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About Alisa

Hi, I'm Alisa (pronouns: she/her/hers) I’m so glad we found each other. [This is where I take a running leap into your arms]. I am a storyteller, writer, facilitator and childhood sexual abuse survivor. My work focuses on offering emotional support to other young survivors healing from sexual trauma.
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About Healing Honestlyâ„¢

If this is the first time you’re here, lemme tell ya, have the last couple years have been a doozy. I had been living my best 20-something in DC boss  life in a cute apartment with a dream job advocating for abortion rights with international travel included. I had a fancy office with a WINDOW and also a boyfriend who I believe looks like Jesse Williams if Jesse Williams had never exercised in his life. The dream.

But then, my dormant complex post-traumatic stress disorder (C-PTSD), which had been hiding quietly under the surface this whole time, returned with the rage and shit hit the fan. I decided to stop hiding from myself, and through that, I began healing. These are my stories.

I started Healing Honestlyâ„¢ in 2016 as a way to share my experiences as a millennial woman trying to live my career-building, tequila-drinking, sex-having, Netflix-and-chilling life while contending with my experiences as a survivor of child sexual abuse. I wanted to create a space to speak about healing from trauma in an honest, funny and compassionate way that didn’t feel so damn scary.

All these years later, HealingHonestly.com has a readership of 500,000 people who stick around for my  transparency, humor (healing from child sex abuse is funnier than you’d think), and ability to talk about really heavy and hard topics around sexual trauma, mental health and healing in a way that feels accessible. I am thrilled to share that now Healing Honestly includes my book, Healing Honestly, The Messy and Magnificent Path to Overcoming Self-Blame and Self-Shame, a first survivor-to-survivor guide to healing from childhood sexual abuse. In addition to this delightful, surprisingly funny, and practical book, I also facilitate workshops, do coaching work with survivors and give keynote addresses around the country.

I do not talk about the traumatic experiences themselves, but rather about the complicated experiences of healing. I discuss about what it is like to, one hand, try to live my young vibrant messy life, and, on the other, hand to have to deal with the unpredictably of C-PTSD. In my experience, the only way I can heal is to hold these two hands together in the big complicated mess of being alive.

A few things you should know before diving in...

I am super NOT a doctor or therapist

I am not a clinician or mental health professional (the only license I have is a drivers, and it took me 3 tries to get it). I am a writer and storyteller who has experienced how helpful it can be to create understanding around these really stigmatized topics. I encourage anyone with access to mental health professionals to take advantage of those resources, therapists and doctors can be dope and super helpful.

I think trigger warnings are very excellent

My stories are all true, as I remember and feel them, with some names changed. Each story has a specific content warning, because, trust me, I know triggers suck.

I can speak only for myself.

I understand that the identities that I hold, as a upper-class, white, cis, hetero woman, afford me privileges that significantly impact my experiences in healing. I will try to be as transparent as possible about these privileges through my work. I encourage and support anyone trying to tell their story of healing that is unique to them, their identities, and their experiences.