EXULANSIS

FUCK EXULANSIS!! HEAL OUT LOUD!!!

Exulansis is the tendency to stop talking about a personal experience because other people cannot relate to it.

Coined by John Koenig in The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows, the term describes the quiet isolation of keeping a meaningful story to yourself when listeners meet it with blank stares, pity, or total misunderstanding.

Psychological Impact

Isolation: Makes a significant personal memory feel like an isolated myth rather than a part of your daily life story.

Silence: Leads you to trail off mid-sentence because you realize the gap in understanding cannot be bridged.

Acceptance: Teaches you to hold onto your own memories without needing external validation from others.

A new word that happened to land in my lap during a very interesting time in my life.

Whatever.

My life is always a chaotic web of interesting.

Nothing new there.

This last week, I was presented with another challenge to evaluate everything in my life once again. Old patterns, people, and situations resurfacing all at once.

Now, should I go and explain all of that here?

That is the question of the day.

Because according to the definition of Exulansis…

Nah.

I have been through the Isolation of having a mind and soul built differently from the majority of people walking this world.

I have been through the stage of Silence as well.

Hell, sometimes I wish I had been silent more often.

I wasted a lot of breath on minds that could never understand the road, the path, the history, or everything that made me who I was and who I am today.

And now?

I have hit Acceptance.

I don’t need validation anymore.

Hell, I don’t even want it.

Then a song lands in my lap, and I cannot stop listening to it.

“Heal Out Loud” — Queen Butterfly

One line says enough:

“I built this voice from the times I drowned.”

A song I wish all Survivors would embrace.

Because suddenly something clicked.

Acceptance does not mean silence.

I learned I was sitting in the wrong circles.

I don’t need validation.

I don’t need to fear speaking out.

And I don’t need to give another ounce of my mind to feeling bad for speaking about the ones who committed the evil deeds.

They all had ample time for redemption.

There is an entire world of people out there who would never put me in the position of Exulansis.

People who understand my language.

People who have lived their own version of it.

People who don’t need the story softened before they can stomach hearing it.

I am here, built in God’s image just like everyone else.

So I will speak.

Not because I need everyone to understand me.

Not because I need validation.

I will speak so the others who lived like I did can hear someone speaking their language.

I am merging my voice with theirs.

There is power in numbers.

We want change.

For our peace.

For our children.

For our grandchildren.

Be the change I want to see.

Help others find their voices.

Teach these girls to say NO from the womb.

Help inspire them to become warriors.

Teach them to save their soft for the ones who deserve it.

Show them that self-worth is the new trend.

Set a new standard.

Because I watch the generations behind mine.

I see girls who are timid. Girls afraid to say no. Afraid to stand firm in their stance.

And I can see the ones who could become easy targets for predators not because there is something wrong with them, but because they have yet to discover the ugly that exists in this world and nobody has armed them with the knowledge to recognize it.

So Survivors…

Stand.

Speak.

Join the other voices.

Burn silence down.

Give the girls growing up and stepping into the ages where sexual violence, domestic violence, incest, manipulation, and abuse become very real dangers an education in standing up for themselves.

Teach self-defense.

Teach coping skills.

Tell them about your mistakes.

Tell them what you learned.

Teach them that NO is a complete fucking sentence.

Teach them that nobody—partner, family member, authority figure, friend, stranger, or otherwise—has ownership over their body.

And if somebody violates that boundary, teach them they are allowed to fight like hell to protect themselves.

Most importantly:

Teach your daughters that if someone they love or trust touches them inappropriately, they are SAFE to tell you.

That you will listen.

That you will believe them.

That protecting the family image will NEVER be more important than protecting the child.

Because we did not bring another generation into this world just to hand them the same silence that failed generations before them.

STOP LETTING THESE GIRLS LEARN LIKE I HAD TO.

LIKE SO MANY OTHERS HAD TO.

And while we’re changing the standard, stop pretending men don’t have a place in this fight.

Wake up the protectors.

Give good men room to stand beside women instead of treating every man as the enemy.

Give men who have been hurt a safe place to heal too.

Raise boys who understand boundaries.

Raise girls who enforce them.

Stop rewarding destructive behavior with access to our bodies, our homes, our loyalty, and our futures.

Set the standard so fucking high that abuse doesn’t get a second generation.

Set it so high that the first time somebody hits her, she knows love does not require staying.

Set it so high that when something feels wrong, she trusts herself.

Set it so high that our daughters don’t inherit our silence.

Because maybe I misunderstood Exulansis at first.

Maybe the lesson isn’t:

Stop telling your story because some people will never understand.

Maybe the lesson is:

Stop telling it to people committed to misunderstanding it.

Find the ones who speak your language.

Find the ones still trying to find their voice.

Then speak loud enough for them to hear you.

I no longer need everybody to understand my story.

But I refuse to bury it just to make other people comfortable.

FUCK EXULANSIS.

HEAL OUT LOUD.