TW: Sexual Assault

If anyone had ever asked me if I’d ever been sexually assaulted, I would have said no. I know my mom has. My nieces have. I know they’ve been victimized by men, as women are every day, and I always breathed a small sigh of relief that I hadn’t experienced what they have. You see, I was reading sexual assault as rape and molestation. I was reading sexual assault as forced intercourse, and violence, roughness and crying for help. And all of those qualify. But I wasn’t reading the full story.

I didn’t see it as an unwanted attack on my person. As an ass slap when I’m walking by, or a grope when I’m dancing with you, or a kiss before I push you away. I didn’t see it as being touched when I didn’t want to be touched. I didn’t see it as those things. There were levels. And I always thought that as long as I cussed you out after, and put you in your place, and told you I don’t roll like that, that I had protected myself sufficiently. I always thought that if you stopped when I said “no,” that I had prevented an actual sexual assault. But something happened that showed me that I was wrong.

I went to a party. I met a man. I danced with him. I was drunk. He was drunk. We ended up against a wall. Next thing I knew I was being kissed. And it was fine. But then I was being groped. And my skirt was being lifted. And that wasn’t fine. I pushed him away. I told him to stop, and he did. And then I took my drunk ass out of there before more happened. And I didn’t think about it. I mean, I pushed it completely away. I shrugged it off, and I went about my life. I didn’t see it as anything other than a guy getting too excited and acting out. I excused it. Because it was me. I honestly don’t know if I would have excused it so quickly had it been someone else. But it was me, and I thought I knew myself. And I let it go. In short, I made it okay.

But it wasn’t okay. It occurs to me lately (after some retrospection you don’t need to know about), that sexual assault covers a lot more than what I thought it did. That it was more than the blatant, sexual coercion. That it had happened to me. Of course, it’s not something I’m reconciling very well, hence me writing this. It’s making me anxious, edgy, fearful. I want to shrink and withdraw; I spent a whole day sick to my stomach. It skewed my perspective, and left me reeling. You don’t think of it as being taken advantage of. You just don’t. You write it off and think you’ve escaped unscathed because they listened to your “no.” But you’re not unscathed. And the fact that they listened to “no” doesn’t mean a fucking thing because they still felt entitled to touch you in the first place. And that’s wrong. It’s dead ass wrong. It crazy wrong. It’s made me sad, and angry with myself.

It just made me sad that I’ve babied men for so long. Like, I don’t even hold them to the same standard that I do my fucking self. EYE don’t touch anyone, in any way, without their consent. I have that as a rule. For MYSELF. And for this man I just wrote it off for him as “at least he stopped when I said no.” Like that bar was so low, I’m embarrassed. And then I thought of all the other things I do to prevent being touched. How I shrink in a crowd when a man is about to brush up against me. How I excuse myself far too often so they don’t share my space, so they don’t violate my space. How I meet the most ignorant, disgusting ones in the street but I still smile and speak when they speak to me because I’m afraid of what they’ll do if I’m not polite. If I reject them. How I hate being approached when I’m alone. How I stand with my back to the wall in certain places. How I shrink myself, protect myself; how I COWER on a day-to-day basis because you never know what men will do. How I’ve taken it for granted that they will take advantage of me at the first opportunity, and I’ve modified MY behavior because asking them to modify theirs will bring their anger. How I’ve been doing it for years, and how I did it that night. It’s… heavy to say the least. And I’m not okay with it.

I think about my nieces (I have nine of them now), my beautiful girls and I think of them shrinking. Not being who they really are. Cowering. And I’m angry. With myself. With men. With the world. I always have rose-colored glasses; I have a vacation home in Optimism. But it’s been dwindling, and it’s all I can do to hold on. Keep your hands to yourself. Teach your sons to keep their hands to themselves. Stop thinking you’re entitled to something because you like it. Or because it’s there. In the meantime, I’m learning to shoot. And I’m buying a stun gun. I hope none of you niggas have to learn the hard way. But I will teach you if necessary.