The following is a guest post by Deb Schmidt-Rogers. It orginally appeared on her blog dschmidtrogers.wordpress.com.
33 years ago, my family was changed in a moment of sexual violence that you only read about in the papers. We all know the statistics about rape. Somewhere in America, a women is raped every two minutes, according to the U.S. Department of Justice. One in four women are victims of rape or attempted rape, 84% of those women knew their attacker, 57% of the rapes have happened while on dates. About 42% of the victims told no one, 38 % of the women raped are between the ages of 14-17. 75% of men and 55% of the women involved in date rape had been drinking or taking drugs before the attack occurred.
My sister was 16 years old at the time. It was the last of a string of lovely fall days and instead of taking the ride offered to her, she opted to walk home from work. She was not in the 84%. Her rape took place at the hands of a stranger, in the forest preserve where he dragged her off the busy street with no one paying attention. He raped her multiple times and told her not to tell anyone because he knew where she lived. She walked home when he was done with her. Her rape was reported in the newspaper – the last reported rape of the “Jogging Rapist”.
Her rape was her first sexual experience. It was the first time that she experienced fear, and was the last time she ever prayed “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us”. Her rape forever changed my family. She was the happy one, the only one who could ‘defy’ my father and have him laugh about it. She did not take life seriously, she was always happy and smiling. 33 years later I rarely hear her laugh, her smiles come for her children only.
I was 20 years old at the time and attending college at Loyola University. My parents called me very early the next morning, and while I have no memory of this my roommates tell me that I was destructive in the room. I only remember crying. My brother was in college at Northwestern at the time and we took the el home together not speaking.
What do you say when you walk into the house and see your little sister bruised physically and emotionally? How do you begin the conversation? How do you heal? I remember my father crying and I overheard him say to my mom, “I am afraid to hug her, to touch her. What will she think, what will she do?” As a parent, how do you feel when the child you were supposed to protect was alone when she needed you the most?
She had flashbacks for years. I witnessed several of them and learned to just be quiet and let her experience them. It took years before we talked about the details of the rape, before she was okay to tell us the memories she still has about this event. Her children do not know she was raped.
As an adult, the word rape is one that I want kept for the most heinous of crimes. Sexual assault does not sound harsh enough to me. When I hear people say that humans are “raping” the earth I want to shout NO…people get raped. When I see and hear and experience rape culture each and every day of my life I think of my sister. And it does happen each and every day. My sister used to speak about rape culture and she wrote several articles about rape culture – it was one way she tried to heal. She tells me that she will never be whole, never be healed but that you learn to live daily with the memories and the pain and the altered life.
Today I will call my sister and tell her that I love her and I am thinking of her. My husband finds this to be an odd tradition in my family but each of her siblings and my parents will call and tell her the same thing. She is a beautiful woman, a woman deserving of hope and of healing and she needs to hear that message as often as we can say it.
In my work I often think of the rapes that go unreported. Seeing my sister struggle to regain some sense of normalcy (which literally took 15 years) I wonder about the women I pass each day on campus. Who is holding them close when they relive their rape? Who is telling them they are deserving of hope and healing? Who calls them to say they are loved?
SISTER by Cris Williamson
Born of the earth, Child of God…just one among the family.
And you can count on me to share the load, and I will always help you
hold your burdens and I will be the one to help you ease your pain.
Lean on me I am your sister; believe on me, I am your friend.
Lean on me I am your sister; believe on me, I am your friend.
Lean on me I am your sister; believe on me, I am your friend.
I will fold you in my arms like a white wing dove…
Shine in your soul , your spirit is crying…spirit is crying.
Born of the earth, Child of God…just one among the family.
And you can count on me to share the load,
and I will always help you hold your burdens and I will be the one to help
you ease your pain.
Lean on me I am your sister; believe on me, I am your friend.
Lean on me I am your sister; believe on me, I am your friend.
Lean on me I am your sister; believe on me, I am your friend.