13 Reasons Why

   

      I watch "13 Reasons Why".  There.  I said it.  I know it's controversial, and that it really stirred up a lot of conversation, good and bad, when it debuted a few years back.  I think conversation is important, especially when it allows people to have a voice that they may not have had before.  My adult children do not like that I watch it, and actually advised me against it.  However, I was drawn to it like a moth to a flame.  I could identify with so much of the plot line.  It was much of my own high school experience.  Some feared I would be triggered by watching; actually it was very cathartic.  It's strange for a 52-year-old woman to identify with a group of high school students, but watching transported me right back to high school years.

     I recently binge-watched season 3.  It's the best season so far.  I will warn you, it was often difficult to watch and the f-bombs fall like rain.  But this is the season that the characters find their voices, and finally tell their stories.  It was good to see how they supported each other and helped them understand each person's story could be told in the time frame that was best for them. 

     Sexual assault is never easy to talk about.  As hard as it is for women, it's even harder for men to talk about.  The statistics say that 1 in 4 women and 1 in 5 men will experience sexual assault before they graduate from high school.  Most of them will never tell anyone what happened and will live with that secret all of their lives.  I think "13 Reasons Why" will  help some of them to find their voice and tell their story.

     Here is mine.

     My early, early childhood was rough.  My father was physically and emotionally abusive to all of us, culminating in my mother's murder when I was 4.  He also made me shower with him, and touch him while we were in there.  This might seem mild, but it's still sexual abuse.

     After our mother's death, my younger sister and I ended up at our maternal grandmother's house.  She loved us with all of her heart.  My teen-aged uncles were still living at home, and my grandmother worked very hard to support all of us.  Unfortunately, that meant our older uncle babysat us sometimes.
     He came out of the bathroom wearing just a towel, and sat down beside me on the couch.  He said his girlfriend was coming over and he needed me to help him get ready for her.  He stood me on the floor in front of him and he opened his towel.  He put his penis into my tiny mouth, making me gag and try to escape.  He held my head there until he was done, again causing me to choke on his ejaculate.  He yelled at me for spitting it out.  Then, with his face close to mine, he hissed that I was to never tell anyone what happened.  He said my grandmother would punish me if she knew.

     So began my life of keeping secrets.

     My sister and I were eventually placed into foster care and then adopted.  My sexual abuse didn't appear on any paperwork, and I didn't feel safe to tell.  Plus I was so conflicted inside.  Our new family were Christians who taught us our bodies were our own, to not have sex before marriage, to not put ourselves in bad situations.  None of this meshed with what I had already experienced in my life.  And, my new family didn't know about it.  I felt like if I told them that they would see me differently and, maybe, not want me anymore. 
     I had a lot of trouble reconciling what they were trying to teach me about boundaries with how badly my boundaries had already been trampled on.  I entered my middle school years trying to figure this all out.

     Dennis was our neighbor, and we had a love/hate relationship.  His home life was super-brutal, he and his siblings were beaten on a regular basis by their father so I felt a bit of empathy towards them.  There were times when we got along really well, and there were times when he was just cruel to me. My parents didn't like us hanging out with them, for a number of reasons, but you know what they say about forbidden fruit.
     There were times when Dennis and I would kiss.  We got caught one time, and I was grounded because of the big hickey he left on my neck.  My parents and older sister made me feel so ashamed!  This only caused more conflict for me.  This was nothing compared to what I had already been through in my life.  But their reaction reinforced that it wasn't safe to tell my story.

     I was 12 when Dennis sexually assaulted me.  His family has an empty mobile home on their property that the kids would hang out in.  My parents has strictly forbidden my sister and I from going in there.  One summer day we were all hanging out, when Dennis and his younger brother asked us if we wanted a tour of the trailer.  They said they were making it into some sort fort.  My sister and I decided it was ok, so we went in.
     It started out innocently.  We walked from room to room as a group.  At one point Dennis told my sister and his brother to stay in a room where they had a bunch of games.  He said he wanted to show me something in another room.  I followed him.  There was a mattress on the floor. I looked at him, expecting there to be more.  He quickly pushed me onto the mattress, covering my mouth to stifle my screams.  Just as fast he was on top of me, pushing his tongue inside my mouth.  It was so slimy and his breath was bad.  He was dry humping me while he fumbled to unbutton my pants.  I tried reasoning with him, forcing myself to be calm while everything on my inside was frantic.  He ignored what I was saying, instead putting his hand up inside my shorts and underwear.  My mind was racing!  I knew it wouldn't be long til he won.  In my desperation, I broke into tears.  It caught him off guard and I was able to knock him off balance.  I ran through the trailer, grabbed my sister and leaped out the door.  We took a few minutes to regroup, then we headed back to our house.  When our mom asked where we'd been, we lied and said we'd been playing in the woods. 
     I never told anyone what happened because I was somewhere I knew I should not have been.  That made it my fault, right?

     I developed early, which caught the eyes of the older boys in our neighborhood.  They would appear in the yard while I was doing chores and ask me to go for a walk with them.  After my experience with Dennis, I knew that was bad news.  I made up plenty of excuses to make them leave.
     One night there was a group of us running around in the neighbor's yard.  Dennis's older brother and another neighbor showed up.  The three guys separated me from the group.  They held me on the ground and pulled my pants down.  I was fighting them with everything in me!  They were grabbing my breasts and crotch, laughing as they told me to be still.  I continued to struggle.  Then we I heard it... my dad whistling.  Everyone knew that meant we had to go home.  The guys released me, still laughing.  I pulled up my pants and ran home.  My mom asked why I had leaves in my hair.  I lied and said we had been throwing them in the air and some must have landed on me.
     Again, I kept it secret.  I felt like I would be blamed, so I told no one.

     All of this served to strengthen my introvert tendencies.  In high school I had friends, but no one close and definitely not close enough to tell them these kind of secrets.  I went to parties with friends but I had a heightened sense of needing to be in control, which meant I often stood out for not "relaxing".
     Dennis and his family had moved away while I was in middle school and, for a little while, mostly girls ruled our neighborhood.  One of the three guys involved in the earlier assault still lived with his parents, but he basically avoided us.
     My junior and senior years of high school I worked as a life guard at an amusement park near our house.  By best friend lived right next door to me, and worked at the pool, too.  She had way more freedom than me, with none of the fear.  Sometimes I'd go to parties with her or we would hang out at whichever house had no parents.
     One of those times my parents and sister were away for vacation.  My friend and I invited several of her guy friends to hang at my house.  Someone brought beer and some harder stuff.  We played games, listened to music and all of us ended up falling asleep on my living room floor.  I woke up laying on my stomach with someone's hand under me, a hand inside my pants.  I felt the familiar terror rising up in me. I pushed my body hard into the floor.  He growled, and pushed in his hand harder. The pain was horrible!  I was starting to panic when I realized other people were waking up.  He removed his hand, but I pretended to be asleep until he left because I didn't want him to know I knew.
     Once more I kept the secret and carried the shame.  My parents were away and I broke the rules by having people over.  So this was my fault, too, right?

     After high school I got a job direct-selling cutlery.  The company I worked for had weekly meetings and, occasionally, conferences requiring hotel stays.  Both were just excuses to do a whole lot of drinking.  I remember one of those conferences well.  We had spent the day touring the factory and meeting the bigwigs.  We also discovered that when you're part of a convention at the hotel, the liquor store didn't card you.  What could go wrong with a couple of hundred drunk teens to early-20 year-olds in a hotel?  We danced.  We watched movies.  We sat in the halls and drank. 
     I woke up in a chair, a guys was pulling on my arms, trying to get me to stand.  He said he wanted to help me back to my room.  I didn't know who he was, and I also couldn't see him very clearly.  He stood in front of me and tried to lift me by putting his arms under my armpits.  Once he got me up, he pulled my body tight up against his.  He was kissing me and groping my breast.  He tried to get me to walk saying he was trying to help me, but even stone cold drunk I knew he wasn't.  I acted like I passed out and slumped back down into the chair.  He called me a slut and whore, but he left me there.
     I didn't tell anybody.  I was drunk.  I was passed out where anyone could have harmed me.  This was my fault, right?

     All of these events served to create some pretty hostile thoughts towards men.  It became evident to me that men were only interested in me for what my body could do for them.  I was so disinterested in men that my dad asked me if I was "funny" (his term for gay).  No, not at all.  I was just harmed, damaged and nobody knew.  I was starting to take back control of my own body.
     This has created many obstacles in my soon-to-be 30-year marriage.  When my husband first began to show romantic interest in me, I would vomit most of this to him in an attempt to scare him off.  But he didn't run.  He has not always understood what I've been through or how it continues to shape who I am, but he has provided space for my story.

     If statistics prove true, there will be several people reading this who have experienced sexual assault.  It's time to start unpacking your story.  There are safe places and safe people who can help.  Your voice will come.  Don't let anyone force you to speak.  But remember these things:

• you are brave
• you are strong
• it's not your fault

When you're ready:

• info@joyfulheartfoundation.org
• www.13reasonswhy.info
• www.nomore.org