December 23, 1979

Forty years ago today, an adult in my life made a choice which changed my life forever. He sent me into a ten year long downward spiral of confusion, self-loathing, anorexia, alcohol and drug abuse. All because he believed he had a right to use my teenage body for his pleasure.

I say he made the choice on this date, but he really made the decision to follow this path months before. First though, he had to groom me, which took awhile. He had to test me by disclosing increasingly inappropriate secrets to see if he could trust me to be silent, obedient. Took me with him to places I should not have gone, and told me not to tell my foster mother. Told me personal stories, and asked me to keep them confidential. Said things and did things that I should have reported to my social worker or my foster mother, but swore me to secrecy, and waited to see if I could be trusted. Fed me alcohol at family functions, and waited to see if other adults would challenge him or if I would tell other adults where I got it.

After months of testing and grooming, I was sent to his home to babysit while he and his wife were out at 2 different activities. He came home first, asked for help wrapping gifts for her, fed me wine while I was wrapping them. After a couple glasses of wine, he acted on his decision.

It started like a seduction, if you want to call a 28 year old man molesting a 14 year old girl "seduction." Nothing violent, nothing intrusive, nothing like the events he would escalate to over the next year and sustain until I was 17 and leaving for college.  The first evening was confusing, a mix of gentle kindness, talk about my need for "instruction in sex" and inappropriate intimacy. Leaving me anxious, nauseous, confused and afraid. Swearing me to secrecy, a secrecy that knotted my stomach and left me unable to eat for 3 days.

Three days in which family and friends descended on my foster mother's home, making privacy and alone time impossible. Three days in which I became entirely invisible to any of the adults around me. Three days in which I was scolded for not eating, but in which no other adult in my life had the presence of mind to ask what happened to make me unable to eat. Or they didn't want to know. Three days in which he fed me alcohol and nobody noticed or they chose to look the other way. Three days in which he grabbed at my butt or my breasts in rooms full of other adults and nobody said anything. Three days in which he made dirty and inappropriate comments to me in earshot of other adults and everybody laughed at my embarrassment.

Three days to solidify a pattern of ownership over my physical and mental self, with noone to defend me or challenge his behavior. And three days for me to establish a pattern of coping through starvation and alcohol use.

Three days to alter the course of my life forever. It took me ten years to finally ask for help, to address my eating disorder, to get sober. Forty years later, and his choices, and the choices of the adults responsible for my safety and well-being, still haunt me.