#MeToo
Earlier in the week, an actress by the name Alyssa Milano “encouraged [sexual] assault survivors to use the hashtag #MeToo in an effort to prove just how pervasive the problem of sexual assault and harassment is” after sexual assault allegations made against Harvey Weinstein, a studio & film producer. If this is the first you’re hearing of it, then you either must not get on social media or have incredibly lucky (or maybe just quiet) friends. Over the past week, I’ve seen more and more #MeToo posts. By friends, by strangers, and by celebrities from all areas of stardom. It’s been terrifying and, to a certain extent, liberating.
Liberating?
Yes. Liberating.
Why?
Because #MeToo.
For the longest time, I felt like it was just me. I felt like I was the only one. No, I wasn’t raped or molested by an older man or anything too traumatic, but yes, I’ve been sexually assaulted. My close friends know the story, and I’m fairly certain my mom knows as well, so this won’t come as a surprise to them (unless they forgot), but for most of you reading this, you probably had no idea. Honestly, I was toying with writing this post for a good portion of this week. I decided to do it. I decided to be vulnerable after seeing many #MeToo posts. If those men and women can be vulnerable, I can too.
For the protection of his privacy (which my dad or brother might argue that he doesn’t deserve any after reading this), I won’t be using his real name, but we can call him John.
When I was in the eighth grade, I rode the school bus. Every morning and every afternoon. The bus in the eighth grade was a lot more fun than it was in seventh grade. I had a few friends who rode the bus too - Bre and Mandy. There were a few boys who rode the bus too, and they were in the seventh grade while we were in the eighth - one of them being John.
Now, I never liked John. I always thought he was kind of a jerk. He wasn’t ever mean to me. John was annoying, but what twelve and thirteen year old boy isn’t? However, I wouldn’t call John a friend. Bre and Mandy, yeah, they were my friends, but John? No way. I wasn’t upset if John wasn’t on the bus, and I wasn’t happy if he was. He was just kind of... there.
Another thing about John was that he was always kind of weird. He was always trying to do things to make us laugh or weird us out - boys and girls alike. He got off the bus a couple of stops before mine and got on a few stops before mine. So whenever we were on the bus, we always saw each other. Most of the time he was pretty quiet or he was joking around with the other boys. He was one of the two seventh grade boys who got to sit at the back of the bus with us eighth graders.
Something important that I should mention about my bus was that it was incredibly small. Some busses sat three kids to a bench while ours could practically sit one kid to a bench. There weren’t a lot of people on the bus, but we were still like any other bus. The eighth graders sat at the back and the seventh graders sat at the front, unless you were invited. And these two seventh grade boys and Bre were invited.
Anyway, there were a few weeks in the spring of my eighth grade year, I was fourteen years old and always in a “relationship” if you could call it that. Another important thing that you should know about me is that I started puberty a little bit earlier than most girls. I was wearing bras in fourth grade, started my period in sixth, and by eighth grade, I was.... rather developed. Continuing on....
One day, John asked if he could touch my boobs. I said no. He asked why. I said that it was because I didn’t want him to. So he left it alone for the rest of the ride home. This went on every day for probably two weeks. After the two weeks, he started getting more aggressive. He would sit next to me and ask. And after he got tired of asking, he just started going for it. I kept saying no, and fighting him off. I physically pushed him away using my hands, my feet, saying no, no, no, no. But he still kept on.
I know why he kept on.
He kept on because I laughed. I laugh so easily. At puns, at little jokes, at cat videos, and especially when I’m nervous. I laughed, and he thought that I thought it was funny despite me physically kicking him out of my seat on the bus and saying no, no, no. Despite me telling him to stop, he still did it. He still moved on the bus to sit next to me, he still asked, he still tried, and I still laughed and kicked him out of my seat.... literally.
He kept on until one day, he did it. After he grabbed my boobs, he never bothered me again.
This all took place over a few weeks or a month, maybe even more. Riding the bus went from something I enjoyed to something I despised. I hated when Bre or Mandy or one of the other girls wouldn’t be on the bus, so I wouldn’t have anyone to sit next to, to make sure that John couldn’t get close. Whenever the bus doors would close and we’d start rolling, I would let out a sigh of relief if John wasn’t on there. I even started sitting in the front of the bus again just to get away from him after it happened.
From that point on, any time I saw him, I would get nervous. Not because I thought he was going to do it again but because I knew what he had done. I knew that he was proud of himself. As an eighth grader, I did everything I could to block out the memory. I tried my hardest not to talk about it, not to think about it. I didn’t tell anyone what happened for years. Not my friends, not my mom. The only people who knew what happened were me, John, and the kids on the bus who sat near me.
In eighth grade, nobody wants to be the person to stand up to the bully. I don’t blame the other kids for sitting there a letting it happen. I didn’t even blame him for what happened. In the eighth grade, when you’ve been taught nothing about sexual assault, you think it’s your fault. I knew what he had done wasn’t right, but I believed it had been my fault. It was my fault for having boobs in the eighth grade while other girls didn’t. It was my fault for laughing nervously. It was my fault for sitting in the back of the bus every day. I was the reason he did that. He wasn’t trying to grab any of the other girls’ boobs on the bus, so it was clearly my fault.
All of this became internalized, of course, and thinking about it even now makes me feel icky. Though now, I have the ability to say that it was his wrong doing. It was his fault. I did nothing wrong. I said no. I said to stop. I physically pushed and kicked and even pulled his hair (it was long- like the classic Justin Bieber hair) to get him to stop. But he still got what he wanted. It turned into me hating my body. I wore t-shirts and bagging sweaters after that and I tried to show as little cleavage as possible. I didn’t like anything too form fitting and if it was, I always covered up with a vest or a jacket or something.
After it happened, I felt alone. I was the only girl I knew who had something like this happened to her - or at least none of them were saying anything about it if it did happen. Of course, my friends talks about how boys were touching their butts, but that was different. They liked that attention. I didn’t like the attention I got. And butts are a lot different than boobs. I felt alone and I felt scared, and as mentioned before, I felt like I was to blame. I once kissed a boy in preK4, and my family still teases me about it. I was scared if I told my mom about it, that she’d tease me about this as she had done when I kissed a boy on the playground. Of course, knowing now, she totally wouldn’t have, but then? It sure felt like a possibility. Overall, after John sexually assaulted me on the school bus, I was scared.
As for now? I don’t think if affects me much. I don’t think about it every day or every week or every month. It might cross my mind every now and again, if I’m watching Law and Order: SVU or if I go back to Woodstock (I’m currently in Rome) and I’m worried that I’ll see him. But otherwise, I’m not affected. I’ve made my peace with what happened. I’m not mad at him or scared of him or have any feelings towards him other that just.... normal human feelings when they see another human. He’s a stranger to me now. We haven’t seen each other or said words to each other since I was in the eighth grade, so just as many feelings you have towards the person who’s shopping at Kroger near you as I do. If he walked in the room right now, I don’t think I’d be happy to see him or want to talk to him. But I’m fine with what happened. It’s just a part of my story and my journey.
As for the moral of my story, there’s three:
One, raise your boys better and empower your girls. Teach boys how to respect girls and women. Teach girls how to speak up for what they believe in and for what they think is right. And teach both the difference between right and wrong.
Two, call sexual assault what it is. It’s not just “boys being boys.” Boys being boys is playing with monster trucks in the dirt and getting more food on their shirts than in their mouths. Boys raping, molesting, and sexually assaulting and harassing women and girls is not “just being a boy.” It’s not a boy flirting with a girl on the school bus because he thinks she’s cute.
And finally, the last moral is to know that if it’s happened to you, whether you are male or female, you are not alone. Because #MeToo.
[A photo of me from the eighth grade, around the time that all of this happened.]