Joanies and Wildhorse (CUPP of Hope)

By Joanies and Wildhorse (CUPP of Hope), June 2024

CUPP of Hope is a drop-in support group that meets twice a week on Zoom. We have had 88 different systems drop in from 13 countries in the last two years. Some of the systems have consistently continued to come since group one and others drop in from time to time or come for a season.

The idea of CUPP of Hope had been in Joanies’ heart for a long time. The longing was to have a place where an RA/MC survivor could be, not pretend, and share their painful truth. For years Joanies had been in various other DID forums and still felt different than other folks. Through a blog post of Jean Riseman’s, Joanies discovered GrassRoots and attended a poetry reading they were having. Immediately Joanies realized that they had found their tribe. Everything the poets wrote about resonated so deeply within her, including a survivor mentioning how alone they felt. Out of that came the pursuit of how they could help that person, and themselves, not feel so alone. The day after the poetry reading, the journey began. Through many email exchanges with GrassRoots, a peer lead, drop-in, support group, on Zoom, was getting underway. At the same time, Joanies and Wildhorse met through a different DID forum. They connected because of shared experiences of RA/MC and it wasn’t long before co-facilitating was in process.

CUPP of Hope has been a work in progress. In the beginning things were quite time consuming and challenging. There was no framework to go by as this kind of group had never been done before that we knew of. A lot of time was needed to figure out how to create a safe place where fellow survivors of RA/MC could share their truth and have supportive witnesses to their stories. There were many situations that we encountered in the beginning that initiated an adaptation in our guidelines.

Besides the logistics of creating and running the group, we had a lot to learn about co-facilitating. It was challenging to have two systems work so closely together. Through the course of time we have had to really learn about each others’ system. We often tease and say it’s like a marriage. We have many similarities like both having taught kids, our faith in God, and passion and dedication to almost anything we do. We also have differences: Joanies likes to delete every email as soon as it’s read and Wildhorse holds on and files everything. This funny example is one that represents harder things we had to learn: communication and trust. A system communicating with another system, oh my. We have both learned so much about ourselves through good and hard times in trying to communicate.

Trust has been equally challenging because let’s face it, trust is at the core of many survivor issues. We have learned that we have each other’s back. We have learned how to help each other and recognize when one is struggling or needs space. We have learned how to say we are sorry. And bigger yet, that nothing bad is going to happen because we were less than perfect. We are both dedicated to building a healthy relationship without co-dependence, both actively working on our own trauma. We’ve laughed, we’ve cried. We’ve given, we’ve taken. We say hard things to challenge each other and sit together through that discomfort. We have learned to trust and help each other navigate through the areas where one is blinded by RA/MC distortions, knowing full well that the roles will soon switch. We share our lives outside of RA/MC. We make every decision regarding CUPP of Hope together. We have realized that together we have different strengths we both bring, and checks and balances that keep us strong and CUPP of Hope running smoothly.

With many hours of help from Rivers and GrassRoots, and almost 200 meetings, CUPP of Hope has settled in. We recently had a 2-year celebration where we all reflected on how being able to be in a group such as this has impacted us. Here are some quotes from that group:

• “C of H is a cocoon of love and caring.”
• “C of H has helped me advocate for ourselves.”
• “I come here and practice life skills.”
• “I have found a community and now I have found friends.”
• “Here we have found our voice.”
• “Here we can practice being us.”
• “We feel like we are blossoming.”
• “Being here is helping me bond with my system.”
• “This is the one place I feel I am not the only person holding unspeakable things.”
• “Everyone is welcome here… including the kids.”
• “A fellow survivor is like a mirror to see ourselves and C of H provides that space.”
• “We have tears of gratitude for C of H.”
• “There is a consistent structure and the facilitators help us feel safe.”
• “The facilitators have given their hearts and souls to make C of H a safe, nurturing space where we can speak our truth.”
• “People we have connected with here, help us have a reason to continue to go forward.”
• “I was about to give up and then I found C of H.”

CUPP of Hope has certainly evolved since the beginning. It will continue to evolve as those who attend ebb and flow, and as healing and needs shift and change. That ever changing nature of a drop-in group, though scary to begin with, has become a beautiful thing. New members become regular attendees and strangers become friends. And the biggest blessing of CUPP of Hope is that “other people are telling my story” and we are not alone. We hope to see you there.

Joanies and Wildhorse

You can contact Joanies and Wildhorse, the co-facilitators, at cuppsofhope@gmail.com.