What Happened After

   Last week I wrote about how I had been sexually assaulted when I was in junior high school. While I admit that the many women finally reporting their experiences did influence my decision to write about something only a very few knew about, I did not want to seem like I was jumping on a bandwagon. I wanted to write about how I once shielded someone who should have been reported despite the fact that I had once been a victim myself.
  Today I want to write about how I dealt with my assault. I believe it's important. I feel like most of the focus is on the offender and punishment of the offender. There should be more on how to survive and make something good out of what happened.
  I'm sure that many people will read this and marvel at the fact that I'm suggesting that anything positive can come out of a sexual assault. They might think that the only positive thing that could happen is an offender being put in prison or so severely shamed that he or she will never even think about doing something like that again.
  I will admit that I was lucky/blessed at that time in my life. I was seeing a school counsellor on a regular basis to help me deal with the bullying that I was experiencing when the assault happened. I  reported the assault to my counsellor who probably told my mother. At that time what those boys did was not considered to be a crime nor was it something the school felt needed to deal with. After all, boys will be boys, right? I wasn't physically injured and the boys in question had parents that had status in the community. There was really no reason to do anything. I had been told that one of the boys called and apologized to me. I have no memory of this.
  From my counselling sessions, I had been given the idea that what happened was not my fault. This was a huge gift. This was very important. To me, it was the basis for recovery. I was able to build on the fact that I did not cause nor was I at fault for what happened.
  I decided that I wasn't going to let my offenders take anything more from me than they already had. They took my ability to feel safe among larger groups of people. To this day I have a need for a large amount of personal space. If someone I don't know invades my  "bubble" I will do anything from moving discretely away to going into a full body flinch. If I feel threatened in any way shape or form I tend to react on an instinct level which looks like overreacting to those who see it.
  I was not going let those boys take away my sense of self worth. I wasn't going to let them give me the belief that I deserved their assault. I wasn't going to let them take away my ability to decide my own future. I wasn't going to let them make me unable to get an education.
  Another thing that was helpful was being able to take a long view. I'm not sure how I did this. I knew that I was going to graduate from school in five years. Then I could go someplace where I wouldn't be around those boys anymore. I would be able to get away.
  I believe that when something bad happens to you, you have a choice. You have a choice on how you are going to deal with it. You determine the outcome. You can let it make you angry, bitter, hurt and filled with hate. You can let it give you strength, compassion and a desire to help and protect others. You can accept the fact that you will have scars, but those scars will not run your life.
  No one should ever be assaulted. No one deserves an experience like that. It is a bad experience, but it doesn't have to be destroying one.