Last year, I shared a very difficult story–the story of the first time I was sexually assaulted.

I would hope that over time, things would change. That women would worry less about being treated as less than human, simply because of their gender. But the fact that the worst kept secret in Hollywood is now out there for everyone to read about (and that some people still aren’t outraged by it), proves that things don’t seem to change in that area…in some ways, they seem to be getting worse, as women feel that they can’t come forward, or worse, that when they do, they can expect their accusations to be buried, and that they will be the ones to be ostracized, instead of the predator.

The stories coming out of Hollywood are terrible, but sadly, they are not unique to Hollywood. So I’m back this October to tell the story of the first time I was sexually harassed. In some ways, this story is harder to tell, because I was older when it happened, because I understood fully what was going on, and because it had longer-lasting effects. But maybe if more of us share our stories, we will stop feeling like it was somehow our fault, and we will bring this issue to light in a way that it can no longer be ignored.

My freshman year of high school, I signed up to take German I. I was very excited about having this as an option, because it reflected my ethnic heritage. And as is the case in many high school foreign language courses, I got to choose a new name for the year, one that had a German origin.

I picked Katerina. Yes, I know the spelling is a little unusual, but I liked the way it looked when it was written out. And it paid homage to my very favorite childhood figure skater…Katarina Witt. It was fun to get to be Katerina for an hour every school day.

Several students that shared that class with me also rode the same bus as I did. It took me a long time to get to know people in high school, because I had gone to a private grade school, and didn’t know anybody when I started that first day in ninth grade. But slowly, I started to get to know people, and people started to recognize me.

Well, these boys that were in my German class and rode the bus with me did figure out who I was eventually. They always called me Katerina, though…I don’t know if they never bothered to learn my actual name, or if they didn’t care, but they never used my given name to address me. And I didn’t really care, because I figured at least they knew who I was.

Well, one day, on the way home from school, I suddenly wished that none of them knew who I was at all. Because one of the boys from my German class (and one who I had thought was one of the kinder boys, at that), stood up in the seat behind me, and very graphically pretended to ejaculate on my head. In front of everyone. And, of course, everyone laughed. Maybe it was uncomfortable laughter…I hope for at least some of them, that was the case. All I know for sure is that I sat there, completely frozen while my cheeks burned red, and stared straight ahead, wishing I wasn’t there at all.

If that had been the end of it, that would have been bad enough. But for the rest of the time that I was a bus rider, I had a new nickname…Katerina cummy hair. The boys loved to call me that and retell the story and laugh.

Can you even imagine?

I don’t think it even occurred to me to tell someone. Who was I going to tell? The male (and extremely crabby) bus driver? The male principal? The male (and intimidating) dean? I couldn’t even bring myself to tell my parents…how was I going to tell someone in authority?

The worst part (Is that right? I don’t even know…was there a worst part? Was this really the worst part?) is that to those boys, this was supposed to be flattering. Like I was finally accepted by their group. It was no big deal to them. Clearly it was supposed to be no big deal to me.

Except that it was. The fact that I remember it so clearly over 20 years later proves that it was a big deal. The fact that I was embarrassed to recently share this story for the first time with Ryan, whom I have known for 20 years, and whom I have been married to for 16, proves that it was a huge, humiliating deal to me.

I shouldn’t have expected to be told that “boys will be boys.” That it was just words (plus a rather graphic and disgusting action). That it was a joke, that they didn’t mean anything by it, etc., etc., etc. And worst of all, this story is not unique to me. It happens, has happened, will happen, to countless girls of all ages, just like me. And it doesn’t matter how you try to twist it when it happens.

It was a big deal.

It is a big deal.

Those boys did it to make a spectacle of me in front of others, to humiliate me, to show their power over me. What other reason can there possibly be? Excuses won’t cut it, because this isn’t just teasing, and it’s not like someone can accidentally do something like this without knowing that it’s wrong, and without knowing in some way how it will make the other person feel.

They were the ones with the problem, not me. And they were just the tip of the iceberg. Because there have been others since. Men who have catcalled me, made rude remarks, even a teacher who made inappropriate comments to me.  The jerks on the internet who think that they can just send dick pics to me, and I’m what…supposed to appreciate them? Be flattered by them? And don’t even get me started on Pervy McGroperson who assaulted me in the dark of a movie theater while I was sitting next to my then-fiancé. Yes, these are all real, actual examples of things that have happened just to me. Think of how many similar and worse things are happening to women all over the world, every hour of every day. It doesn’t matter how many events have happened to me since that long-ago day in high school, or how many events happen in the future, because like I said last year:

I didn’t ask for it.

I didn’t deserve it.

It wasn’t my fault.

And the same is true for every woman, whether a famous actress or a relative nobody on a school bus, who has been sexually harassed or sexually assaulted.

You didn’t ask for it.

You didn’t deserve it.

It wasn’t your fault.

There are some stories we try to forget, that we bury so deep inside of ourselves, we hope they will never come to the surface. I have a story like that, one that I have pushed away for so long that even Ryan had never heard about it until today, even after knowing me for almost two decades.

This is the story of the first time I was assaulted.

I was eight or nine…I think. I may have been a little younger or a little older. Like I said, I have spent most of my life trying to forget it, so I don’t remember exactly when it happened.

I remember how it happened as clearly as if it was yesterday, though.

I suppose I was lucky…and I use that word loosely, because how lucky is anyone who is assaulted? But my assaulter was someone about my own age, a neighbor kid, not an adult man who might not have been scared off by my reaction, and for that I am thankful.

I don’t know what we were doing before it happened…whatever kids in the 80s did in the summer when they were playing outside, I guess….riding bikes or climbing trees. But out of nowhere, he grabbed my crotch. Hard. Even though he was about my age, he was a big kid, and it was traumatic.

After I ran home, I remember feeling two things. Pain and shame. His actions hurt me physically, to the point where I couldn’t ride my bike for a time. I couldn’t pretend that it hadn’t happened, because there was a physical reminder that I had been violated. It was undoubtedly a painful experience.

But what was worse was the shame. First the shame that someone had touched me there. Even at that age, I knew that no one…not a friend, not a neighbor, not a stranger, was supposed to do that. I was ashamed that it had happened at all.

I felt shame as I told my parents. The words wouldn’t come. How do you tell your parents about something like that? I remember choking the words out, and they were awkward, wooden words, “He touched me on the front of my bottom.” I couldn’t even bring myself to say the actual name of the body part.

The worst shame came, however, when his parents got involved. At first, his mother said I was making the whole thing up. She must have leaned on him, though, because eventually he did admit to it…kind of. He admitted to touching me, but according to his mother, it was my fault. My idea. “She touched, he touched.”

This was the 80s, so that was the end of it. There were no police, no lawsuits…we just weren’t allowed to play together anymore. His mother’s idea, because she didn’t want him around me. Already at a young age, I had been labeled as a harlot for what a boy had done to me. And I was one of the lucky ones, (there’s that word again), because that was all that happened to me. There are so many worse things that could have happened, and I know that. But it’s still not something I would wish upon any other young woman.

I am not sharing this story to jump on a bandwagon, or to titillate, or to make people feel sorry for me. I’m certainly not trying to equate my experience with the trauma experienced by a woman who has been raped. I am sharing it because we have a real problem in this country, and more people need to speak out about it. Back then, I assume he thought that it was ok to treat a girl that way because of something he learned at home. And how sad is that…a young boy being taught that it’s ok to do that to another person? To grab a girl without her consent in a private place? But what happens if someone who thinks that’s an appropriate way to treat women becomes President of the United States? What kind of message does that send to young men about how they should treat women? Then it’s not just a matter of what’s learned at home, it’s about what the most powerful man in the country has condoned, has bragged about doing himself. That is not the kind of man I want as a role model for my sons. That is not a man I want influencing the young men who will date my daughters. This is not a man I want representing our country on a world stage.

If you are a woman who has had a similar experience, it doesn’t matter how old you were, who you were with, where you were or when, or what you were wearing.

You didn’t ask for it.

You didn’t deserve it.

It’s not your fault.

It doesn’t matter what the boy next door, or your boss, or a rich man says about how he treated you. It doesn’t even matter if it’s said by the President of the United Sates. It’s not ok for a woman to be treated that way…it never has been, and it never will be.