Sharpies and Silence
Jan 07, 2026
Way back in 2007, I published a novel titled Invisible Me.
It was story written from the perspective of Dini, a girl with selective mutism.
Selective mutes aren’t silent because they have nothing to say. They feel unable to speak up because no one ever created the safety for their voice to come forward.
After the book came out, a well-known therapist in the community wrote an op ed in the Jewish Press about how much she hated it.
How wrong I was in my portrayal of selective mutism.
And how deeply she disagreed.
At that point in my life, I was a classic people pleaser.
I wanted desperately to get it right.
To be liked.
To be approved of.
But when my proud father dutifully sent me that paper clipping and I read her words, I felt… nothing.
No shame.
No urge to defend myself.
Only a deep sadness.
And a disappointed understanding.
She really didn’t know.
Here she was, letters after her name, tearing down a book I had spent almost a year researching and writing.
And she was wrong.
She wasn't intending to be cruel or unkind.
But she was doing something I’d seen over and over and again since.
She was an individual trusted to work with people suffering in silence.
People who needed help finding words.
Who needed safety before insight.
Presence before interpretation.
Instead, she took a Sharpie and wrote all over their experiences with her academically approved opinions.
Labels.
Diagnoses.
Ultimatums.
Certainty.
Everything except the one thing a still, small voice actually needs in order to emerge.
Ignite was born as a response to that pattern.
It isn’t about telling women who they are.
It isn’t about explaining them to themselves.
And it certainly isn’t about fixing.
So many women come to Ignite having lived for years with an inner knowing they couldn’t name.
They aren’t silent because they're powerless.
They sit in silence because no one has ever listened properly.
In Ignite, the shift is subtle but profound.
Women find words. Not imposed from the outside, but arising naturally from within.
And once something has language, it can finally move.
It can finally be lived.
Our Ignite welcome call is in 24 hours.
I’ve been listening for your silent voice my whole life.
Ignite exists so you can finally feel heard.
There's still time to join the conversation before registration closes Friday,
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Life happens in little bits. Learn to love the little bytes.
