Resilience Unveiled: A Survivor's Journey from Trafficking to Triumph with Jennisue Jessen

In this episode of Carrie's Always Talking, Carrie has a powerful conversation with Jennisue Jessen where she shares her harrowing journey from childhood trauma and exploitation to becoming a resilient advocate for survivors of trafficking. She discusses the importance of empathy, the misconceptions surrounding trafficking, and the healing process. Jennisue emphasizes that trauma does not define us, but rather equips us to create a more just world. Through her work, she aims to empower others to find their voice and navigate their healing journey, highlighting the significance of survivor-led organizations and the need for compassion in addressing these complex issues. This episode serves as a reminder that there is hope even in the darkest of places. 

Jennisue's website: https://compass31.org/

 https://www.facebook.com/jenni.jessen

If you have a story you'd like to tell, send me an email at carrie.always.talking@gmail.com. I'd love to hear from you.

You can also find me on Bluesky- @carrie-is-talking.bsky.social 

www.youtube.com/@carrie-always-talking

Transcript

Carrie McNulty (00:01)

Welcome back to Carrie's Always Talking. I'm your host, Carrie McNulty. This is the podcast all about stories and connections. I believe that when people share their stories with one another, it's the main way we build empathy and humanity. And that's something I think we need a lot more of in the world today. This is episode 13 of season two. I do have a guest with me today and her name is Jenniesue Jessen. She is a survivor of human trafficking and founder and CEO of Compass 31.

She's dedicated over 25 years to combating human trafficking globally and her remarkable journey from being sold into the sex trade at the age of four to becoming a key figure in shaping federal counter trafficking policies reflects her passion for justice and resilience. Jenniesue's story is incredibly powerful. And with that, will say listener discretion is advised. There is discussion of her own abuse as well as sexual abuse of others that she has helped.

in her career along the way. But as she says in the first couple sentences of our discussion, things turned out well for her and she is living happily ever after. So while I know that this topic is a very heavy one and you know could be challenging for people to listen to, I also feel that if there are people who are not yet ready to share their stories, they might find some hope in hearing hers.

I think it's important to know what resources are out there, just in case you ever need to be able to point somebody in the direction of finding some help if they need it or if you yourself need some help.

If you have been listening to the podcast, thank you so much for listening. Please like, share, leave a review. It helps us to get noticed. And as always, I'm going to do my call to action. If you are able to donate to your local food bank and join me in my monthly donation that I'm doing, I would really appreciate that as would your community. Now is a time for building community and knowing who is in your neighborhood, helping to support one another.

food insecurity is a very real thing and is going to continue. So if you are able to help in whatever way you can, or if there's another charity that you've identified that you would like to put your money, support, time, anything that you can give behind, absolutely consider doing so. If you want to come on the show, you can send an email. It's always in the show notes.

I really want to get into this discussion that I had with Jenniesue. And I hope that you enjoy hearing her perspective. I know I did. And I also learned so much from talking to her and hope you will as well.

Carrie McNulty (02:44)

Hi, JenniSue Thank you so much for joining me.

JenniSue Jessen (02:47)

Hi, Carrie, I'm excited to spend some time with you today.

Carrie McNulty (02:51)

Awesome. I'm looking for you to share whatever parts of your story that you feel comfortable sharing with the audience and with me and just sort of seeing where this takes us. Does that sound OK to you?

JenniSue Jessen (03:03)

That sounds amazing. ⁓ I usually at the beginning of sharing my story offer just ⁓ a bit of a content warning because my history involves quite a bit of violence. But I will give the caveat that right now I'm living happily ever after. So you can set whatever your listeners boundaries they need or if they're with kids in the car, maybe put headphones in. But also it's OK to lean into the story because it

Carrie McNulty (03:12)

Mm-hmm.

Good.

Mm-hmm.

Right.

JenniSue Jessen (03:32)

it ends well. So with that, my once upon a time really begins at the age of four. And I was growing up in the Midwest of the USA in what many would call the buckle of the Bible belt. And my home life was lovely in a lot of ways, but also chaotic because my dad was an alcoholic. My mom was addicted to my dad. And whenever my house was

in chaos. I think, believing the best in them, I think they thought they were making the best choice. They would send me three hours away to live with my grandparents. And unfortunately, that was not a safe or happy place. But my grandfather was a pretty wicked bad guy. And so at the age of four, he started selling me to other men for sex.

Carrie McNulty (04:12)

Mm-hmm. ⁓

JenniSue Jessen (04:29)

By kindergarten, I was praying every night that God would just let me die. So first baby ideas of suicidal ideation, which people might not know, but pediatric suicide for five to nine year olds is the ninth leading cause of death right now in the US. For five to nine year olds. And it's the second leading cause of death for 10 to 14 year olds.

Carrie McNulty (04:34)

Hmm.

Mmm. Wow.

JenniSue Jessen (04:57)

And so for those kids like myself, they sometimes think that the only hope to escape was to not wake up anymore. And that was my experience in first grade. had first symptoms of a sexually transmitted infection. School, my first grade teacher noticed I was uncomfortable, took me to the school nurse. The school nurse called my mom. My mom took me to the pediatrician and got the appropriate treatment.

Carrie McNulty (05:07)

Mm-hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (05:26)

But no questions were asked. ⁓

Carrie McNulty (05:29)

Seriously,

so nobody at the school looked into it any further.

JenniSue Jessen (05:34)

Well, it was a different time. I'm old. That was in the 70s. So I...

Carrie McNulty (05:36)

Right.

Yeah, right. You're right. You're right. Kids

were on milk cartons and nobody knew where their kids were at night. You're right. You're right. It was a different time. Yeah.

JenniSue Jessen (05:44)

Right, you know, I was in first

grade, I guess in 1977-78 and ⁓ the nurse did her part. She called my mom and my mom took me to the pediatrician. But in that time and culture, you just don't ask questions and keeping secrets was kind of a cultural thing. You don't rock the boat. So second grade, I...

Carrie McNulty (05:49)

Mm.

Mm-hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (06:11)

sat in a church on Sunday morning with my grandparents. My grandfather was an elder in his church and sat behind the man who had paid to rape me the night before. And the violence continued until I was 17 and was pervasive. A lot of damage done physically, emotionally, spiritually, until at the age of 17, the day after a failed suicide attempt, I found out I was pregnant and I...

I that that really is the miracle that saved my life. Because as desperately as I wanted to escape, that pregnancy awoke in me this mama bear instinct. So there had been times as a child that I tried to fight, tried to escape, tried to run, but I was wee little bitty, you know? You can't out fight a grown man when you're a 45 pound six year old.

Carrie McNulty (06:45)

Hmm.

Right.

JenniSue Jessen (07:11)

And I learned as a child very quickly that my survival depended on my silence and my submission. But as a 17 year old, then 18 year old pregnant, I've got this innocent baby to protect and not on my watch, not gonna happen anymore. And so at that point he was born,

Carrie McNulty (07:18)

Right.

Right.

JenniSue Jessen (07:33)

Christmas break, my freshman year in university, beautiful blue eyed boy tore his way into my world and turned it upside down. ⁓ But with that, I finally had the courage to tell a counselor enough about what was happening to intervene in my situation and get both my son and myself to safety. And that really began my journey towards freedom and homeless. And ultimately,

⁓ to the point that 14 years ago I was able to found an international counter-trafficking organization and we have a presence doing prevention across 43 nations now and restoration work in five nations. So I've come to the understanding or the belief that trauma does not define us. So many times in this day and age and in our culture we wear

badges of victimhood like their honor. Well, I'm a victim of this and I'm a victim of this and instead I think it equips us. It's not my identity. It's something I went through. I was victimized absolutely, but I am not a victim. I am a fierce, resilient human being who's using all of that to hopefully create a more just world for my kids and my grandbabies.

Carrie McNulty (08:30)

Mm-hmm.

Right.

Right. Well, listen, I think, first of all, thank you for sharing. And I'm sure there's more that you'll share in your story. But thank you so much for sharing that and with everybody that is in my audience. Because these kinds of stories, I think it's important to share as part of the journey of what I'm trying to do with this podcast is to build empathy and humanity. Because I feel like we've gotten so far away from that. And hearing that people have real lived experiences that are very difficult and challenging to get through.

but that they can get to a place where their life is worth living. You've built a life worth living for yourself ⁓ and are helping other people to do the same after experiencing something similar to what you've gone through, which is amazing. So I appreciate you sharing it because I think that people need to know that this still happens. We're talking about the 70s, but obviously this is something that still happens to this day. It may not look exactly the same all the time, but it's something that does still happen.

JenniSue Jessen (09:53)

Right.

Carrie McNulty (09:53)

and you are putting a voice to that. And I think that's really meaningful.

JenniSue Jessen (09:59)

Yeah, it is pervasive. Trafficking is happening in every country in the world and every state in the US and every city in the US and in many, many hidden browser histories in suburban America. It is happening and it's intrinsically linked to ⁓ consumer demand.

Carrie McNulty (10:05)

Mm-hmm.

Mm. Right.

Mm-hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (10:23)

for pornography.

Pornography is the marketing department for exploitation. They are intrinsically linked. And so it's happening all around us. And we have a fair amount of cultural outrage, like this shouldn't happen,

Carrie McNulty (10:29)

Right.

JenniSue Jessen (10:42)

And it's also incredible that now there are platforms to talk about it. So child trafficking in the seventies wasn't something that was known. People didn't talk about human trafficking in the seventies and eighties. It's not that it wasn't happening, but we didn't have the words for it. And it was that culture of what happens at home stays at home. Right.

Carrie McNulty (10:47)

Yes.

Mm-mm.

Mm-hmm.

Right.

Don't say anything. Yeah.

I have a question if I could ask you going back to when your mom found out and just took you to the doctor and got you medication and just kept it moving. Was she also abused by your grandfather? Was it her father?

JenniSue Jessen (11:18)

It was not her father. ⁓ It was my step-grandfather, actually, on my dad's side. So my grandmother's excuse was, well, it wasn't incest because you're not blood. So that's how she justified it. But my mom did have her own history of violence. And when I did finally disclose what had happened as a young adult,

Carrie McNulty (11:20)

Okay.

Okay. Gotcha. Okay.

Wow. Okay.

JenniSue Jessen (11:44)

My mom said she had been raped three times by my grandfather over the years as an adult married to my dad, but thought it was just her, you know.

Carrie McNulty (11:50)

Mm-hmm.

I'm just curious because I am a therapist and I've worked in mental health since I was 21. And what I have seen is that there are patterns in families and that, when it isn't healed by your parent, tends to end up happening then to the child. so again, it sounds like a part of you immediately upon finding out you were pregnant was like, no, no more. stops here. Yeah. Right. Right.

JenniSue Jessen (12:16)

Yeah, it stops here. Not carrying this another generation further.

And I made all kinds of devastating mistakes as a teenage mama recently free of exploitation. had experienced at 18, 14 years of that had been amidst violence. And so raising a tiny human, a tiny boy human to be a man, I made all kinds of mistakes.

Carrie McNulty (12:27)

You

Mm-hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (12:45)

And I would say grace is sufficient. So today my son is 35 now and we have this beautiful, beautiful, tender relationship. spent an hour and a half video chatting just earlier today. But it wasn't that I was suddenly a healed good mom. I was at 18, devastated, traumatized.

Carrie McNulty (12:50)

Thank

Woo.

Aww.

No.

JenniSue Jessen (13:13)

trying to figure out how to survive and still and still we survived and broke the cycle.

Carrie McNulty (13:18)

Right,

right, I was gonna say at 18 to be a parent regardless, I mean, I think even if you had not had the abuse history, it would be very challenging. And I don't think it's possible to do it all right anyway, no matter who you are or how old you are. I don't think that's possible. But the fact that you knew immediately the day after attempting to not be here anymore, right, to take your life and that was unsuccessful and then you knew, no more, no.

JenniSue Jessen (13:32)

⁓ Right.

Yeah.

Right,

yeah. It stops here. And that makes for a really beautiful story. You healing has been a lot of ups and downs, a lot of crawling forward on skinned knees, so to speak. I still sometimes sleep with the lights on. I still, my husband and I, we've been married 31 years now, and there's still occasions that I'm a touch me not. Like...

Carrie McNulty (14:07)

Mm-hmm.

Yeah. Yep.

JenniSue Jessen (14:16)

And we have a wonderful, beautiful, deeply intimate relationship. And there's still times that I'm like, no, right.

Carrie McNulty (14:23)

Right. Right. Yeah, even if you fully trust him, even if you can fully

be present with him, my guess is that your body doesn't always agree with what your mind thinks after going through what you've gone through. Yeah. Mm-hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (14:35)

Right. There's still sometimes shadows or

the language that we've developed between us is that I'm just haunted right now. So he knows I'm not rejecting him, that it's not personal. It's that my body is in hyper alert and can't relax enough to be ⁓ connected. And that's just part of it. There's scars that our bodies carry.

Carrie McNulty (14:43)

Yeah. Right.

Yeah.

JenniSue Jessen (15:03)

and our somatic system carries and those get activated at a moment's notice. And ⁓ I used to think triggers were something that I needed to manage or avoid. And I have discovered how beautiful it is to just welcome it. Like when it happens to recognize, look how fierce and brilliant my body is. It has everything in it to keep me alive. And it did. I won. I'm here.

Carrie McNulty (15:04)

Yes, absolutely.

Yep. Yep.

Absolutely.

Yeah,

you're here. Well, I always say everybody has more skill than what they realize. And if they didn't, we wouldn't be alive. And the way I look at what you're saying is you are embracing the part of you that says, I don't feel safe right now. Instead of being upset or frustrated or trying to figure out or push it away, you're embracing it and saying, thank goodness I have this as a part of my system so that if I truly am not safe, also, you my body lets me know, you know?

JenniSue Jessen (15:37)

Mm-hmm.

Carrie McNulty (16:00)

or if I'm having an off period, my body lets me know, and that's a good thing.

JenniSue Jessen (16:04)

What an incredible design that is, right? That our whole body, chemically, physically, emotionally works together strategically to keep us alive. And so yeah, I can embrace it with gratitude. And sometimes, you know, there's like grief or shame, and I can just hold that with tenderness. Like, yeah, that needs to be grieved. That needs to be honored. Good job telling me. And that way I can just roll with.

Carrie McNulty (16:06)

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

JenniSue Jessen (16:31)

I call them invitations now instead of triggers. It's not that I don't get triggered. It's that I'm not bothered by triggers. When they come, it's an invitation to celebrate everything that I've been through, this fierce resilience that I would credit with God's design that is at work in the human body and in humanity at large.

Carrie McNulty (16:31)

Mm-hmm. Hmm.

Sure.

Right.

Mm-hmm.

When you talk about it being a long process to heal, what did that look like? How did you get to this place where you can look at triggers as an invitation versus something that totally throws you off your square and ruins your day? How did we get here? You're like, well, we only have a few, we only have an hour, but no, how did we get here?

JenniSue Jessen (17:10)

Yeah. It is a long process. Yeah. How long do we have?

I would first say there's no shortcuts. It takes as long as it takes. Professionally, I was a midwife for many years. And if anybody in your audience is given birth, know, the contractions roll in and they roll out and it's life altering pressure when it rolls in. And

Carrie McNulty (17:23)

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (17:38)

I used to have mamas go, how long, how long? And daddies who have no understanding of what's happening to their partner, what is happening, how long, how long? And it takes as long as it takes. And that really has been my journey of just incremental healing, of finding peace in this one space and crying over this one thing. And ⁓ really the pivotal point though,

Carrie McNulty (17:43)

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

JenniSue Jessen (18:06)

that shifted my healing was the understanding that my emotional state follows my thoughts or the story that's playing in my mind and my body. Now, sometimes it's a conscious story, sometimes it's not. Somebody you had an argument with last week and three days later, you're winning that argument in your head. ⁓

Carrie McNulty (18:15)

Hmm.

Mm-hmm. Yep.

Right, you're going over it again. Yeah.

JenniSue Jessen (18:30)

So sometimes we're aware of the thought playing, but sometimes it's a trigger that's instantaneous. Your body responds, but it did. It opened a story. That trigger came from something in the past, right? And when I started recognizing that my emotional state, whether I was feeling anxious or shame or grief or terror, whatever I was feeling in the moment, joy, passion, whatever I was feeling in the moment.

Carrie McNulty (18:39)

Mm.

Thank

JenniSue Jessen (18:57)

was directly linked to a story that's playing in my head, conscious or unconscious. Then I could just suddenly realize like, like my husband used to say, if he came in the kitchen, he could tell if I was anxious or upset, because he would go, where did your lips go? And it meant my jaw was tight and my lips were pursed and my shoulders were up. And I didn't even, I wasn't even in touch enough with my body or my thoughts.

Carrie McNulty (19:02)

Mm-hmm.

yeah.

Mm-hmm.

To notice that.

JenniSue Jessen (19:26)

So he'd go, where'd your lips go? And I go, ⁓ wait, I'm feeling really anxious. And then, okay, what's the story playing? The story playing is I don't know what's going to happen about whatever the situation is, X, and Z, know, schooling my kids, a relationship, medical diagnosis. And so my body was responding. And when I discovered that all of my emotions are directly linked,

Carrie McNulty (19:29)

Hmm. Yes. ⁓

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (19:56)

to a story that's playing. Suddenly I can step into the story and hit pause. I can honor the story, I can hold the story, or I can switch the channel. have you ever been, somebody recommended a movie or Netflix said, you might like this, and you start watching it in 15 minutes and you're like, what is even happening? Like we can change the channel, right? And so sometimes for me now triggers or invitations are that.

Carrie McNulty (20:02)

Hmm.

Right, right. Yeah.

JenniSue Jessen (20:25)

Something gets tripped, the story starts playing, my body responds, and it may take 10 minutes, 15 minutes, an hour for me to recognize I'm spinning. And then I go, like, this is not a movie I have to watch anymore. Change the channel. Yeah, I'm gonna go out into the forest and hike with my dog. I'm gonna lay in the sun. I'm gonna call a friend. I don't have to stay in the story anymore.

Carrie McNulty (20:40)

I know how this movie goes. I don't need to replay. I'm good. Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

No,

it sounds like you ground yourself. So what it sounds like is the process, you for anybody listening, I'm just sort of not being JenniSue's therapist, but being a therapist in this and saying, when she's having these stronger emotions, that probably takes her out of her body without realizing it. And in order to bring herself back in to see what's happening, she grounds herself, then takes inventory and then decides, do I want to stay and grieve this, honor this, or am I okay to change and move on to something else now? Okay.

JenniSue Jessen (21:19)

Exactly. Yeah.

And it can happen either way. Like I can, I can know I'm caught up in a story and then recognize where am I feeling that anger in my body? Where am I feeling that grief in my body? Or I can be my body in a reaction and go, okay, wait, my stomach is feeling really tight. I'm feeling nauseous. My shoulders are in my ears. My, hands are in fists. What's the story playing? And either way,

Carrie McNulty (21:23)

Mm-hmm.

Mm. Mm-hmm.

Hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (21:48)

Whichever entry point I come to a place of grounding and then I get to decide I'm empowered to choose to honor and hold the story to change the channel. To breathe deep to maybe do some somatic exercises to hold myself to do some trauma-informed yoga. ⁓ Whatever my body needs or my heart needs in that moment to move.

Carrie McNulty (21:49)

you can get in there.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. ⁓

Thank

JenniSue Jessen (22:14)

from that place into a place, return to a place of calm. I think our default setting is calm, is peace, is love. And when we've lived a really stormy life, all these clouds obscure the sun. But if you ever get on a plane, you go through the cloud cover and it's bright blue on the other side. And so my capacity, my developing capacity to do that, to recognize like, it's really cloudy right now. And also,

Carrie McNulty (22:23)

Mm.

Mm-hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (22:45)

My default is calm. How do I get back to a state of love and peace?

Carrie McNulty (22:45)

Mm-hmm. Right.

Yeah, because our self energy is peace. It's the things that happen to us that come in to protect that in different parts of us that develop and show up in order to help us survive that make it seem like we're so far from our peace. But really if we can get back from being self, get to self led, nobody's self led 24 seven, by the way, nobody's mindful 24 seven, nobody's grounded 24 seven. But when we can get back there as touch points in our day whenever we're having a harder time,

JenniSue Jessen (23:05)

Right.

Right.

Right.

Carrie McNulty (23:21)

It is, it's a hopeful experience, right? To be.

JenniSue Jessen (23:25)

Right. Well, just to recognize that we have the capacity to do it. One,

that the piece exists, even if my view is obscured right now, even if it seems really stormy and cloudy, the clear blue sky is on the other side. So that's the first foundational belief that it does exist. And two, that it is our default state. And three, how do we get back there? And once we learn how to negotiate those steps, then

Carrie McNulty (23:34)

Right.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

JenniSue Jessen (23:55)

I don't think anything's insurmountable. I've been through some really hard things as an adult since I got free from exploitation, including as an adult, I was pregnant 17 times and had 14 losses and three live births because there's just a lot, lot, lot of damage done.

Carrie McNulty (23:58)

Yeah. Right.

Wow.

Mm-hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (24:23)

before your audience gets ups and arms, like, why did you keep getting pregnant? I was actually trying to prevent it most of the time. I'm super, super fertile. Like, husband would sneeze on me. Like, are you kidding me? So actually the three children I carried to term were all conceived on birth control pills. So it was just the part of the journey that I was on.

Carrie McNulty (24:31)

Hmm.

they wanted to be here. What are gonna do? Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (24:48)

It wasn't foolishness

Carrie McNulty (24:48)

Yeah.

JenniSue Jessen (24:49)

or carelessness just before people get all up in arms about what I could have, should have done.

Carrie McNulty (24:54)

Well, I mean,

and also if anybody does get up in arms about that, I would just have to say, how does that impact them? It doesn't, right? If you decided that that's what you wanted to do and it was what you wanted, then that's what you wanted, right? And I think that what is most empowering is that those were decisions, it sounds like you weren't necessarily trying, but if you would have been.

JenniSue Jessen (25:01)

Right?

Right. Right. Right.

Great.

Carrie McNulty (25:21)

and that was your body and you were making that decision, then that's what you wanted, right? And after having so many people do things to your body that you didn't want and weren't in your control, you know what I mean? So.

JenniSue Jessen (25:25)

Right. Yeah.

Right. And yeah,

there definitely was something very healing about life being in this deepest, darkest place in my body. And there was also a cycle of after a loss, well, can I carry and this desperate longing to satiate that grief, right? And so some of them were planned pregnancies. Some of them were not planned pregnancies, but yeah.

Carrie McNulty (25:36)

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. In some not. Yeah. Now.

You talked about, well, and called it what it was, which is trafficking, even though at that time nobody identified it as such. When did you decide after having your experience that this was the kind of work that you wanted to do? It sounds like you did, you were a midwife for a period of time. And when did you decide, okay, I'm ready to do something to give back and to...

JenniSue Jessen (26:11)

Yeah.

Yeah, I was not a willing participant in counter trafficking. ⁓ For many, many years, I kept my secret, my story secret on the down low. I didn't talk about it publicly. I didn't want to be labeled as a pariah or a victim or whatever people would label me as. ⁓ Right. Yeah. And so I didn't talk about my story much, if ever.

Carrie McNulty (26:23)

Hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Right. Or just people putting their shame on you, which, yeah.

JenniSue Jessen (26:49)

But my husband and I were actually living in Southeast Asia for a period of time. And when we would go out on a date on Friday night, we could not go out to a normal restaurant without seeing little kids being exploited. Everywhere, in the tourist areas, in the nice restaurants, in the nice hotels, ⁓ there were little kids being exploited. And just to be clear, it's not that trafficking happens more.

Carrie McNulty (27:04)

Oof.

Yeah.

JenniSue Jessen (27:15)

And like we always think it's somewhere out there, over there, some third world country. It doesn't happen more there than it happens in the US. But in the US, we culturally condemn it. So it's on the down low. It's not public in your face. Whereas where I was living in Southeast Asia, it's just a normal thing. It's just a normal cultural thing. It is part of the tourism. Yeah, we.

Carrie McNulty (27:18)

Yeah. Yeah.

Mm-hmm. ⁓

Well, and in some of those places, part of the tourism as well. So.

JenniSue Jessen (27:43)

The city I lived in regularly had tours come in with 30 to 40 men that would spend two weeks and every day their tour guide would take them to a place to meet their specific.

Carrie McNulty (27:53)

Hmm.

Mm. ⁓

JenniSue Jessen (28:00)

⁓ activities that they desired. And so I couldn't go anywhere without encountering little kids being exploited. And I really wrestled deeply with, you know, I could have kept my story just locked up safe. I've done my own personal work, my own internal healing, raised my family to the best of my ability. I was a homeschool mom at that point. That would have been fine. And I could have done that.

Carrie McNulty (28:02)

Right.

Wow.

JenniSue Jessen (28:30)

but also I wrestled deeply with if I kept it locked up and a lid on it, you know, just put it in my hope chest and put some books on top, then what was it worth? Because the suffering I went through was profound and it was costly and surviving it was profound and it was costly.

Carrie McNulty (28:49)

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Right.

JenniSue Jessen (28:57)

And so if I could be courageous enough to crack open that box and share bits and pieces of my story and my experience, then there was the possibility that it might be a map helping somebody else find freedom. And when I was confronted day in and day out, seeing these little kids being exploited as terrified as I was and as resistant as I was, I couldn't not. I couldn't not act.

Carrie McNulty (29:25)

Hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (29:26)

I had to, it would be like, you know, standing on a boat and see something drowning and I'm holding the life ring and just not throwing it. Not throwing the life ring, I could fear that they're gonna drag me under. They're gonna pull the rope, I'm gonna get pulled overboard, we're both gonna drown and that's really what it felt like at some points in my journey.

Carrie McNulty (29:33)

And just not throwing it. Yeah.

Right.

I can only imagine. mean, even with the healing that you were working on doing, it's always possible, right? That, mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (29:54)

Right? It'll pull you under. It is

the work that I do is crushingly beautiful. I get a front row seat to watching redemption unfold again and again and again. In our 14 years that we've had our organization, we've seen God impact more than 240,000 people. And so that is just a profound

blessing and also that means day in and day out I'm up to my neck in the darkest darkest stories.

Carrie McNulty (30:30)

Right?

And that means there's this many people and more that are still dealing with this every day constantly. Yeah.

JenniSue Jessen (30:35)

Right, right.

And the people that I work with are at varying levels of freedom. The youngest participants in our program right now are four years old. But to have a front row seat to watch their healing, them learn to play, them learn to be safe, to ask for a Barbie doll for their birthday, to...

Carrie McNulty (30:53)

Hmm.

you

JenniSue Jessen (30:59)

you know, when they've never had a birthday, they may not even know when their birthday is, but they choose one and we celebrate, is just an incredible to see what humans are capable of. I get the honor of working with the most fierce and resilient people on the planet and watching them rise to their highest capacity. So it was entirely worth it.

Carrie McNulty (31:01)

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (31:23)

to crack open my heart and the stories so that I get to bear witness. Not that I don't have advice, I can't fix anybody, I'm a companion on the journey. And because I'm willing to get in the mess and I'm not afraid of the dark, I get to witness the light breaking in in just astounding ways.

Carrie McNulty (31:26)

Yeah.

Alright.

Well, to have somebody like yourself ⁓ work with individuals who are still dealing with being in this environment, have somebody who wants to hear their story, doesn't shy away from it, can handle the details, ⁓ and still thinks that these individuals are worthwhile because they very much are is huge, right? Because again, the shame factor,

JenniSue Jessen (32:09)

Great. Yeah.

Carrie McNulty (32:12)

Even in your healing, you got to the place where you were like, I could just kind of keep moving. I've built a life for myself. And, then you were like, you know what? I'm going to take it a step further and I'm going to talk about my story and share it all and anything that comes with it. that.

JenniSue Jessen (32:25)

Great.

And that a lot was like the theme of your show and your life ⁓ was driven by empathy. I can't see the suffering and do nothing. But one of my really curious experiences with empathy recently, I'm still processing it. So I'm just gonna process out loud with you for a minute. Is because it's really curious to me, like my grandfather, he was a wicked bad guy. He was a.

Carrie McNulty (32:37)

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Hmm. Talk through it. Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (33:00)

He was wicked, bad guy. Violent in every respect. But I have three grandbabies so far. Grandbaby number four is due in October. Can't wait. But third grandbaby, tiny little guy, he's just now three months old. And recently I was holding him and...

Carrie McNulty (33:01)

Sounds like he was the

No.

JenniSue Jessen (33:19)

When I take a baby in my arms, everybody calls me a baby whisperer because the baby just melts into me. And so this perfect, beautiful little guy, as soon as I took him in my arms, his little toes uncurled, his tight little fist relaxed, his every muscle in his body just sighed against my heartbeat. And it was like 90 seconds before he was asleep against me. And in that moment, I was just overwhelmed with awe at this tiny little human, how perfect he is.

Carrie McNulty (33:24)

⁓

You

Mm-hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (33:49)

tears

came to my eyes because I thought he does not know yet that the world is a dangerous place. And I don't ever want him to know that the world is a dangerous place. So far, all he knows is delight. He knows he's loved. He knows if he cries, somebody's going to meet that need, right? He knows love and peace. And in that moment, as I was overwhelmed, you know, I don't know if I was soothing him.

Carrie McNulty (33:55)

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (34:15)

my heartbeat was, you know, lulling him or his heartbeat was lulling me. But in that moment, I had this flash for just a second that once upon a time, my grandfather was a baby just like that.

Carrie McNulty (34:18)

Mm.

Hmm. Mm-hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (34:30)

Right? Like a tiny, perfect,

I would say made in the image of God, this tiny, perfect human that longed to be held and cradled and nurtured. And maybe he was, maybe he wasn't. I'm not excusing, defending, justifying anything he did or what he became. I don't have empathy for that guy, what he became, but I had just this one perfect moment.

Carrie McNulty (34:46)

Mm-hmm.

Right, right.

JenniSue Jessen (35:00)

of this deep empathy that once upon a time he too was innocent. And what would the world be if we approached every person we met with that kind of view that you are worthy of love and care and attention and you matter and I hear you and I see you. ⁓

Carrie McNulty (35:07)

Mm-hmm.

Right?

JenniSue Jessen (35:29)

what a different world we would live in if we met every person we met with that kind of awe.

Carrie McNulty (35:32)

Absolutely.

Yeah, that just because you are alive and just because you are human in this world, you are deserving of being treated like a human being with empathy and compassion. Yeah, absolutely. And again, like you said, not to say that we're forgiving behaviors that people do that are dangerous, ⁓ horrible, all of the above, but...

JenniSue Jessen (35:46)

Yeah.

And so.

Carrie McNulty (36:06)

You know, Mm hmm. ⁓

JenniSue Jessen (36:06)

It was ⁓ a different moment of empathy,

of compassion, of insight or understanding. And yeah, like we need strong boundaries. Like people who are perpetrators, prison can be a good, valid, the right option. Like they need to be held accountable in a criminal sense. I'm not dismissing, I'm not going to be like, it's okay, it didn't happen. No, none of that nonsense.

Carrie McNulty (36:12)

Well, yeah.

Mm-hmm.

yeah.

No.

JenniSue Jessen (36:35)

but it was just a flash of...

Carrie McNulty (36:38)

Yeah, like you had empathy

for the part of him, the one little tiny part of him for whatever brief period of time that was innocent. Yeah.

JenniSue Jessen (36:45)

Right, right.

That was innocent. At some time there was innocence. huh. Right. And it was a really holy moment. I'm still, it was like 10 days ago, I'm still processing it. I'm still trying to figure out how I feel about that. ⁓ I mean, just my humanness. Like, no, I don't want to have empathy for him. But he wasn't born a monster.

Carrie McNulty (36:50)

At one point, right, even if it was brief, that did exist. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. What does this mean? Yeah.

And yeah, for him, don't.

No, you have empathy for the parts of him that you never knew. You didn't know him not to be a monster. You're having empathy for whatever potentially created the monster. What happened to him that caused him to be who he was? Maybe nothing, but potentially something. And at one point, he was a baby too. No.

JenniSue Jessen (37:19)

Right. Right.

Right, right.

I don't even need to know. Like, I don't carry

him around anymore. And I'm glad that I don't. But yeah, it was a different experience of empathy.

Carrie McNulty (37:39)

Nah. Mm-hmm. Hmm.

Yeah. Well, I am definitely hoping that we, again, with you sharing this, that the point of what we're trying to do is to help people understand that everybody has their story and that everybody is deserving of telling that story if they want to and having a space to do it and to feel connected and to help other people who may not be yet ready to share about some of the things that they've gone through, but hearing somebody else do it and seeing where you've ended up and how things have turned out for you.

JenniSue Jessen (38:15)

Yeah, there's no...

Carrie McNulty (38:17)

is

JenniSue Jessen (38:22)

this may be my, know, starry-eyed naivety. I don't think I'm very naive, but... ⁓

Carrie McNulty (38:28)

I would doubt that.

JenniSue Jessen (38:32)

I've come to believe that there's no darkness, no devastation that is beyond healing.

I think will carry scars. I mean, if the light was better, I could show you cigarette marks on my arms from, you know, 40 some odd years ago. I think we carry scars, but I don't think that there is any devastation that is beyond healing for those that want healing. I think our body's designed to heal and our mental health.

Carrie McNulty (38:39)

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (39:05)

is the same. It's always driving us towards. That's why I've come to call triggers invitations because everyone is an invitation to deeper healing, to more freedom. And I think that that's true of every human that desires it, nobody's so lost that they can't be found.

Carrie McNulty (39:07)

Mm-hmm.

Right.

So tell me a little bit about what do people think about when they think of trafficking? What misconceptions are there about trafficking?

JenniSue Jessen (39:42)

Yeah, the most common misconceptions are it's somewhere out there that it doesn't happen close to home. ⁓ Another really common misconception is that it's strangers and kidnapping. And the vast majority of people who are trafficked, I think it's between 76, maybe 78 percent, are originally trafficked by a family member or a romantic partner.

Carrie McNulty (39:47)

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (40:09)

and another big chunk after that is a trusted person, like somebody in the neighborhood, a coach, a teacher, but another trusted adult. And so it's something like less than 3 % of people who are trafficked are trafficked to be a kidnapping. And that's because they can use force.

Carrie McNulty (40:19)

Mm-hmm.

Hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (40:35)

fraud and coercion so much simpler. They can offer, you know, the lonely kid they connect with on video games. Hey, come to the mall, we're going to have a big tournament. The kid shows up and, our whole gang of kids, we all live together and have a great time. There's six other kids there. The kid goes, but all of them are being exploited, right? And so they build relationships. They offer

Carrie McNulty (40:56)

Yeah.

JenniSue Jessen (41:05)

They meet the need, whatever the vulnerability is in the person. Trafficking is always an exploitation of vulnerability. Yeah. And so I think one of the other misconceptions is predators are so skilled at identifying the vulnerability and meeting the need. They win, right? They take the kids and us.

Carrie McNulty (41:12)

Right. It's always predatory. So they're always looking for the target and yeah.

Mmm.

Mm-hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (41:32)

normal humans who can't imagine the depravity of buying and selling a child. Like it's hard to conceive of. If we were as skilled at identifying vulnerabilities and meeting those needs, trafficking would stop. Because we would be meeting the need in a healthy way, in healthy community. Those children would grow, thrive, resilient, healed. But instead,

Carrie McNulty (41:47)

Right.

JenniSue Jessen (41:59)

predators key in on the vulnerability and meet it. So who gets there first? Unfortunately, often it's the predator because we normal people think it's something that's happening somewhere out there instead of, you know, at our school or the fastest growing trend for trafficking in the US right now is high school kids exploiting middle school or underclassmen kids.

Carrie McNulty (42:04)

Right.

Really?

JenniSue Jessen (42:29)

That's the fastest growing trend right now. And it's predominantly high school girls, the cool girls, the it girls, the girls that everybody wants to be will identify younger kids that want to be them, invite them to a party, get them under the influence of some substance, take sexually explicit photos of them, use those photos then to force them.

Carrie McNulty (42:53)

⁓ no.

JenniSue Jessen (42:57)

into exploitation. And ⁓ that's the fastest growing trend happening in the US right now.

Carrie McNulty (42:57)

blackmail. Yeah. Wow.

I would not have thought that.

JenniSue Jessen (43:09)

Right?

Carrie McNulty (43:12)

Because again, when you think about it, you're thinking, ⁓ it's primarily men. And yeah, wow.

JenniSue Jessen (43:12)

We turned. Yeah.

Right. And

42 % of traffickers, the people who are trafficking the women, men, women, and children, are women, 42 % of the traffickers. Now the buyers are overwhelmingly, predominantly men. There are some female buyers, not a whole lot. It's predominantly men that are buying, paying for sex.

Carrie McNulty (43:25)

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (43:46)

But 42 % of the traffickers themselves are women because it is far easier for them to gain trust to build relationship with the families and with the kids.

Carrie McNulty (43:58)

Wow.

And is that like them working independently or is that them also working with, had they been trafficked and then moved up to a place where they could start to, okay.

JenniSue Jessen (44:12)

It's, yeah, it's both and it depends

on the area, the area of the country, the area of the world. In a lot of the places that we work, it is girls that were originally trafficked and then they age out. They're less desirable and they can earn more money if they bring more girls in. And so they go back to their homes, areas where they're known.

Carrie McNulty (44:18)

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Right.

JenniSue Jessen (44:37)

build relationships, take their friends, girls to the city to work for them. So that happens often. But like in the case of our high school girls, these are like upper middle class, predominantly Caucasian girls that have cars and money and phones, but it's a power play and it's status. Like if I provide this kid to the high school team,

Carrie McNulty (44:49)

hand.

JenniSue Jessen (45:05)

I'm the coolest girl on the block. And so it is, it's a status thing. And the, we talked about trafficking is always an exploitation of vulnerability. It is also a crime of power. Now it's often carried out through sex, right? But rape, sexual exploitation, pornography, domestic violence, all of those are crimes of power, of domination and not

Carrie McNulty (45:20)

Mm.

Mm-hmm.

power, right?

JenniSue Jessen (45:35)

crimes. I mean, they're carried out by means of sex, but it's the purpose or the drive is a drive to dominate, to have power. And that's true of high school girls in the US who don't know their identity, don't know their purpose, they want status, they want to be popular at any cost. And if it costs somebody else, then

Carrie McNulty (45:39)

Yeah.

oh well Yeah. Wow. Wow.

JenniSue Jessen (46:03)

No skin off my nose.

And so that's the symptom of a culture that lacks empathy, right?

Carrie McNulty (46:11)

Right, people are so dehumanized that you don't think about that that's a human person inside that body that you're offering up and what that's gonna do to them for the entire rest of their lives. Right, yes. Because like you said, people can heal from anything, but they also still carry what's happened to them. There's no magic wand. And as resilient as our brains are,

JenniSue Jessen (46:18)

Great. Great.

for the rest of their life. Yeah.

Great. Great.

Carrie McNulty (46:36)

And our brains will do things like block memories, you know, that you can't access for the purpose of helping people to survive. Again, our brains are incredible, you know, and there's so much we still don't understand about how our brains work, but you can repress things and never be able to retrieve them. And that is if your brain does not think that you can handle it, you will not be able to access it. But even so, there are things that you will carry with you regardless of how healed you are. And that's what these girls are doing to these other

JenniSue Jessen (46:43)

incredible.

Great. ⁓

Carrie McNulty (47:04)

young kids for the whole rest of their lives. That's all to say they're popular.

JenniSue Jessen (47:06)

Right. Right.

Right. Right.

Carrie McNulty (47:12)

Wow.

JenniSue Jessen (47:13)

I mean, they profit off it. They take the money happily, but yeah, but it's about power. It's about status.

Carrie McNulty (47:17)

well.

how do you find these folks and how do you work with them to get them to the place where they can?

JenniSue Jessen (47:27)

Yeah.

I primarily in cases like that consult, like I last year was working on a case of a 14 year old girl who that was her story. She had snuck out of her house. she wasn't supposed to sneak out. So when this she snuck out, cause she got invited to the cool party, this horrible thing happened. Then she was extorted. She was afraid to tell her family because she wasn't supposed to sneak out. Right. She thought.

Carrie McNulty (47:33)

Hmm. ⁓

JenniSue Jessen (47:55)

which you and I know it was not her fault ever. But she felt like it was her fault. So she couldn't tell. The threat was we're going to send these pictures to your dad, to your family, to the school, to your youth pastor. So she went along. She was exploited for a long time but she lived at home. She went to school every day. And after school, she was submitting to what these high school girls demanded.

Carrie McNulty (47:57)

Not at all. No.

⁓

JenniSue Jessen (48:22)

because she was afraid of not, right? And one afternoon was at a motel, waiting for the next client. The knock on the door came and she opened the door and it was her own father who had spun in his own journey, know, initially pornography and then deeper, darker, deeper, darker until he thought the best idea was to book

Carrie McNulty (48:25)

Right.

No.

⁓ no.

JenniSue Jessen (48:50)

time with a teenage girl not knowing what was happening with his own daughter. So imagine how that world blew up. And this guy, like a respected business leader, you could see him at any professional networking meeting in the USA, like a respected guy in his church, a respected guy in the community, but confronted with his own child.

Carrie McNulty (48:53)

my God.

you

Hmm.

Wow.

JenniSue Jessen (49:19)

being exploited. Fortunately, he took her from that place. He was scared straight, I guess. He was devastated. He was devastated. How could I end up here, right? ⁓ And, you know, the whole family blew up. He went to inpatient treatment. He's now living separately. The daughter's getting therapy in recovery.

Carrie McNulty (49:27)

Mmm.

I'm sure. Yeah, yeah.

JenniSue Jessen (49:45)

the family doesn't know if they're going to ever be able to be a family again. But I get called in to consult because I do podcasts like this because people know my organization because I served two years on the US Advisory Council to Human Trafficking, which was a presidential appointment where I spent two years advising federal counter trafficking policy. So because of that, people will reach out in the US with different cases.

Carrie McNulty (49:49)

Mm.

Right.

Yeah.

and say, hey,

yeah.

JenniSue Jessen (50:14)

and I will help ⁓ strategically connect them. I'm not the be all end all. Like don't have all the answers. I can't fix the problems, but I can connect them to local resources. Yeah.

Carrie McNulty (50:25)

Well, which is so important. Again, there's so

much shame around all of this and still so much hush, hush. know, just knowing where to go once you find out that this is going on is a huge deal. You know, who are the people that can help? Directing folks in those places, super important. my gosh, wow. That's a story you don't expect to hear. That a father.

JenniSue Jessen (50:37)

Right. Yeah.

Carrie McNulty (50:54)

opens the door to his own daughter there. Yeah.

JenniSue Jessen (50:55)

Right, opens the

door to his own daughter. He had no idea what she had been going through. She obviously had no idea what his proclivities had. Fortunately, I guess, I mean, he had never victimized his own daughter, but he was so compartmentalized and into his own addiction that he was able to.

Carrie McNulty (51:03)

What he was doing. Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Mm.

JenniSue Jessen (51:25)

think that that was a good idea.

Carrie McNulty (51:25)

Ugh.

When you speak about what you've been through, how do you do that in a way that people can hear your message and if they aren't to the place where they can look at triggers as invitations, how do you speak to them about it in a way that keeps them present and engaged with what you're saying so that they don't feel so shut down or triggered that they can't engage with you?

JenniSue Jessen (51:57)

Yeah,

you know, I...

I made reference to it already. I'm not afraid of the dark. So I actually, I always see it as a really good, positive, healthy sign when one of the individuals that I'm working with that, you know, is coming out of exploitation. The first time that they get like table flipping mad at me and they're just, you know, raging via text, via voicemail, ⁓ in person, they're just raging. They say all kinds of horrible things.

Carrie McNulty (52:04)

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah. Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (52:31)

in that moment and I'll be honest, like it ⁓ can leave me breathless because these are people that I love and serve. And also I'm so proud of them. I'm like, it girl. Like it's worth being angry about. And what an honor and privilege that you think I'm safe to express it.

Carrie McNulty (52:37)

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Yes.

JenniSue Jessen (52:57)

So I'm not afraid of the dark. I'm not afraid of the mess. If they're triggered, I'm like, let's just sit together. Let's just take a breath. We don't have to talk about it. Do you want to watch a sitcom for 30 minutes? Like, do you want to go for a walk? We can talk about it later or not. Your body right now is protecting you and that is worth celebrating and honoring. So how can I celebrate you right now? How can I love and serve you in this moment?

Carrie McNulty (53:10)

Mm-hmm.

Yep.

Mm-hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (53:27)

And so instead of trying to push them to process the trigger or the story, like whatever the story was, was overwhelming because it sent them into this spiral. So let's acknowledge how fierce and amazing their body is. And how do we celebrate that? What do you need right now? Do you need to tell me the story? Because I can, I can listen. Do you need to go get ice cream? Let's go get ice cream. Like what, what do you need?

Carrie McNulty (53:31)

Keep going. Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. ⁓

JenniSue Jessen (53:56)

in this moment, but I begin with compassion and celebration. Like, oh, these are really big feelings. And I feel really big feelings when I hear the things that have happened to you. Do you want to tell me about it? Do you want to tell me what's happening in your body? Do you want to take some deep breaths? So that part's just intuitive, but it starts with compassion and celebration. This is worth embracing, worth acknowledging. Now, what do you need?

Carrie McNulty (54:00)

Yeah.

Yeah. Right.

JenniSue Jessen (54:26)

And sometimes they want to tell me the story. Sometimes they want to do something totally different. And when they have permission, then every step that they're making a choice is empowering.

Carrie McNulty (54:42)

Absolutely, I was just gonna say you're saying whatever you need, you're in control of this. You don't wanna talk about it, we don't have to talk about it, but if you do, I can handle it. I can be there with you, but I don't, you don't have to, it's all up to you. You're in charge here, and that's, mm-hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (54:54)

Right, we go at whatever pace

your body wants to go. And that's the way that I can help invite people back to that blue sky, that place of calm, safety, the other side of the cloudy storm that just rolled through. And we can take it from there. I don't have an agenda. Like we don't have to solve this problem today.

Carrie McNulty (55:06)

Mm-hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (55:19)

or in this hour or in this year.

Carrie McNulty (55:22)

Yeah.

JenniSue Jessen (55:22)

Let's just this moment, love being alive.

Carrie McNulty (55:27)

Well, and it sounds to me like in those moments you're modeling for them because sometimes I'm guessing at the worst people don't know what they need or what they want. And so you giving them options. Okay, I'll pick that. Okay, that sounds good, but they're still getting to pick, you know? Yeah. Yes.

JenniSue Jessen (55:34)

Right. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Right. The choice is theirs. Do just need some

quiet? Do you want a weighted blanket? Do you, you know? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. I can drop f-bombs with the best of them. let's, sometimes the only way to, this is going to get me in trouble with some of my audience, but sometimes the,

Carrie McNulty (55:47)

Do you want to keep swearing at me? That's okay, Yeah

JenniSue Jessen (56:02)

Only way to describe the profane is with actual words that match the profanity that they have suffered. It's not, it's an actual factual description. It is a valid label that can and should be expressed. And I would say can be holy and can be healing. So giving them choices, permission.

Carrie McNulty (56:08)

Yes, with profanity. Yes, yes.

Mm-hmm.

I mean, well, yeah, it's

true to their experience and whatever language they need to use, you're letting them be true to their experience. You're not saying, ⁓ that happened, but tone it down. You know, like, right.

JenniSue Jessen (56:32)

Right? Right.

Right. Only in this filter. Only in...

You can only share this much. You know, it has to fit in this pretty little package. There's nothing pretty about trafficking. And there's very little pretty about recovery from trafficking. Now, there's a lot to celebrate and embrace with joy, but it's a bloody mess. and I think that's actually what made me really good as a midwife.

Carrie McNulty (56:42)

Yeah.

Mm-mm.

Mm-hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (57:04)

is I love the blood, sweat and tears of new life breaking in, the drama of all that moaning, groaning, bloody effort that comes with bringing new life. And because of what I been through, Right, right. And so I could, as a midwife, I could sit with my clients knowing exactly how far a woman's body can go and what they can recover from.

Carrie McNulty (57:07)

Hmm.

Well, just the act of being born, the act of being born is traumatic, you know? It's so,

Mm-hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (57:31)

And that brought them a sense of peace and empowerment. And it's the same, I'm still a midwife. I'm just midwifing in a different realm. But being able to sit in the blood, sweat and tears of new life breaking in, that's where I sit every day.

Carrie McNulty (57:40)

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, well,

and it is their new life breaking through. It's a whole different way of living that they haven't had the experience of that you're helping them usher in. Yeah.

JenniSue Jessen (57:55)

Right.

Yeah, I get to bear witness.

Carrie McNulty (57:58)

Yes.

what would you say to people who want to learn more about this? Because you told me things today that obviously I had no idea about, especially with the statistics about, you know, the numbers of people and who are the primary perpetrators at this point, what those numbers are. How can people find out more? How can they find out information if they want to know?

JenniSue Jessen (58:08)

Mm-hmm.

Right.

Yeah, there's, I would encourage them to research survivor led counter trafficking organizations because survivor led and survivor informed organizations bring just a whole nother level of lived experience to the work that they're doing and the services they offer. So there's a lot of good ones out there. I have my own organization. They can find me online. I'm at compass31.org.

Carrie McNulty (58:28)

Okay.

Mm.

JenniSue Jessen (58:49)

And so people are welcome to find me there. I've written a couple of books, but one of them that might be helpful is called the art of healing. And it's really my theory of how the brain works and how to engage in a broken world and find resilience and find healing. We talk a lot about the intersection between trafficking and pornography, different addictive behaviors, how our emotional state is following our

Carrie McNulty (58:59)

Hmm.

Mm.

JenniSue Jessen (59:17)

thoughts and how to navigate that. So the art of healing may be something that somebody is interested in. But they can find those on my website on compass31.org. They can find me on social media. I can direct them to organizations that are maybe local to them. ⁓ Or if they want to reach out, I'd be happy to have a virtual cup of coffee and see where they're at and how to plug them in where they are.

Carrie McNulty (59:23)

Okay.

Mmm.

Talk to them.

Yeah, I will be sure to include JenniSue's information in the show notes to anybody listening. So if you want to find her there and the resources that she listed, it will be there for you. So is there anything, I mean, there's probably a million things that we didn't cover, but was there anything that you wanted to share that I didn't ask you about?

JenniSue Jessen (59:54)

that would be great.

no, I think just a final, final thought for anybody who is still experiencing violence, you know, domestic violence or otherwise, sexual violence, or they have a history of that. I would just encourage them that there's hope. I started this podcast, started my story with I'm living happily ever after. And, and that's where I'm calling in from. I live in the middle of national forest in a fifth wheel.

Carrie McNulty (1:00:16)

Mm-hmm.

Hmm.

Yes.

JenniSue Jessen (1:00:34)

traveling wherever the wind blows me as a digital nomad, overseeing my international counter-trafficking organization, but grounded in the wild. So there is hope, there is a future. If they're still breathing, it's because there's a purpose and the world is waiting for them. And then finally, I would just like to thank you. I said, you know, that in my childhood, I learned to survive by silence and submission.

Carrie McNulty (1:00:37)

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Mmm.

Hmm.

JenniSue Jessen (1:01:00)

So anytime someone like you, Carrie, offers to share your platform for a few minutes or an hour, you are giving me back. You are restoring part of my voice that was stolen as a child. And so for that, I am deeply, deeply grateful.

Carrie McNulty (1:01:05)

Mm-hmm.

Well, thank you. think that's a beautiful way to say, you know, you've gotten to where you've gotten, but that you also speak about it whenever you can because it helps little you. It helps her to have a voice now. So hopefully she is present, and knows that you're okay. I always think of, you know, our younger parts that didn't want to be here. What would she have thought? What would she have thought about the life that you have now? She couldn't fathom it, I'm sure. Right.

JenniSue Jessen (1:01:26)

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Right. Right.

Right. Right.

Right.

Carrie McNulty (1:01:44)

So,

very cool. Thank you so, so much. I've loved having you and I know that what you shared is gonna be impactful and the work that you do is so important. So thank you very much. All right. Well, for everybody listening, thank you so much for being a part of the podcast today and I will be back in another couple of weeks with another episode. Until then, be well.

JenniSue Jessen (1:01:56)

Thanks, Carrie.