I stand with Dolores Huerta and every single survivor of rape and sexual violence.

As a child, I was repeatedly sexually assaulted and abused by a friend of my birth father. The abuse lasted for years, and fundamentally broke every beautiful sacred thing within me before I ever had the opportunity to experience love or safety.

In my 20s, I was kept as property by a man who raped me on a daily basis–sometimes 2-3 times per day. That was the LEAST violent of things he did to me on a regular basis, and I literally survived by fleeing 7 states and going into hiding for years.

As a result of the abuse I endured, I have experienced 2 miscarriages, because my body is too “broken” to maintain. I have scars, and wounds, and am in chronic pain most of the time.

It took me years to be able to open up about what happened to me in my 20s, and I have spent years going through therapy, 12 steps, small group, etc to heal from my experiences with sexual and domestic violence. When I started healing, I got some support but more judgement and disgust. I lost friends, lost family, and have people who still to this day send me threatening messages about coming forward.

I did not disclose to another living soul about the years of sexual abuse I survived as child until I was 36 years old, and I only started doing so because I was told the man who abused me had died. It took until I was 36 years old, and knew this man was underground, before I felt even one minute of safety in telling my story.

And today, when I share my experience of surviving childhood sexual abuse, I still get these questions:

1. What were you wearing?
I was 4 years old.

2. What did you do to encourage him?
I was 4 years old.

3. Why did you let him do it for so long?
I was 4 years old.

4. Did you like it? You probably liked it.
I WAS 4 YEARS OLD.

5. You understand that this was God’s plan for your rapist, right? To do this to you and then be redeemed?
I was 4 years old.

6. Why didn’t you tell someone sooner? Do you feel like you are responsible for him raping someone else because you were a coward?
I WAS FOUR YEARS OLD.

Women have been destroyed at the hands of sexual violence since the start of time, yet survivors still have to deal with this disgusting daily stigma that it was “our fault”, or that we “probably liked it”. We still have to combat spiritual leaders, politicians, and community advocates doubling down on men’s right to rape over a woman’s right to exist in safety.

The ONLY person “responsible” in a sexual assault is the PERSON WHO IS RAPING ANOTHER HUMAN BEING, PERIOD.

I stand with Dolores Huerta.
I stand with the survivors of Jeffrey Epstein and every person in his cabal of evil.
I stand with any person who has had to rebuild the pieces of their life around the destruction of their body and their spirit.

We are not alone.

📷: Me at the age I was when the abuse started.