Sexual harassment is a problem born in the gray areas of abuse, and silenced through rape culture. It sounds heavy.  It is. 

I’ve written my #metoo post over a year ago.  Even then, thinking of my now, I know there was a comfort level I have yet to reach.  There’s a space that doesn’t feel safe enough to speak in and that is the space I’m writing about now.  As I type, I’m unsure if my hidden stories are shame, protecting someone that I know couldn’t help it, or some misguided fear of acceptance. As open as I am on this blog and as much as I share, there's so much that I will never share. 

It’s beyond street harassment and sexual aggression.  It’s about dominance so perverse, it takes the form of politeness and dismissing what we feel is wrong as something that is in our heads. 

How do you feel about your voice being heard?

I was often accused of lying to my ex-husband.  I did. A lot.  The truth was always something I was afraid to share.  It was my truth, but I knew in his eyes, I was wrong.  What I thought was wrong.  What I felt was wrong.  What I spent (my most common lie) was too much, and wrong.  It taught me that when my kids lie to me, I’ve made the truth unsafe.  I’ve made them feel so bad about the reality they are facing, that a lie feels better.  Denying how they experience this life means my version is more important to them. 

It started in childhood.  My Dad often told me children should be seen and not heard. I try my best to let my kids feel safe in telling me how they feel.  I'm very human and often too tired to remember this is what I want to do. I try to remember to give them agency over their own bodies.  They aren't forced to give hugs or do anything with their bodies they don't want to do (except showers - with teenage boys, this is a public service). I was taught to never call someone's house between 10 pm and 8 am.  I was taught to offer refreshments to company and never let the phone ring more than twice.  I was taught to not answer on the first ring (but who has time to wait for a second ring?). There was a lot I was taught I aught to do in order to be polite.  

Sometimes being polite means I don't speak up when I think I might be in the wrong. I try my best to change what I teach my boys because I don't want to raise victims.

There was a time when I was in my late teens.  I had a friend I sometimes kissed.  He brought over alcohol and I drank with him.  It was the first and only time I've ever had a Long Island Iced Tea. Things progressed and it took years to realize that if I was too drunk to stand on my own, I was too drunk to give consent, and yet he was sober enough to drive home.  I still have a hard time calling it what it was because we were both drinking, right? And yet, if I were to see that happening to someone else, right now, I would intervene.  That is not okay.  And for me, I'm unsure if I was in the wrong.  I know what I think but I'm uncertain of what I'm supposed to feel.  

What does abuse mean?

I've never been physically harmed by an intimate partner.  Not really.  At least I'm not sure. There was one night with a lover where he was rough.  It was painful but it was right on the line where I was unsure if it was a level of kink or if he was angry and just looking to dominate me.  I was confused and hours after he fell asleep, I was staring at the wall he had forced me against and tears streamed down my face.  Shame kept my tears silent.  Shame kept me in place next to him. 

I was in counseling a few years ago.  It was several sessions in when my therapist encouraged me to say, “I am an abused woman.”  Saying it within the safety of an office where I poured my heart out to a woman (that I paid quite a bit) was hard.  

I can see it now.  I'm still paralyzed from stopping it and very much aware that I excused the inexcusable because I had compassion and no boundaries.  I love him so I can see how he's hurt or angry or tired or stressed.  I saw that as reason enough to forgive him for saying the things he did . . . For purposely trying to hurt me, no matter how often I bit my tongue and tasted my own blood to stop myself from lashing out in anger. 

I didn't understand domestic violence until I was sobbing on my therapists couch.  I had to look up her labels and once the definitions landed, my world spun as I could relate to it all.  

Isolation

I was never discouraged from seeing family and friends.  Sort of.  I wasn't told I couldn't see them, but if I went out, it was clear that my partner was sad about it.  I was expected to check in every hour and never be late in returning a call or text.  If I had a family outing, I learned it was easier to let him skip it than to see him sit in a corner, sulking. 

Intimidation

For me, it was always a look.  Each man I dated had it.  It was a look that said he loathed me.  It was often a flash of anger that would disappear, but I saw it long enough to know I'd be dancing on egg shells.  I watched their anger look like things were being destroyed with bare hands.    I was often stonewalled in a conversation.  In my last relationship, I would often shut down, or walk away.  He was bothered by this but I couldn't explain that I was taught that was the safe thing to do in an argument by a few people before him.  

Threats

I was told they would leave. I was told they would harm themselves if I left.  I was told my family would know what kind of person I was.  I was even threatened that my Dad would see the sexy pictures we took together.  

Emotional Abuse

This one is the hardest to analyze for me.  I suppose the best description is the argument that ends in me apologizing for crying after they said something to intentionally hurt me.  I was sorry my tears made them feel guilty. No concession I made was good enough.  Nothing I said or did was good enough. I've been told I made someone feel like I intentionally wanted to make him feel dumb.  I've also been told I was the dumbest person they knew.  Some of the names I've been called would make you wonder why I stayed.  I still don't know why. It's a land of feeling no matter what I did for them, I was alone in a minefield.  And yet, I could easily see how selfish they were.  It's about them.  It's about what they think, believe and feel.

Minimizing

There were times I would state my needs.  I need your insults and threats to stop.  I need you to not be so mean.  I was often told I was being sensitive and over exaggerating.  I was told I was on the attack and I started the fight.  I didn't know we were fighting.  

Financial Abuse

It wasn't just about permission to spend and having someone carefully examine my grocery store receipts.  It wasn't just being told I can't have an individual bank account or how the bills were to be paid. It was being told my spending didn't justify financial support.  I didn't spend in the approved way, so any support would be as wasteful as burning money.  

Blaming

Their mood was always my fault. I made them lash out.  I made them jealous.  I was powerful enough to make them do things they regret, but I wasn't powerful enough to make the honeymoon periods last forever. 

Denying

Gaslighting was big in all of these situations.  I was often convinced I didn't know what I saw or thought.  I was wrong.  It's actually a gift that keeps on giving.  I still doubt and question myself at every possible turn.  Was he right? Am I exaggerating? Was that what others thought? In public, they were terrific people.  They were loved.  There was a community that saw them in the best possible light.  Behind closed doors I saw the liar.  I saw the men that hated and loved me in the same week.  I saw the critical side that had no respect for me.  I wondered why anyone would have respect for me.  I wondered why I should have respect for me. And they deny that every aspect of your relationship is controlled by the mercurial moods that swing without warning.  

 

Abuse Meets Harassment

It's not a huge leap, if you think about it. If these very real forms of domestic violence can be dismissed . . . If I can see it in varying degrees in every single one of the intimate relationships I've had throughout my life . . . How can we expect men to understand their behavior is not okay? I'm not sure I would know what a healthy relationship feels like.  But it's that same boundary that gets crossed. 

It was crossed when I was about 7 and a man pulled up for directions while stroking his erect penis.  

It was crossed when I was 9 and on my front porch.  The neighbor was sitting near me and put his hand on my ankle and slowly felt up my leg.  I panicked and smacked his hand back at my thigh.  

It was crossed in my middle school electric class when the boys in my class felt my butt was their property and touched it as often as they could.  I wasn't safe.  My teacher laughed it off as boys being boys.  

It was crossed two summers ago when I realized I was being followed by a couple of men and they were recording me as I was walking to the Third Street Promenade on a busy summer night in Santa Monica. 

It's crossed with every swipe that becomes a dick pic while online dating.  (Don't do it.  I assure you, we've seen bigger.)

It was crossed when a quiet walk gets interrupted with cat calls.  (Really, sticking your tongue out at me won't earn you any brownie points.) 

It was crossed when consensual sex with condoms included a covert removal of that condom. 

It was crossed today as I was walking back to the office and a stranger nearly stood in my way, hoping I would acknowledge him.  He didn't notice how uncomfortable he made me and I don't think it would have mattered to him.  His need to make himself known was more important than my need to walk away.  He wasn't trying to win my heart or take me out.  He was telling me with his body language that he was dominant and it was a socially acceptable threat. 

If you are in doubt, take yourself out of the situation.  How would you feel if someone you don't know was acting this way toward someone you love? Now don't just think of her as someone's wife, sister, daughter, mother or niece. She is someone.  She has her own dreams and desires.  She has moments that make her cry and moments that bring her joy.  She is valuable and capable of love.  She's not your entertainment.  

Rape Culture

Rape culture is about our society making it easier to be a rapist than a victim of rape. It means people are discouraged from reporting it. It's when the college career of a prominent sports player is more important than the life and well being of his victim. It's when a victim's story is dismissed or not accepted as the truth.  It's when American states allow a rapist to sue his victim for custody and visitation rights but a rape victim cannot sue her rapist for child support. It's when we have politicians foolish enough to not just say, but actually believe that women can't get pregnant from rape.  And we keep voting these people into the offices they hold. 

There's no such thing as consensual sex.  Either it's sex (implying consent is the only way it went forward) or it's rape.  Drinking doesn't mean you're asking for anything but to get drunk.  It's not about what clothes were worn or what was started.  No matter how active a person has been sexually, consent means complete control over what you decide to do with your own body at all times.  You don't get to decide for someone else.  Ever.  If you're married, you can still say no. 

If you begin to ask what this person was wearing or drinking or how late it was at night, you're saying anyone in that situation is acceptable to rape. Far too many men, women and children are raped.  It's not about a person asking to be brutalized by something they wore or drank or how they behaved. It's about dominance and control. It's violence.  

If we are aware of domestic violence in all of it's forms, we can label and isolate other harassing behaviors because we'll be less likely to dismiss them.