“When everything happened to me, I dealt with it as best I could. I acted ‘normal,’ was a good student, my parents didn’t have any idea. I kept pretending everything was fine; I put it in the back of my brain.”

Stephanie was sexually assaulted by her uncle on a regular basis between the ages of four and twelve. Her parents both worked full-time, so her grandmother took care of her during the day. Her uncle is nine years older than her and lived with her grandmother.

Her grandmother caught the abuse happening once early on, but did not tell Stephanie’s parents because she was afraid they wouldn’t let her babysit anymore. Stephanie’s uncle threatened that if she told anyone, she would be in trouble.

She waited seven years after the abuse ended to talk about it; she first told her husband, whom she was dating at the time, and some close friends. “It was something I had kept to myself for so long. It really molded a lot of my thoughts, my feelings, my behaviors. It was this huge burden.”

Stephanie suffered from anxiety, depression, and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) because of the abuse. “Depression lies to you and convinces you that you’re not worth the effort, that it’s not worth getting out of bed.” She found counseling and anti-depression medication helpful.

In college, she started speaking to groups about sexual assault and mental health issues, and sharing her experience became an important part of her healing process. “Hearing someone else talk about it out loud, not hushed whispers, and not in a way that was shameful, made me think that I could talk about it, too. And I did. It was terrifying and liberating."