Trust Women

TW: Sexual assault.

I have been trying to write this one story for years. They say to write what you know, so I'm trying to write what I know, but what I know isn't pretty. What I know is not something the bookshelves want to hear. You see, I'm a twenty-year-old woman -- naïve and bright-eyed and strange -- and I have to believe that doesn't make what I know any less real or painful. But God forbid I make art about what I know. You see, they say women with abdominal pain wait, on average, sixteen minutes longer than men in the emergency room because doctors assume their grievances are exaggerated, so if I place my emotional pain on the table to be evaluated, who is going to listen? Time and time again, women are told, like children, to sit down, sit still, sit quiet. And since I'm barely an adult to begin with, who is going to believe me?

**

Once, I saw a two hundred year-old spine in a museum in Copenhagen. It came from a young woman who had lost a long-ago battle to osteoporosis, and my first thought was to wonder whether or not the doctor believed her before the coroner ripped her to pieces and dug out her backbone, asking myself if we only trust women to tell the truth after we kill them.

Once, I read an article about domestic abuse, the kind published on Valentine's Day to remind us that love shouldn't look like gunshot wounds and bruises. "Women seldom overestimate," it said. And I thought about every woman who didn't leave because she didn't want to be the one who overestimated. You see, women are told we cry wolf over spilled glasses of white wine, so when the real wolves are the people who sleep in our beds each night, we learn it is smarter to whisper. Then they demand to know why women don't just speak up, already.

Once, This American Life ran a fifty-eight minute story about a sexual assault case in which nobody believed the eighteen-year-old victim, and had the audacity to title the episode, "Anatomy of Doubt," as if accusing young women of lying is a biological predisposition. After hearing it, I counted out the women I loved who had been sexually assaulted and ran out of fingers before remembering to include myself because, fuck, what if I made it all up, too?

Once, at Florida State, a freshman reported rape, and nobody believed her. Once, at Harvard Law, a third-year reported rape, and nobody believed her.
Once, at Berkeley.
Once, at Hobart and William Smith.
Once, at Columbia.
Once, at UVA.
Once, at Yale.

And nobody ever believes her.

Once, I had a sticker on my laptop that read, "Trust Women," and I peeled it off before the first day of class because the statement felt too controversial.

Once, a man in writing workshop told me my story about depression was "angsty," while the thirty-something's story about "drunken whores" was "edgy," confirming my suspicion that anytime pain comes from a young woman's mouth, it's an embellishment of the truth, but the minute her pain is co-opted by a man's hand, it's art. Zelda overshadowed by Scott, Sylvia outlived by Ted, Frida outcast by Diego -- these women taught me you can use ink made out of your own blood, paintbrushes from your own bones, and you will still be told to step aside so the authentic artists can work.

I have been trying to write this one story for years, a story that's not pretty, a story about the pain I've experienced as a woman at the age of twenty. But every time I sit down to type, the Word document takes up too much space, and my anger takes up too much space, and I take up too much space. Close without saving, shut the laptop.

Sit down, sit still, sit quiet.

I have been trying to write this one story for years, a story that's not pretty, a story about the pain I've experienced as a woman at the age of twenty. But if I don't write it down, and soon, who will?