#me too

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I was nine years old when my next-door neighbor molested me. I had come to trust this man who showed me how to find food when my family and I had nothing to eat. We already received food stamps and the odd ration of government cheese but I learned that there was a treasure trove of packaged food to be had if one was willing to dumpster dive behind the Alpha Beta grocery store. He also took me to the rescue mission where an hour-long sermon earned you a hot meal. Why I was allowed to spend time alone with this man is a whole other story but the short answer is I didn’t have a loving home and he paid attention to me. When it happened I didn’t know what to do. I acted casual and left as soon as possible and never went back. I avoided him and told no one. I was scared and ashamed. My third grade mind thought I did something wrong.

Six years later, shortly after my fifteenth birthday, I woke up to find a strange man next to my bed. Our lives were so dysfunctional at that point that I thought he was some random person (not uncommon at that time) my mom had brought home. I told him he could not sleep in my room, that he had to sleep on the couch. He paused briefly; looking confused, and then jumped on me, sexually assaulting me while holding a small blade to my throat. I stayed calm, determined not to die or lose my virginity to rape. When he struggled to keep the knife at my throat while fumbling with himself, I made my move, pushing him off of me and running through the connecting bathroom to my mother’s bedroom to wake her. I continued through the house grabbing a cast iron frying pan in the kitchen to defend myself. By then he had run and I discovered he had taken the hinges off our back door to get in the house. We had to drive around the block to use a pay phone since the phone was usually the first thing to go when we couldn’t pay the bills.

A single male police officer came to question me, no counseling was offered, no physical exam administered. I didn’t know about those things until much later. I stared at the officer’s shoes that squeaked with the smallest amount of movement wishing the floor would swallow me. I was ashamed. Ashamed of the smudged mascara I hadn’t bothered to wash off before bed. Ashamed of the way we lived. Ashamed that I had to tell a man I didn’t know what another man I didn’t know had done at a time when all the self consciousness of being a teenager was upon me.

Eight years later, when I was entertaining the notion of becoming a park ranger, I was taking a criminal justice class. Though I loved nature, I had learned that law enforcement was part of the job for rangers. The class was taught by a county sheriff who explained the penal code defining rape as penetration however slight. That is how I learned what I had called an attack was actually rape. I was stunned but I kept it to myself, too embarrassed to talk to anyone about it.

In the years between 15 and 23, I had several incidents of sexual harassment. While walking to and from school I had been flashed four times on separate occasions. Another time I was approached by a stranger near my junior high school that wanted to know if I would be interested in modeling for nude magazines. He quickly took off when I informed him that was child pornography. I was walking home when a man in a truck passed me more than once yelling things from his window. I ducked into a restaurant and ordered a soda thinking he would go away and I could walk home in peace but he was suddenly in the restaurant trying to sit with and talk to me. When I got up to pay and leave, he tried to buy my soda and kiss me. He grabbed the bill and I ran out of the restaurant using the time to get away. I didn’t know where to go but I saw a phone booth and got in. The phone booth was painted on the lower half so I squatted down and called my sister. I told her what was happening and where I was and asked her to be ready to call the police. I watched the man drive by a couple of times and finally give up.

Twice I had my ass grabbed by strangers. Once while shopping in Miller’s Outpost and another time at a restaurant called the Cantina. I hit both of those men, ready to fight to protect myself. The first man ran off and the second laughed at me with his buddies. I haven’t even included the rash of ass grabbings that were common in my junior high, as a dare boys would make to one another. Many unsuspecting girls were accosted while reaching into their lockers only to turn around and see several boys laughing, not knowing who the perpetrator was. I was one of the many.

Admittedly, I grew up in rough areas. The current term is low socio-economic status and there are a host of dysfunctions that are exacerbated in these environments. Still, I did not deserve to be victimized and I wondered why did it happen so often? I am small and female and I was living in poor neighborhoods where I had to walk to and from school and later work. I am still embarrassed by the things that have happened to me and rarely talk about it. So I waited and wondered, should I share my story? Does it matter? Obviously, I decided it does because if that many acts of sexual harassment and assault could happen to one person, what is happening to others? 

On the rare occasion when I have shared my story with another woman, I have discovered they have one, or more, of their own. I told a female therapist once that I was afraid of what might happen to my daughter, especially as she got older. She told me that it was important not to catastrophize and that gave me pause. I can be emotional and sensitive but I am not prone to hysteria and I wondered if I was making the threat of sexual harassment and assault bigger than it was? I think the #me too movement has proven that this is a catastrophe and far more widespread than I, or possibly, anyone else imagined.

 

None of us deserve to be victimized no matter where we live, what we wear or how we behave. I would be naive to think that those things are not factors but they are not a defense for perpetrators and a boys will be boys mentality is not an excuse. I have spent a lot of time figuring things out and working on myself to be more trusting and less fearful. I am not broken and I refuse to call myself a victim but I have been changed by these events. I don't often think about these events, but there are residual effects:

 

When I walk I do not wear earphones, and do my best to avoid distractions because I want to be aware of my surroundings. Before I go to bed I do a perimeter check to make sure all the doors and windows are locked. I don’t sleep with the windows open unless my husband is home. When he travels I close all the doors in the house so I have an extra opportunity to hear if someone breaks in. When we were looking at homes to buy, where the bedrooms were played a role because I wanted my daughter to be close to me with no street access to her room. I sleep with a baseball bat and a Maglite flashlight next to my bed. 

 

Though it has been many years since I have experienced anything like I did when I was young, I still feel the need to be on guard. A feeling far too many women can relate to. I have been told I am a survivor and it is true but it does come with a price. A price no one should have to pay. #me too