Community & writerly resources
Please support the folks who support Writing Ourselves Whole, and please let me know about your services, workshops, calls for submissions, fundraisers, and community events — send a blurb about the event, and tell me you’d like me to add it to our resource list! Updated 10/10/23
- Join the Transformative Language Arts Network for the 18th Power of Words Celebration, November 11, 2023 (online).
- Elana Story, LCSW offers sliding scale therapy in Oakland focusing on healing for survivors of trauma. She uses a gentle, body-based technique called Lifespan Integration to offer healing from past trauma. www.elanastorylcsw.com 510-671-1297
- Charna Cassell offers body-centered, trauma-aware psychotherapy and sex therapy in the SF Bay area: www.passionatelife.org
- Jacks McNamara offers creative trauma healing groups in Santa Fe and online (and sometimes in the SF Bay area, too!)
- If you haven’t already, make sure you get your copy of Queering Sexual Violence: Radical Voices from Within the Anti-Violence Movement, edited by Jennifer Patterson.
- Sade Gryffin offers intuitive energy healing in Oakland. “Intuitive healings are a powerful way to get clarity and insight into patterns and belief systems that are shaping your life. Clients often feel a powerful positive shift in their energy, and a profound sense of rejuvenation.”
- Rachel Grant is the owner and founder of Rachel Grant Coaching and is a Sexual Abuse Recovery Coach. She works with survivors of childhood sexual abuse who are beyond sick and tired of feeling broken, unfixable, and burdened by the past. rachelgrantcoaching.com
- Apply for a writing residency at Hedgebrook! My residency at Hedgebrook allowed me to embrace and nourish myself as a writer; it was an astonishingly powerful experience. I encourage all writers who identify as women to apply for a fully-funded residency of their own so they, too, can experience Hedgebrook’s “radical hospitality” firsthand.
- Sexual trauma survivor? Looking for support in the San Francisco Bay Area? Contact the brilliant, generous folks at San Francisco Women Against Rape or CUAV.
- Chris DeLorenzo has been offering weekly, generative writing workshops through Laguna Writers in San Francisco for more than two decades — he now also offers local weekend retreats, special topic writing groups, and international week-long writing opportunities. I can’t recommend Chris highly enough — if you get the chance to write with him, grab it and go.
- The brilliant Rae Gouirand offers creative nonfiction workshops in Napa, Sacramento and online!
- Jodie Stein, MA, helps women in transition to be fierce about loving themselves. She offers a women’s divorce therapy group and drop-in support group for women in the early stages of divorce or navigating other forms of loss. jodiestein.com.
- Naomi Rifkin and Brush Fire Painting use “the power of the arts to heal hearts and transform lives. We teach Process Oriented Painting to unleash the therapeutic qualities of the creative process. Creativity is a basic human need; we strive to bring art to the lives of marginalized youth throughout the San Francisco Bay Area.” Naomi offers workshops for youth and adults; visit website to learn more.
- Renee Garcia offers writing prompts, one-with-one writing coaching/encouragement, and online writing community at Write the Fuck Now. Renee is a brilliant writer and a powerful advocate – get her in your corner.
- Writing Ourselves Whole <hearts> The Center for Sex and Culture. There’s no other organization in the Bay Area that does the kind of incredible sexual-culture work that the CSC does — and we want to keep it going! Check out their website for events and classes, and please donate!
- Marty Williams offers a writing workshop in North Oakland, A Thousand Words. Contact Marty at 510-928-7032 or at thousandwordspress@gmail.com FMI.
- If you’re interested in facilitating your own writing groups, check out the Amherst Writers and Artists‘ facilitator training schedule.
- The Survivors Healing Center in Santa Cruz offers expressive arts (and lots of other) therapy groups for survivors of sexual trauma.
- If you’re up in the Sacramento area, check out AWA Sacramento for powerful workshops and a fun, supportive and engaged writing community.
- Check out the incredible work that Vanissar Tarakali, Ph.D., is doing around embodiment, trauma, deep self-care and allyship.
- Have you read Trauma Stewardship? Remember: taking care of ourselves is a part of doing ethical, sustainable work in the world. We deserve it, our communities deserve it, the folks we work with deserve it… please be easy with you!
Writer resources: Calls for submissions and more:
Lambda Literary’s Calls for Submissions
Publishing and other forms of insanity
Erika Dreifus – Practicing Writing
Additional community organizations:
San Francisco Women Against Rape
Hotline: (415) 647-RAPE
Resources, support, advocacy and education for all those responding to and healing from sexual violence.
The Trevor Project
1-866-488-7386
A national 24-hour, toll free confidential suicide hotline for gay and questioning youth.
RAINN (Rape and Incest National Network)
RAINN allows you to search by state and/or zip code in order to find the rape crisis center nearest you.
Communities Untied Against Violence (CUAV)
(415) 333-4357
San Francisco-based services and support for gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, queer and questioning (LGBTQQ) survivors of sexual violence, hate crimes, and intimate partner abuse.
Survivorship
Support and community for survivors of ritual abuse, mind control, and torture.
