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One survivor’s reflections: Sometimes I try to imagine what it would be like to live in a body that wasn’t repeatedly touched, fondled, and/or used without my consent. My relationship to my body has been shaped by all these experiences of people touching me against my will, since I was a kid. When I was raped at age 23, it felt weirdly unsurprising and familiar because I had experienced so much non-consensual sexual touching in my life already. I decided to make a map of my body that shows where people have touched me against my will. Why do I want to share this with the world? 1. To say, “Hey! This is what sexual assault looks like (or can look like). Recognize it! Acknowledge it!” 2. To share what has happened to me as a part of my own healing process. 3. To bring attention to the complex, confusing, and deeply internalized ways that non-consensual touching can affect a person. I am trying to reclaim my body as my own – to unlearn all of the experiences that have taught me that my body exists for other people’s whims, and to proclaim that I am the ruler of my body – the only person who gets to decide what I do with it. I have bodily autonomy and I will not give it up!  |