I have a difficult time with name tags. So many possibilities could fill the blank rectangular space and show the world who I am. I could say “1/32 Native American,” “Possessor of a crooked ring finger,” or if I give up on specifics, I could use my given name, Caroline. But for the past year, one title has been a heavy shadow: “victim.” I see it, hear it, and feel it every day, but never have I written it on my name tag. Instead, I’ve been spending all my time erasing it when it’s written there by others.
I was molested in July 2013. I could first tell you how it felt to have his eerie eyes glance over me, how his touch painted goosebumps all across my skin, or how his body on top of mine far surpassed being swallowed by the weight of the world. I’ve shared those vignettes with many individuals as an attempt to calmly let them sense the screams I couldn’t release, and to find the help I truly needed. But few believed me. My parents were the only people in my life for a majority of my healing period who did not doubt the legitimacy of the event, of my pain, and of my change. My friends and peers rejected it, as they believed I had watched too many Lifetime specials and was attempting to draw attention to myself, by labeling myself a victim. My assault was too real for them; it scared them more than it did me. So they pulled me out from under the bed, and made me the scary monster.
Whether I wanted it to be true or not, this experience marked an entirely new chapter in my life, a painful new beginning. I knew I had a choice to make: either end it, once and for all, or start it, once and forever. I tried both (I’m a multitasker). The former decision was the best failure of my life; the latter came to soothe. Out of the ashes I rose to be stronger, and officially met myself for the first time. I greeted someone with beauties and horrors, flesh and blood, and confounding respect for how one chapter can intertwine in a full story without defining it. Never again shall I underestimate the strength of a memory’s undertow, but as it rivets and weans through my mind I welcome it, allowing it to drip off my auburn curls, kiss the pavement under my feet, and wave goodbye as I travel down the path it lead me to.
My godmother sat down with me for coffee one day, so I could tell her this new chapter of mine. She ended up sharing hers as well. I never knew she had been assaulted in her life, but she told me why it doesn’t label her: “There is so much hate in the world. It is so easy to hate your assaulter. As a woman, a perceived symbol of weakness and prominent victim of rape, it is your duty to be stronger than any other being in the world, and not hate the person who hurt you. Love them, love everyone around you, and say to yourself, ‘I’m glad that it happened to me, because it made me the person I am today.’”
I’m not yet ready to say those words, but I feel their tickling embrace wrapping around me. I do not hold any anger inside me towards the man who hurt me, or towards myself for falling into that experience. I understand the suffering every human endures, and I thank it, for it truly showed me who I am capable of being, and how strong I actually am.
I never wear name tags any more. Instead, I wear incessant exploration, a roaring laugh, and an impenetrable might.
