The first time I was sexually assaulted I was 12. I was at my 7th and 8th grade dance. I wore a red skirt with a red sparkly top. I remember this outfit so well because after that night I never wore that outfit again. I even bought special red heels for the occasion. It was stupid but it was my first dance and I wanted to look nice. I wasn't dressing because I want attention. I wore what I wore because I felt good about myself in that moment, and I hate that I was robbed of that confidence. When I got to the dance I felt people staring at me, I got anxious. I talked with friends, and I felt better after a while. But that's when they came up to me. There was a group of guys in my 7th grade class that were jerks. They wanted to dance with me so I agreed thinking nothing of it, until my skirt was lifted and I felt someone's hands on me. They touched my legs and my butt. But it was over in a second. Nobody else noticed. I didn't know who touched me, I still don't know. This persisted throughout the night. These guys would touch my chest, and make jokes about me, and openly laugh and talk about me in a derogatory manner. There were too many of them. I felt like I did something wrong. I felt like it was my fault. Like I was asking for it. I wasn't. I didn't want this. I've never talked about this with anybody until this year. I guess I just repressed it until I was mentally stable enough to handle it. Now the process of dealing with this has begun. And I hate it. Because reliving these moments in PTSD flashbacks are pure terror, and almost anything can be a trigger. It almost doesn't feel real. It feels like this never happened because I haven't talked about it until now and I've never fully processed it. Now I understand what happened to me over the course of two years. The sickest part is, those boys didn't think they were doing anything wrong. They thought it was fun and normal and not at all damaging to me. I feel like they stole a part of me. My innocence maybe, I'm not sure. But I feel like a part of me is now gone. I still know them all to this day. I go to high school with some of them. I'm almost 17 now and I'm disgusted with myself for not fighting back. I'm disgusted because I didn't know what was going on at the time because nobody talked about sexual assault to me. Nobody ever explained what happens and how quickly it can happen. Nobody ever talks about how anybody can be assaulted and how anybody can be the offender. If there is one thing I wish to change about 2017 is for people to learn about sex crimes. I don't want to grow up in a world where a huge portion of the population can't even give an accurate definition of sexual assault. I knew what self respect was before the dance, but I never imagined anybody would take away my self respect by touching me. It's disgusting and cowardly to do this to another human being. If I could rewind the clock and tell somebody to call the police I would. I don't care if people think that's irrational whoever assaulted me deserves to understand the severity of his crime and how badly he damaged me. I unfortunately still don't know who it was. There were too many guys. I couldn't tell whose hands were whose it was all very overwhelming. Nothing I can do about it now but tell my story. So other people know that they aren't alone. I want to make sure nobody ever feels the way I do again. It's not just, it's not fair, and it needs to be stopped.
