Zine-making as a therapeutic process

Written by Andrea with interventions from Zora, team Andrea Speck

Andrea: In this blog entry we would like to talk a bit about our zines, and what making zines means in our therapeutic process. It has been quite a surprise, to be honest.

We made our first zine between Christmas and New Year, and since then we have made several zines. The truth is that we have made each zine mainly for ourselves, not thinking about other people.

And, actually it all started with Zora starting to express herself through drawings in March last year. Zora was the first part of our community we connected with at the end of February 2022. Her drawings were her way of communicating with the world. They were very harsh drawings, of anger, of abuse.

Zora: Hey, you always talk about me. I can speak for myself. I don't like it when you talk about me like that.

Andrea: Calm down, Zora. Sure, you talk, please. We didn't know that you like to participate in this text. Go ahead.

Zora: Thank you, Andrea. Yes, I think that in February last year I was fed up with hiding, I felt that you'd better discover me. So I let you discover me ;-) But the truth is that I was also fed up of being alone, of eating all my fears and all my pain by myself.

I didn't know how to express myself. I cried a lot, and I really needed your hugs, to feel loved, as I had never felt loved in my life. I didn't know how to express myself, so I started to draw. I didn't see myself able to talk about sexual abuse, but I was able to draw it. And also to draw pictures of my anger, of my desire to kill our father, mother, brother. All the people who have mistreated me, abused me.

Andrea: Yes, Zora. Your first drawings were very hard. And you wanted to draw and draw, so in the end we came to an agreement: that you could draw a picture of whatever you wanted, and then we asked you for a picture, something nice, your favourite animal or something like that. We couldn't handle all your drawings of abuse and anger.

Zora: I'm sorry. But it's what came out, what I felt, what I needed to express.

Andrea: Yes, I understand, Zora. But it was hard.

Then you didn't need to draw so much. And when we also connected with Alex, I think in December last year, we encouraged them to draw too. But they didn't do so much, they didn't do so many drawings.

We had the idea of writing a long text - maybe a small book - about our trauma process for a while, but as everything kept changing all the time, it was impossible to think about how to make such a book. When we read Meg-John Barker's text about zines, and the zine about making zines, we were inspired: why not, instead of writing a small book, make a zine about our process? A zine is shorter, but, above all, it is clearly something rooted in the moment, it doesn't pretend to be timeless, valid for eternity. And the truth is that the process was great.

Zora: I liked it a lot. I did some of the drawings, and I liked it. Although, the truth is that in the end you just took my drawings and talked about me again...

Andrea: That's true, I'm sorry. But, you didn't talk much at the moment either. Now you do talk a lot, you want to communicate. But, before it was very difficult to get some words out of you. You preferred to draw.

The first zine (Spanish) was a hard process. It connected us to our whole trauma process of the last seven years. In one way it was nice to see our progress, that we were no longer at the same point. But there were very hard aspects, like reminding us of the time of feeling suicidal, etc.

After the first zine - in this zine only you, Zora, and Alex appear - we made a document - it's more of a document than a zine - about our internal community, and it was probably the first time we became aware of this wider community. Of Cris, Ginger, etc.

From then on, almost every zine marks an important step in our process. Alex's zine (Spanish) - a mini-zine - marks how we began to accept a relationship between our gender identity at an early age and abuse. And La Rigby's zine (Spanish) surprised us with La Rigby coming out as the trans girl she is.

I think each zine has contributed a lot to understanding ourselves better. And the last zine was very interesting, it was something new, as for the first time the whole community speaks for itself.

Zora: Finally!

Andrea: Yes, Zora, finally. I think this zine has improved the dialogue between us a lot. Let's see what happens from now on. We're going to continue making zines, that's for sure. Beyond the therapeutic aspect, making zines has also connected us with an artistic side that we didn't even know existed. You can find all our zines here (better check Spanish here). Zora, you have plans, don't you?

Zora (smiling): Yes, I do. I don't know when, but yes, I want to do my zine too.

Andrea: I encourage you to do it. And I can't wait to read it.