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October 7th, 2019

Drugged

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..I had gone to a concert with some friends at a smaller venue. One of my friends knew one of the guys in the band so we were kind of hanging out with the band, etc. They invited us up to the bus. I remember the tour manager handing me...
September 23rd, 2019

No Comfort

2
I woke up today feeling especially withdrawn. I’m sure it has to do with the thoughts I had last night of my latest rapist getting away with what he did to me. God it makes me sick that there’s been more than one. Sometimes the thought sends me directly to...
June 14th, 2014

Confused

0
When I was 15 years old I had gotten a Facebook message from a guy telling me I was beautiful and that he wanted to take me out for coffee. After he asked me if I wanted to hang out at his place and I went. I had fount out...
August 22nd, 2022

Fraternity gang rape

1
This is something I have never shared online before only with close family and my current partner. When I was freshly 19 I moved to Eastern Washington University to start school as a freshman. I had just gotten out of a long term relationship and would be attending school with...
July 24th, 2019

LOST

3
When I was 5 years old, I was sexually assaulted by many men. The next day I tried to kill myself. At the age of 10, I was raped and again tried to end it by ending my life. I also am a survivor of FASD and there for not...
June 5th, 2019

Christianity teaches men to treat women like...

3
I was born into a Christian household, 12 siblings, my mum was pregnant with twins,when I was 19, the guy I started dating (courting) was perfect in the eyes of my father, he has 8 siblings and both attended the same Christian church. We married after 3 months, on our...
April 21st, 2021

A respectable collegue

1
The next day I walked down the stairs to the hotel, aware that he was sitting at the table having breakfast. Some things you think would never happen to you, you think that working externally with a colleague (married and with children) is not dangerous. But then in a moment...
May 24th, 2019

The Statistics that Changed Me

2
2 sexual assaults and 1 rape… the statistics of my story. I can’t promise that this story is pleasant, but I can tell you that power and growth comes with telling it. So sincerely, thank you for hearing me out. October 2017 I was in Chebut, Argentina(a part of the...
August 17th, 2019

My/our German “Weinstein” Case

6
My name is Jany Tempel. I live both in Germany and Thailand. I turned public now, to end the big silence of our country. Almost twenty years ago I had already written a novel about my arduous life. The book wasn’t published back then, mainly because I reported on crimes...
October 28th, 2019

I was carrying his daughter.

2
I’m in a tough spot. I was seeing a therapist for recurring nightmares and was diagnosed with PTSD. Due to some financial limitations recently I’ve had to stop seeing her and it’s been very difficult. So I thought maybe I would give this a try. I’m sorry this is kind...
July 16th, 2020

Mental Breakdown

2
My life’s a mess at 19, but I don’t like complaining to people (friends + family) because I don’t want to burden someone else with my problems, and to be honest nobody really cares like that, I don’t want to project myself as this ‘weak abused girl’ so later on...
December 30th, 2020

Miss

1
I got raped nearly 14 years ago now, it never gets easier over time im constantly numb, painless and confused. I’ve never felt what it is to be normal I always feel unwanted, scared and betrayed. The police never did anything, didn’t arrest him, didn’t question him they said they...
April 27th, 2019

Everyone Else Likes You, Too

2
I had never been to a bar before. Sure, I’d gone out to Applebees with other coworkers where they’d serve me drinks. But I was 19, and had to drive home. I had never been drunk before, and didn’t push my limits. I went to the bar to see him...
July 25th, 2023

Older

1
When I was 16, I was introduced to a 24 year old retired marine who has had a very difficult life. We became friends first and I wanted to help him through his breakup and fix his depression. We then started dating. A few months into the relationship, after I...
December 5th, 2020

Summer 2019

1
I got my first job working at a lovely Mediterranean restaurant/cafe one summer because my teacher said she knew the man who ran the place and put in a reference for me. I was 15. He was in his 60s. Two days after I started, the groping began. Only he...
September 8th, 2019

Frozen in fear

2
I thank you for your story. I have kept silent about all my traumas for most of my life. In the last 2 years I have started my healing journey and still have a hard time sharing with anyone but my therapist. I mostly have shamed myself because of how...
August 26th, 2019

Family members ex husband

2
I was 5 years old going through heart surgery when he would come home late from work drunk, or high or his normal scary self and he would come into my room and put his hands down my pants and feel my butt I would act like I couldn’t feel...
November 15th, 2020

J’avais 13 ans

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J’avais 13 ans j’étais allé avec mon amie chez un gars pour la soirée ils étaient trois gars et c’etait la première fois que je buvais de l’alcool et ce gars qui s’appelle pascal m’a agressé. Je ne l’ai dis a personne et j’ai fait comme si rien ne s’était...
December 22nd, 2015

Is There Still Hope

6
I was 9 or 10 when it happen it’s pretty sad because I don’t remember much. I was at my best friend’s house and we were playing with her brother downstairs in his room. So we ended up sleeping down there and I woke up to him raping me. I...
June 24th, 2020

Too naïve

3
I was 16. I had my first job, a lifeguard. I was so excited. I have been a swimmer since I was 5 so this was a very fitting job for me. I was the youngest person working there by far. Most of the kids were in college and one...
December 26th, 2019

Ms.

2
I was raped by a co-worker when I was in my mid-20’s. We were at a work function, we were all drinking, then about 10 of us went to his place to continue the party. He grabbed me on my way out of the washroom and dragged me into his...
May 6th, 2022

My Ongoing Journey

1
When I finally decided to switch my major to psychology and now pursue my career as a therapist, I got a lot of questions. Things like, why do you want to be a therapist? I got this from family, friends, and even strangers back in the time I served tables....
October 18th, 2019

First boyfriend raped me when i was...

2
I was 14, he was 17. Both from priveledged white families in Australia. He regularly gave me vodka on the weekends, then on 3 occasions, undressed me and had sex with me when I was unconscious and drunk.
May 8th, 2019

Spoke out and was blamed

3
I am the only girl at a job of 4 men. I am also 20 while these men are 40+. One worker would grab me from behind when I would walk in the back to the bathroom. This would happen often. One day all my coworkers had to go outside...
October 12th, 2023

Workplace Sexual Harassment

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As I write this story to you, please note that this sexual harassment case is still in progress. It began in December of 2022 when I worked as a contractor for a company named TEKsystems. I do IT work for Nutrien Ag Solutions. The first week I was there, I...
January 2nd, 2016

It Was the Second

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This story may not be relevant. But when I was 11 yrs old, I was almost raped by my aunt’s, husbands, uncle. I had such an uncomfortable feeling when I was around him…. well, I’ll just get to the point. He was a guest, so my aunt asked me to...
March 13th, 2023

He was my younger brothers friend

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My younger brother who is over a year younger had a friend. I saw him often, and he came over to the house a lot. His friend is younger than me as well. He was always mean to me and excluded me when I wanted to hang out with them....
August 30th, 2019

My story growing up with a secret

2
I’m a black South African, I’m 40 years old now, and my son it 20 years old… loved, taught but I still can never live him alone with my nieces as I was left alone and violeted💔💔😭😭 I have spoken about this, but I hate putting this down in writting😭😭...
April 29th, 2019

Broken Girl

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My abuse began at 7 years old at the hands of my 1/2 brother. This went on for almost 8 years. I never spoke a word because he brutally raped me… and my 3 year old sister. He used sharp items, which caused an enormous amount of vaginal scarring. I...
May 10th, 2019

I was raped for 3 years

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My uncle raped me for three years saying if i told anyone id be sent away and my family would hate me. It was repeated. It started when i was 13 and ended when i told on him when i was 16. My aunt called a lying whore and half...
April 16th, 2009

Thank you

1
I am a survivor of sexual abuse and rape. As a child my father repeatedly raped both my sister and I until we were adopted by my step-father. I suffered from selective amnesia and didn’t remember much of my youth until I was a freshman in college and began having...
October 9th, 2022

When My Body Wasn’t Mine.

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I remember the times where my body wasn’t mine. When you grabbed my barely developing body forcefully. And my small body with little to no strength could not fight back. Could not take away your hands from places that were supposed to be private. Places that were supposed to be...
October 16th, 2019

I was a kid, you were my...

2
My first memory of being touched in such an unpure way was when I was three or four. I lived with my grandparents on my bio dad’s side. My step- Grandma would molest me while my grandpa would watch NASCAR next to us. I don’t think he knew, but who...
August 17th, 2019

My/our German “Weinstein” Case

6
My name is Jany Tempel. I live both in Germany and Thailand. I turned public now, to end the big silence of our country. Almost twenty years ago I had already written a novel about my arduous life. The book wasn’t published back then, mainly because I reported on crimes...
September 18th, 2019

Raped in the Air Force

2
My first duty stationed 28 years ago, i was sexually assaulted by my first supervisor and violently raped by an officer in my unit. The violence of that raped, ruined me for a long time. Suffer from severe PTSD and after 31 years i am being forced out of the...
March 5th, 2021

7 years and it still controls me

1
I seen him today. The exe who thought he had the right to just take what he wanted. It’s like you need you moved on. That your okay. Then ask if takes is to see him and can’t breathe. I froze. I just turned around and wanted to run. I...
April 15th, 2019

raped as a lone solidier in israeli...

2
Hi Linor I was raped by the חובש on my base in the army. Unitl today – almost daily I think about it. At the age of 18 I was a young naive virgin from Australia. I moved to Israel by myself. The guy that raped me, ALL the girls...
September 6th, 2019

Breaking the silence

2
I know what it’s like to feel like you have lost a part of yourself that you weren’t ready to give up. I know what it’s like to not recognize who you see in the mirror. I know what it’s like to cry until your eyes swell shut. I know...
July 10th, 2019

So drunk I can’t remember

4
I was turning 18. I was partying like any teen would. I drank a lot. I threw up, sat down. They picked me up and put me in their car. They said “don’t worry we’ll take care of you. You won’t miss the bus”. I remember lying on the bed...
May 19th, 2022

It started with you.

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When I was 16, I was socially awkward, shy and kept to myself. I had a small group of friends and didn’t venture far from them. At home, I was funny, happy and played the annoying little sister act pretty well. I was known for being respectful, caring and well...
April 1st, 2021

Sex doll

1
After work one night I was drugged by a co-worker. I woke up in his bed naked. He was not in the room. I felt 2 emotions very heavily and immediately. Shame and wrong. I remember looking around for my clothes in a panic. I don’t remember how I got...
August 18th, 2019

Abusée par un voisin de mes grands...

2
Bonjour chère Linor, Je suis en train de regarder Brave Miss World. Merci! Je témoigne car j’en ai peu parlé dans ma vie. J’avais 4 ou 5 ans. Je vivais avec mes grands-parents et ils me posaient parfois le samedi chez la voisine qui me gardait pour aller à un...
June 8th, 2023

Unethical or illegal?

1
Last year my partner and I worked for the same business. It was a small business near a small town and it had no management or HR of any sort – only one man owned and ran it, even though it served thousands of people each year. I hit it...
February 4th, 2021

Raped at the Air Force Academy

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In 2002 I was appointed to the Air Force Academy Preparatory School in Colorado Springs, CO. The prep school was a sort of booster school for people who wanted to be at the Academy but fell short of their appointment. It could have been due to grades, SAT/ACT scores, athletics,...
June 20th, 2021

Your truth will change someones’ life.

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Brave Miss World is the first time I knew someone understands the gravity and the depth of what sexual violence does to the souls of the victims but their families. The battle to reclaim my soul’s back is the hardest work I will ever face. The internal growth is where...
March 25th, 2022

Marital Rape

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My husband raped me through the night of February 7th 2020. I was unconscious due to prescription medication taken after being in a car accident two months prior. Police arrested my husband. He posted 25k bail and got out the very next day. Bruises on my stomach and my hips....
September 8th, 2019

Frozen in fear

2
I thank you for your story. I have kept silent about all my traumas for most of my life. In the last 2 years I have started my healing journey and still have a hard time sharing with anyone but my therapist. I mostly have shamed myself because of how...
August 26th, 2020

Stranger, Friend, Lawyer, and Youth Leader

3
People have accused me of being a liar and the one with whom the fault lies… repeatedly. They use statistics to give themselves a platform to shame me or to feel better about their lives, because they don’t want to face reality. The reality is that statistics are not always...
August 21st, 2019

I didn’t know

2
It’s started at such a young age , I didn’t know what he was doing wasn’t okay , I didn’t know that being touched there wasn’t okay , I didn’t know that the things he was doing wasn’t okay , I was confused , conflicted , he begged me not...
October 15th, 2022

Male dancer

1
Hello my Name is Tj. This happen about 4 years ago I was 19 years old at very young age I always tried to see the good in people. I was always happy and felt nothing could break me down went threw cancer as a baby lost my brother and...
June 29th, 2020

My story

1
Hey, I’m an 18 year old girl, living in central germany with a special story. When I was younger I’ve always been interested in different languages and i always wanted to improve my language skills. So when I was 16 years old right before my birthday i’ve decided to look...
December 2nd, 2019

Nerve damage

2
I was raped by someone that was supposed to be my boyfriend when I was 11. When I was 20, I fell in love with a men 2 years older then me. We went out for 2.5 years. None of the sexual activity in this relationship was consensual. I am...
January 11th, 2016

My Family My Love

0
I had always been close with my family. My family is everything to me. We were kids he was only a year older than me…he was my cousin. He was my first kiss, the first boy to tell me I was pretty and I fell in love with him. It...
June 10th, 2021

Date Rape

2
I was visiting family in Texas and I decided to go on a dating app for a hookup. I felt guilty because I was young and I never told him my age, we went to his hotel because he was on a business trip. I remember taking one shot and...
December 2nd, 2020

Mrs

1
I think I may have been raped, nearly 20 years ago. I was staying at my boyfriends house (now ex) at the time. We were young (17) and I was a virgin as we’d decided to wait to progress our relationship. One night I stayed over at his parents house,...
March 17th, 2023

Indigo

I returned to fine art in 1990 when I took at class in indigo dyeing at San Francisco State University. I was lucky that the instructor, Yoshiko Wada, and another student from her class, were in the East Bay so that we could carpool together. We would talk textiles on our weekly journey across the Bay Bridge to the Campus. The other student was an accomplished Quilter named Linda MacDonald. Linda lived in Willits near the famous Mendocino Art Center, but traveled to Berkeley to attend this class once a week. The Indigo vat was made in a 32-gallon garbage can and had to be kept covered between dyeing sessions. Indigo is a unique rich blue dye that develops with an oxidization process when exposed to air. Dipping the fabric several times, and allowing the natural fiber to oxidize before dipping it again, creates darker shades of blue. The dye in the vat is created from a mixture of indigo pigment, various chemicals and a reducing agent to remove oxygen from the dye. It is a rich green color while in the vat, which shows up on the fabric before it is fully exposed to the air. The smell emitted from the dye is unusual, a musky odor in my mind. I like to think that it smells like the color blue. The vat needs to be carefully stirred and maintained between dyeing sessions. There is a “bloom” on the top of the vat created by oxidized indigo, making a bubbly and shiny ball of material reminiscent of a flower. The “bloom” gets moved to the side before entry of the pre-wetted fabric. The process reminds me of baking bread or making yogurt where the steps need to be carefully followed to achieve the desired results. In the process of bread and yogurt making, there are living cultures involved in order to create the product, and with the creation and dyeing process of indigo, it has that same feeling of being alive. In order to create interesting patterns, my classmates and I would use resist techniques on the fabric like pastes, stitching and clamping. Simple household items like clothespins could be used to create patterns by folding and then placing the pins at intervals along the fold lines. Beautiful and surprising results were achieved using these methods. Image of Indigo dye on fabric during the oxidization process. My dream of being a professional artist, all started in early childhood, and the first memories of my creations go back to Nursery School. I loved playing with all kinds of materials, like paint, clay, and crayons, just to name a few examples. Mel (Melanie), painting at Jack and Jill Nursery School, Walnut Creek, California, 1960. In 1974, a neighbor in Marin where I was living at the time and studying art at College of Marin told me about an Art School in Mexico. I ended up sending off slides of my work with an application to the Instituto Allende, and was delighted to hear that I was accepted. I began my journey to study there in San Miguel de Allende by flying to Mexico City in January of 1975. A bus ride completed that journey. When I first arrived, I moved in with a family who had two small children, including a newborn. It seemed like a safe living situation for a 19-year-old woman, but that shortly proved to not be true when the husband started coming on to me. I ended up finding my own place on the other side of town. It was a spacious abode with a wall that was shared with a weaving factory next door. There were 2 adjoined bedrooms, a bathroom, a large living/kitchen area and a small concrete patio out the back door. There was no hot water, refrigerator or a telephone. When I needed hot water for dishes, I would boil some on the stove. For showers, I had to build a fire in a box below a water tank outside to get hot water. I felt much more secure living there and walking a further distance to the Instituto on the other side of town than living with the husband who had made me feel so unsafe. There was the Central Plaza, which was called the “Jardin” that was in the middle of town, and I would pass through it on my walk quite frequently. This was the site of fireworks and festivals, like the celebration of Cinco de Mayo. The streets were cobblestone and many charming shops and galleries were located downtown. The School itself was on a beautiful campus with large ornate doors in front that were closed when school was not in session. Photo of the closed front doors of the Instituto Allende I had heard about you and what you had done to other women before you appeared in my main living space one sunny spring afternoon pointing a gun at me. You had a bandana wrapped around your face and tied behind your head. I had heard you first, in the bathroom. Dressed in a long polyester dress with colorful psychedelic patterns. I wasn’t wearing any underwear or shoes. I walked through the 2 bedrooms and turned left when I saw you standing there. I screamed and shouted, “help me,” thinking that workers at the Weaving Factory would hear me and come rescue me. Nobody came. You said to me “Coyote” which I later learned meant to be quiet or to shut up. You grabbed my shoulders and dragged me out the unlocked back door onto the concrete patio. The tops of my feet got scraped. I gave up. I knew you were going to rape me. I just wanted you to finish as quickly as possible. You took off your belt and put down your gun. Somehow I managed to pick up your gun and threw it over the wall embedded with glass on the top, into the alleyway. The same wall you had climbed over to get into my place through the unlocked back door. Towards the end of this ordeal, I heard a knock on my door. You left, climbing back over the wall. I answered the door. My friend Rhonda had come by to visit me. I told her what had happened and we walked to the Police Station nearby. I had your belt with me. The one you left behind. I went to the front counter, telling the officers behind the counter what had happened to me. They were laughing and playing cards at the time. I showed them your belt. They told me to bring you in if I saw you again. I left with Rhonda and took a bath at the where place she lived. We didn’t talk about what happened. We moved in together shortly after that. I sent a telegram to my father and stepmother about what had happened to me. Nobody came to help me. Rhonda helped me when I got hepatitis A and could no longer go to school. I was on my own when it came to figuring out how to return to the Bay Area. I moved in with my father and stepmother. They didn’t talk to me about what happened to me. They sent me to a doctor who diagnosed me with type 1 diabetes. He showed me how to give myself insulin injections. He told me to practice by injecting oranges with empty syringes. My mother told me years later that “You were never the same again” after what you did to me. I survived. I gave up art for 15 years before realizing that I wanted to go back to art school. In those years, I became so disturbed that I had panic attacks, deep depression and needed to move in with my mother at age 30. I started therapy after becoming self destructive in my 20’s. Depression also called “the blues” has been my long time companion. It has taken me a lifetime to heal. My iPhone predicts the words, depression, PTSD and C-PTSD for my text messages. After my Indigo dyeing class at San Francisco State, I enrolled in the Textiles Fine Art program at California College of Arts and Crafts (now known as California College of the Arts) in Oakland. I was married at the time and had become pregnant with our daughter Emily right before classes started in September. Emily was born on May 13, 1991. By the Fall of 1992, I was a single mom and an art student. An inheritance from my mother who died in 1995, allowed me to graduate and to buy my first home. I continued to work with indigo dyeing and created a large textile piece about my experience in Mexico. After many years of therapy and other healing modalities, I recently started painting on canvas. Part of that process has been a Soul Retrieval session to bring back my 4 year old self who loved to paint. I am feeling uplifted and encouraged after many years of recurring periods of severe emotional pain. Stay tuned for more details about my new work. One of my final pieces was a textile called “Out of the Blues.”
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I returned to fine art in 1990 when I took at class in indigo dyeing at San Francisco State University. I was lucky that the instructor, Yoshiko Wada, and another student from her class, were in the East Bay so that we could carpool together. We would talk textiles on...