peaches

Maarika Freund

A series of essays about the things I learned while dedicating my life to never being r*ped again.

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Society & CultureSociety & Culture
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Chapter Eight: Happily Ever After
Jun 22 2023
Chapter Eight: Happily Ever After
And this is the chapter where I throw myself under the bus! In this final episode of season one of peaches: the podcast!, I talk about how I hurt another woman for my own gain, and how not apologizing properly for what I did ate away at my Soul for years afterwards. In its sister chapter, CHAPTER SEVEN: ONCE UPON A TIME, I speak about how my heart was broken by another woman. But I don’t feel that it’s fair for me to speak about how much pain I was subjected to without recognizing that I, too, am capable of creating that same kind of pain for others. In order to show that I understand that we’re all human and still learning how to be and behave in a world looking to dismantle rape culture, in CHAPTER EIGHT: HAPPILY EVER AFTER, I expose my own imperfections. By exploring a situation in which I did not lead with kindness, through diving into the science of apologizing, and by leaning on the wisdom of Caroline Myss, I put a very important concept in drag with desperate hopes that we can begin to reintegrate it back into our everyday practices again. I sincerely believe that if we do this, healing and reconciliation will become much more safe and accessible. And if there is anything I can receive and/or witness after the seven + year hell rodeo I was put through, even just an iota more of genuine healing and reconciliation will have made the whole experience worth it.

Episodes

Chapter Eight: Happily Ever After
Jun 22 2023
Chapter Eight: Happily Ever After
And this is the chapter where I throw myself under the bus! In this final episode of season one of peaches: the podcast!, I talk about how I hurt another woman for my own gain, and how not apologizing properly for what I did ate away at my Soul for years afterwards. In its sister chapter, CHAPTER SEVEN: ONCE UPON A TIME, I speak about how my heart was broken by another woman. But I don’t feel that it’s fair for me to speak about how much pain I was subjected to without recognizing that I, too, am capable of creating that same kind of pain for others. In order to show that I understand that we’re all human and still learning how to be and behave in a world looking to dismantle rape culture, in CHAPTER EIGHT: HAPPILY EVER AFTER, I expose my own imperfections. By exploring a situation in which I did not lead with kindness, through diving into the science of apologizing, and by leaning on the wisdom of Caroline Myss, I put a very important concept in drag with desperate hopes that we can begin to reintegrate it back into our everyday practices again. I sincerely believe that if we do this, healing and reconciliation will become much more safe and accessible. And if there is anything I can receive and/or witness after the seven + year hell rodeo I was put through, even just an iota more of genuine healing and reconciliation will have made the whole experience worth it.
Chapter Seven: Once Upon A Time
Jun 22 2023
Chapter Seven: Once Upon A Time
This is the chapter where I finally address my anger! …And, it’s the scariest thing I’ve ever done. My anger, if you’ve listened to the previous chapters, you’ll know doesn’t live where anger is “supposed to” exist in the status quo victim narrative within the current conversation around rape culture. CHAPTER SEVEN: ONCE UPON A TIME is the sister chapter to CHAPTER EIGHT: HAPPILY EVER AFTER, and these two chapters examine the heartbreak and trauma that comes after betrayal. But while I did everything I could to responsibly honour my own experience in this chapter, the heartbeat of this piece begs for healing and reconciliation. It's also full of gratitude for the people I have felt safe enough to be angry with. Because at the end of the day, I believe that the female-identifying friendship is too sacred to break up due to something some dude did. So I release this chapter into the world with the utmost love and respect for all women. Because whether or not we were affected directly by sexual abuse, we all still play a huge role within this sticky narrative.
Chapter Six: Survivor
Mar 1 2023
Chapter Six: Survivor
…so why is it that I don’t enjoy being referred to as “a Survivor”?! This chapter was originally published on November 24, 2020 and was the first thing I ever wrote with regards to my views on r*pe culture and healing. 

In this chapter I go through the three reasons why I don’t identify as a Survivor, and the benefits I believe come from of doing all of the really uncomfortable (yet necessary) healing work. It’s also been updated post publication ban (so it's more candid), and I finally touch on something really sensitive and really important with regards to mental health. I also talk a lot about potatoes. If you haven’t listened to any of the podcasts yet, this is an excellent one to begin with. It’s also the shortest one. But while it requires the smallest investment of time, it contains the highest concentration of the “good stuff” that helps with the healing.
Chapter Five: Wisdom from a Baby Elder, pt I
Dec 30 2022
Chapter Five: Wisdom from a Baby Elder, pt I
An important exposé on the healing world, CHAPTER FIVE: WISDOM FROM A BABY ELDER, pt I is the first chapter that dives into the story within my story: the deception and manipulation that exists within the New Age universe. 

This chapter explores my experience with Reiki, a form of energy healing that I turned to while I was desperately needing to make sense of why terrible things kept happening to me. 

But, without realizing it, I ended up becoming addicted to the hits of love and compassion I was getting from the practitioner. So, when I was told the next steps for my own healing journey were for me to become a healer, too, I bought into the multilevel marketing scheme that is, more often than not, New Age healing. Originally published at REIKI on February 2, 2021, this chapter has been revisited and revised post publication ban, as I was finally able to tell the story with the correct timeline, and tell the story exactly the way I wanted to: with humour and lightness.
Chapter Four: Conundrums of the Deeply Traumatised
Nov 30 2022
Chapter Four: Conundrums of the Deeply Traumatised
Originally created on a cassette tape (so you know it’s outdated and listened to one too many times), the CONUNDRUMS OF THE DEEPLY TRAUMATIZED mixed tape is only four songs long, but the baselines that are so sick that they went viral in my head for decades. Chapter Four was first published on January 7th, 2021, as BULLSEYE, a couple of months before I found out there was still an active publication ban on my name. But a lot of it stands the test of time, so it was well worth revisiting, especially now that we’re three chapters into my story. It still carries the same heartbeat as its original, but the fear has been edited out of it.
Chapter Three: Lion's Heart
Oct 30 2022
Chapter Three: Lion's Heart
I was never planning on coming forward! In my most vulnerable piece yet, CHAPTER THREE: LION’S HEART, I recount the events that catapulted me into coming forward, and why I believed that dude might be capable of hurting someone else if I didn’t say anything. 

It also explores a huge question that has been burning in my mind for a very long time: is getting angry the only socially acceptable way for me to react to what happened to me in order to have people believe me? Accompanied by 3 sad trombones, more discount Halloween tracks, and meditation music, I get really open and honest about a lot of things I had previously been forbidden to speak about.

 With the sincerest of intentions, this piece has been created as an exploratory beginning in my work to help shift the status-quo on what we, as a collective society, impose on victims in terms of how we think they should be telling their stories of survival.
Chapter Two: The Disparity Between Us
Oct 15 2022
Chapter Two: The Disparity Between Us
Albeit obscenely invasive, what they were attempting to do was completely legal! In CHAPTER TWO: THE DISPARITY BETWEEN US, I examine two applications that were filed during the hell rodeo that was coming forward, and the extreme disparity between the both of them. Flipping between two separate timelines, I explore how I was affected when dude and his defence council applied for a third party records application to access my personal records in December of 2018, and what I was faced with when I filed the application to lift the publication ban in my name in 2021. Ripe with Halloween music and soap opera organ run chords, this chapter ends with my take on what it actually means to be a loser in a r*pe trial.
Chapter One: The Handbook
Oct 5 2022
Chapter One: The Handbook
I'm leaning into the fact that I feel like a loser! A lot of people don’t actually realize that I had come forward in 2017 about something that happened to me back in 2014, and in 2019 my side lost the trial. 

After the trial was over, I spent another two very gruelling years lifting the publication ban on my name in order to be able to continue engaging in the work I had already began without legally compromising myself. 
 One thing I realized once I started telling my story is that I had to stop and explain things constantly. To be fair, it was all stuff that I also didn’t know or understand when I came forward, either. 

So I created a handbook for you. In this introductory podcast, I do my best to give you the important information you’ll need to understand & follow my story in a way that’s fun & accessible. …but you can decide if it’s those things for yourself. : )