex
Self-translation and how to disclose to partners, therapists, and friends
Re-defining and communicating your relationship to pleasure
How to deal with retraumatization
Avoiding victimhood and taking radical self-responsibility
When to stop going to therapy and follow your own process
“Not only is it gonna be okay, it’s gonna be fucking great. I have remained so committed to that. To having good sex and having relationships that are actually healthy. But that’s on you. You want to offload trauma because it’s heavy, but your therapist and your boyfriend and your friends can’t carry that for you. It’s yours. So get in there and investigate the shit out of it.”
About Jagger Waters:
Jagger Waters is a Los Angeles based comedy writer, goofball and amateur roller skater.
Instagram: @glamorousreptile
Twitter: @glamoureptile
DEPTH Work - A Holistic Mental Health Podcast
This is a space for those who love to dive into the underbelly, to revel in the mystery, question assumptions about what is normal, play in both/and, and honour the wide range of human emotions.
As a complex trauma survivor, holistic counsellor and co-founder of a mental health institute, I learned that there is immense wisdom in our pain and what we call crazy is just what we are yet not willing to understand and explore. Let’s dive in!
