Participating in the AWBW training had a big impact on me personally because I was a participant in AWBW as a domestic violence client at Desert Sanctuary. I’ve grown from these art groups and they have been a huge part of my healing and finding my worth. Now 10 years later I’m working as an Advocate for that very same DV outreach.

For my first group as an AWBW facilitator, my co-facilitator and I did one on resilience for youth who have witnessed domestic violence. We explained what resiliency is and asked them to give us examples of a time when they were resilient. We compared it to nature and how trees and flowers survive all kinds of weather and storms and it makes them stronger.

Some kids had the courage to share, and all of them were eager to create. As I created my art alongside them, I reflected on my own resilience and how far I’d come.

While doing my support groups through Desert Sanctuary I attended an AWBW group I’ll never forget. I remember the facilitator talking a lot about strength. She showed us all a lotus flower and explained how they have to fight through so much mud and rocks and tadpoles to make it to the surface in order to bloom. She said, “You should think of yourself as a lotus flower—after all you’ve been through you’ve made it, you’re blooming!”

I loved that so much it became my favorite flower and I even got a lotus flower tattoo on my neck. The story behind that tattoo has so much meaning, I tell it any chance I get!

A couple of the girls, ages 9 and 10, love to paint and created multiple paintings of flowers. I always find art to be so captivating; I get lost and taken over while creating. As I worked on my own flower painting I found myself thinking, My happiness is mine, no one can take it from me. Just like the lotus flower, I had to fight through a lot of adversity to get to where I am now and can bloom freely. I won’t let or give anyone the control to take that from me again!