GINGER'S STORY

Hello! My name is Ginger, and I am the artist and creator behind The Happy Girl Project here in Loveland, Colorado.  All of this started as a little art therapy project that I made up for myself. I have a very long-lived, traumatic history - involving physical, emotional and religious abuse - and am diagnosed with complex PTSD as a result. I am also a mom. One day, someone asked me to tell them a happy story and, despite my decades of participation in therapy, I had none. I racked my brain for days after, and I honestly had no happy stories to tell. I knew that there must be some joy out there, but my whole life seemed Dark, and that bothered me. 

The fact that I was a mom AND that I had no happy stories to tell was completely unacceptable to me. I feel very strongly that I am responsible to show my kiddo the happiness and joy and Light in life, but how could I if I was stuck in the Dark?  It didn't make any sense. That is when I decided that something had to change. My kiddo was already in elementary school! Time to get to work!

I started in the only place I could think of, creating happy images.  I created individual images of girls and women smiling and laughing to see if I could learn to take on some of that positive energy myself. I created in hopes that I would be able to somehow rewire my brain and teach myself how to notice the Light of joy in my life, rather than being stuck in my Darkness all the time. It didn't work right away, but through some time and process, it did start to take effect. 

First, I started to feel the immense pressure in my chest loosen up a bit sometimes, then there was a smile. Oh, I had been smiling, but this one was different. It was sincere. When I was able to genuinely laugh for the first time, I went to my bedroom and cried for a minute. It was such an overwhelming feeling! 

While I cannot report to you that I'm 100% cured, I have made amazing progress since starting to create these images (in 2023) than I had in over twenty years of therapy prior! Now, I take my images and put them into collages with little tidbits that I've learned along my healing journey. This, along with my continued work in therapy, is my way of continuing to challenge myself in my own healing process. 

I find art shows, and other places, to sell my work and tell my story. My goal is to inspire and empower as many girls and women as possible, and to help fund crisis centers and other supportive agencies. I never set up a show without a tissue box, though. As I'm meeting and talking with folks at these shows, I have plenty of hugs and tissues to share. 

So many of us have been through heartbreak, disappointment, abuse, and even trauma. So my challenge to each one of us is this:

Question every negative message you've ever been told about yourself. 

Replace the abuser's words with words that remind you of your worth.

Don't fall for our society's unrealistic expectations and beauty standards. 

As so many have said, "Comparison is the thief of joy."

Be unapologetically you, and be kind to you, no matter who is watching!

May we all learn to rewrite negative messages, and rewire negative pathways in our brains.

I don't care who you are, what you look like,  or what size clothes you wear. I don't care how old you are, what you've believed about yourself, or what you've been through in life. Join me on this healing path. No matter what kind of Darkness you might find yourself in, there is Light on the other side... Light and beauty and joy. It may take a hell of a fight to find it but, my dear, you are SO worth it! 

LOVE ALWAYS WINS!!!

-Ginger Rose McFate