Hi, my name is Jennifer and my organization is &Rise.

I was a victim of childhood sexual abuse and experienced domestic abuse as an adult.

I was always told to keep my abuse a secret. Not processing my trauma led to depression, anxiety, and low self-worth. As a result, I entered into many unhealthy and toxic romantic relationships, friendships, and work environments.

In my late twenties, I began couples counseling with my abusive partner. Eventually, I broke up with him, vowed it was the last abusive relationship I would ever be in, and kept going to my counseling sessions. It changed my life.

I worked through many difficult, past traumas and found myself healing into a different person.

However, it was hard to find a community without cattiness, jealousy, and gossip between women, so in 2019, I began doing “women’s empowerment” events out of my living room, for fun.

The events were such a success that I started selling tickets on Eventbrite and reached my first 150 max ticket sellout. This was the lightbulb moment - I knew I was on to something and that women needed a safe community like this.

I formed &Rise in 2020 as a 501(C)(3) non-profit organization to position the organization to help as many abused women as possible. Estimates published by the World Health Organization, indicate that globally about 1 in 3 (30%) of women worldwide have been subjected to either physical and/or sexual intimate partner violence or non-partner sexual violence in their lifetime.

&Rise offers:

Free counseling for women in Illinois
Free support groups to female trauma and abuse survivors
Trauma life coaching
Book Club for Women - reading an inspiring memoir or self-help book
Career development - help with resumes and mock interviewing
Financial education - teaching women to become financially independent
Workshops that teach women about healthy relationships and healthy coping skills.

I created a place that provided the services I needed when I was going through all my abuse.

The mission of &Rise is to empower women to be the ultimate versions of themselves no matter what adversities they’ve faced.

We serve women, primarily ages 32-55, who have experienced trauma or abuse and are seeking help to break the cycle as well as a community of like-minded women. Many of the women we serve are low-income or beneath the poverty line, and because many of our services are free and virtual, we are able to reach women all around the globe. Additionally, we are proud to be inclusive of all women, including trans and nonbinary.

We have served over 1500 women through our support groups alone and have served over 1000 women through our special events such as Galentine’s Brunch, Boudoir Photoshoot, and our Casino Night Fundraiser.

We have many relationships and partnerships with nonprofits all around the U.S., including WINGS, Single Moms Jobs, Empowered Conversations, Chicago Alliance Against Sexual Exploitation (CAASE), and, the Chicago Police Department. Many survivors come to us through word-of-mouth, but the majority find us through the meetup app and Eventbrite. &Rise has been featured in podcasts such as Love with Liana, The Toxic Leadership Podcast, and Heal, Thrive, Dream, to name a few. We’ve had television coverage on CBS Channel 2 news in Chicago and been written up in blog and magazine articles. We have an active website with up-to-date blog posts as well as a robust social media presence.

The “&” in our brand means your story isn’t over, and that there is more to tell and the “rise” refers to rising above the adversities faced. We call our women “Risers” to distinguish them from just being survivors.

Our counseling services focus on a holistic approach with a big emphasis on self-care, self-love and community building. We are a trauma-informed organization that leads with empathy, understanding, and meeting our risers where they currently are on their journey.

Women love our events because they are unique, fun, and educational, and always offer positivity and empowerment. For example, we held our first-ever Boudoir Fundraiser where we provided makeovers for our participants and took photos of them, empowering them to feel confident in the skin they are in. We received 100% positive feedback from this event, and plan on offering it again in the future. We even had a woman in recovery from an eating disorder mention that she’s never felt so sexy and confident about herself.

Additionally, we have received positive feedback about our support groups. Many of the women tell us they finally feel validated and that our groups have helped them heal because they weren’t judged and felt cared for. Many of the women say that &Rise is like their second family and how grateful they are to create authentic relationships with other survivors who understand what they are going through. One of our support group participants Ashley stated “because of &Rise I now have so much hope.” Ashley came in with depression, anxiety, fear, and was at a really low point in her life, after coming to our support groups for a few months she said her depression and anxiety decreased, fear decreased, and she feels motivated and hopeful about life and her future.

Our future growth ideas include: offering additional support groups around topics like postpartum depression, eating disorders, chronic pain, infertility, and single-mom support. We currently work with a 3rd party counseling practice but plan to hire in-house counselors with a specialization in trauma and abuse.

Since our start in 2019, &Rise was started with my own money and focused on women locally in Illinois. In 2019-2020 we expanded our reach to women nationally by offering free support groups virtually.

We believe in diversity and inclusion and have curated our board of directors and volunteers to reflect a diverse set of cultures and backgrounds.

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