Fired Up: Fueling Triumph from Trauma

By Alreen Haeggquist

One out of every two women in the United States experience sexual assault. Underreporting, victim blaming, and societal shaming mean the actual rate is even higher. But you are not a statistic. You are a survivor. This book is for you.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lioncrest Publishing
• Release date: Sep 12, 2023
• ISBN: 9781544541716

Alreen Haeggquist

Alreen Haeggquist is a lawyer, survivor of childhood sexual abuse, and fierce advocate for those brave enough to stand up to their abusers in court. Over the last two decades, Alreen has fought for victims of abuse, harassment, discrimination, retaliation, and fraud in high-profile lawsuits. Her law firm, Haeggquist & Eck, has recovered millions of dollars for its clients-and plays a critical role in allowing victims to reclaim their narratives. Determined to break the cycle of abuse, Alreen shares her story of how she uses her trauma to help others get out of the darkness and reclaim their light.

Book preview

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Copyright © 2023 Alreen Haeggquist

All rights reserved.

First Edition

ISBN: 978-1-5445-4171-6

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To my beautiful daughter Maya, who teaches me about the joys of life, the beauty of childhood, and what it means to love unconditionally.

To my loving husband Michael for showing me that beauty is everywhere, I just have to open my eyes and look.

To my brave clients who gave me the courage to speak up and write this book.

To my dear sisters and nieces for being my north star through this journey.

And to my chosen family of friends for supporting me and for being my biggest cheerleaders.

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Contents

Introduction

Part 1: What Happened to You Was F*cked

1. A True Bully

2. Gaslit

Part 2: Trauma Impacts All Parts of Your Life (Even When You Ignore It)

3. A Safe Space

4. Buried (But Not Forgotten)

5. Your Body Remembers

Part 3: You Didn’t Make the Mess, But You Still Have to Clean It Up

6. Memory Wipe, Please

7. Your Body Keeps Score

8. Evolutions

9. Journey

Part 4: Fueling Triumph from Trauma

10. More than Half

11. Superpowers and That Big Shift Energy

12. Always Both

Coda: Waking Up

Appendix: Resources

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Introduction

If you had met me in the fall of 2015, you would have thought I had everything I could possibly want. And on some level, I did. At thirty-eight, I had fulfilled my dream of finishing law school, starting my own successful law practice, and was entering Trial Lawyers College to become a better trial lawyer. I was married to a wonderful man and had a beautiful three-year-old daughter.

My life was full. And yet, I felt so alone.

I know now that I felt alone because I thought my experience—my history of abuse at the hands of my father—was mine and mine alone. I knew in a vague way that other people had suffered abuse, of course, but this was my dad we were talking about. Or not talking about, actually. In fact, I spent most of my life not saying a word, believing my abuse was so much worse than anyone else’s that it had to remain unspoken.

I had heard some people talk about abuse coming from other family members, but that seemed different—my abuser was my dad. I look like the person who hurt me. Sometimes, even today, I shudder to see his face in mine when I look in the mirror. I am my own trigger.

That’s why I don’t display many family pictures in my house, even now. At times, I still get triggered by the sight of faces that remind me of my father, including my own, or anyone else who has his eyes or nose. Instead, years ago, when I bought picture frames to decorate my house, I never changed out the generic pictures of other people that came with them. Those people had no dark backstory to unpack; they were the people I wanted to be.

The impulse to hide the past went deep. I couldn’t talk about it. Even my husband only knew sparse facts about what had happened to me. I was convinced that if anyone else found out, they’d be as grossed out and disgusted by me as I was. I was afraid if anyone else found out, I’d be more alone than I already was. I was determined to keep my abuse a secret.

My first experience at Trial Lawyers College changed all that.

It was a psychodrama class, intended to help us dive deep into our darkest memories, so we could explore what they truly felt like. Developing empathy is important for trial lawyers because they have to be able to fully identify with their client’s feelings and story. Before they can do that, they have to be able to identify with their own.

I knew from the moment I walked in that this class was very different from everything else I’d experienced in my academic life. The students weren’t neatly arranged at rows of desks. They were sitting in a circle, facing each other, exposed. In the middle of the circle sat our leader—the psychodramatist. She calmly explained that she would work with us to draw out our stories so we could tell them and act them out in front of the group to bring our unconscious feelings to the surface.

We would be essentially recreating some of our worst experiences, and I was unequivocally not ready to do it. Sit there in a circle of strangers and share one of my darkest memories? No, thank you. Right away, I made a plan to talk about being bullied at school when I was a kid instead—my go-to trauma for times when sharing was unavoidable.

So there I was—sitting on a cold metal seat in a room full of strangers, waiting to share a trauma from my past. I was nervous, though I still had no intention of telling anyone that my dad had abused me.

As the session began, I was somewhat comforted that there were at least some rules to this sharing exercise. The psychodramatist explained that we would use three metaphorical chairs to help us sort out what we were feeling: first chair, which represented feeling on a surface level; second chair, which represented what we were really feeling on the inside; and third chair, which were feelings so deep they were almost subconscious. I didn’t even know there were feelings that deep. If we couldn’t tap into the feelings, audience members were encouraged to step up and say the feeling they thought we were experiencing. If it was right, the psychodramatist instructed, we should say those feelings out loud and make them our own.

Someone else volunteered to start, thank God. She chose another participant to work with her, to play the role of her brother in the story they would recreate. Then someone brought a mattress into the room. I was horrified already. The two women climbed onto it, lying side by side as the first woman relived the experience of being sexually abused by her brother.

I cried.

I am not a crier. In the house I grew up in, people who expressed feelings that way were labeled criers. No one questioned or ridiculed expressions of anger—if you got mad and slammed a door, it was fine. Tears were a different story entirely, and I learned at an early age to keep my own behind closed doors.

But sitting there in that classroom, watching another woman relive her most painful memories on a mattress in the middle of a room of lawyers—it was shocking and so, so sad. I felt so much hurt for her. The idea that she could share a story like that—that she could make herself vulnerable enough to open such a huge wound—hit me so hard. If I want to be better, I thought, I need to open a big wound, too.

Still, I had zero plans to talk about my own abuse.

When it was my turn to share, I put my ten-year-old self back in the playground of my San Fernando Valley elementary school. The hot sun touched my face; the sounds of the two bullies following me on the concrete schoolyard filled my ears. Hey dot head, they yelled, mimicking my bowlegged walk, did you just ride on your camel from 7-Eleven?

Fear entered my body.

I relived what it was like to be followed around and called so many terrible things while they pointed and laughed at my bow legs, brown skin, large nose, and big eyes. I remembered feeling hunted; I felt like I couldn’t escape.

And then what did you do? the leader asked me.

Nothing. I went home.

Going Home

My thoughts followed my words, and it was like I was there again, walking out of school at the end of the day, face still burning with the shame of being bullied. By the time I got into the back seat of the car, though, a different kind of dread had settled in my stomach like a rock. Being in the car was never fun—it would be either dead silent in there or my mother or I would be getting cursed at for something we had no control over. Either way, it was terrifying. I hoped for silence, though in the silence all I could think of was what I would face when we got home and went inside, where nobody could see us and when he didn’t have his hands on the wheel.

My face must have reflected these thoughts even as I fought them, because the leader didn’t let me stop there. She asked me whom I went to at home. Who was my safe person—the one I told this situation about? Who was the person who protected me?

What? I felt disoriented. Safe person? Protection?

To my astonishment, I fell to the floor and found myself sobbing into the psychodramatist’s lap. Remarkably, I heard myself telling her…the truth.

Nobody protected me, I said. Home wasn’t a safe place.

I couldn’t recreate my home scene, even though it filled my thoughts. I could barely speak.

Someone at home wasn’t safe? she pressed.

I continued to sob.

My dad, I said finally.

Your dad wasn’t safe? she said, her voice kind.

I don’t really know if those were her exact words, but that’s what I remember hearing. All I know is that I finally felt free to admit what had happened.

Yes, I said. My dad molested me…and he wasn’t the only family member that did. My head stayed in her lap. I kept my face down as I continued to sob.

There was so much pain. But there was something else going on, too. I felt a strange sort of bewildered relief. I had told my secret and survived the telling. I hadn’t thought that was possible, but I’d done it, and the world did not end. Huh. I was still alive; imagine that.

Eventually we took a break. People thanked and hugged me for sharing. One of the women from the group came up to me and brought up the impersonal picture frames that decorated my home, which I’d shared earlier in the day.

Oh my god, she said. At first I thought that was so odd, but now I totally understand why you wouldn’t have a bunch of pictures up.

It struck me that this woman I’d just met—who, only a day before, had been a stranger to me—knew something about me that the people I’d known all my life didn’t. It felt strange, but good, too. Being in that intimate space with strangers helped me. I’d had so much fear about telling other people. Now others knew what had happened to me, and instead of running away, they were drawing closer to say thank you and tell me that they understood.

It was surreal, even beautiful. And for the first time in my life, I began to feel less alone. Now, for the first time ever, I’m going to tell my full story, and the stories of some of my clients throughout this book, with the hope that we can expose this epidemic, tear down shame inflicted by the silence, and emerge on the other side stronger together.

Nobody’s Talking

The way I understood the world, it was imperative that I never let myself cry, or let myself share what was happening at home. The risk was too great. If I talked, if I cried, that would mean the end of everything. I wanted to survive, so I kept it all in.

Most people who are sexually abused do not talk about the abuse. I get it. I understand the feeling that saying the words out loud will bring the world crashing down around them. Like so many others, I was certain I was the only one; I worried no one would believe me anyway, since they’d never experienced anything like it. And if they did believe me, that was even worse—they would know what a disgusting human I really was.

The sad irony is that I was far from alone. Sex abuse is incredibly common. In reality, over 50 percent of women and nearly 33 percent of men have experienced some form of sexual assault or sexual harassment in their lifetimes.1 Over 50 percent of women! And, honestly, I’m surprised the number is that low; in my line of work it seems closer to 100 percent some days.

The truth is it happens to people of all ages, from young children to adult professionals, but we don’t get that message. The only message we get is that we are the only one, we should be ashamed, and we must have done something to deserve it. If anybody knew about it, they would think we were disgusting. Terrible and bad. They’d ridicule us, reject us, leave us. Punish us. Fire us. I now know that is not true.

My abuse left me angry. The person who hurt me—who caused my Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), my depression, my anxiety, my