Speaking Now
I wasn't ready until I was ready.
This edition of SARATONIN references an October 12, 2023 story published by Rolling Stone. I link it here with a trigger warning for abuse and alcohol addiction.
I have chosen to hand the burden I have carried back to the one who gave it to me.
Thank you to kind folks for being kind. Your messages mean so much to me. I kept my mouth shut for many reasons, one of which was that I didn’t want to disappoint fans of the podcast. Some are my friends. I didn’t want to negatively affect the thing they loved.
I was not egotistical enough to think my own story could cause a disruption in the production of an extraordinarily popular project with which I have no relationship. I never resented anybody for enjoying what was, by all accounts, a very fun program. I just didn’t want to bum my friends out. Telling some of them felt like killing Santa Claus.
I did not see the story before it came out. I asked other people to read it first. I worked with my 12 step program to feel safe and secure enough to read it. I asked my mom to sit in the room with me while I read it. I am almost 43 years old. I was shaking but reading it made me feel less scared somehow.
I’m still terrified, I promise. But I realize now that by trying so fucking hard to build walls around myself against people who would say I was a stupid liar (or worse, try to hurt me or my loved ones) that I was also keeping out the people who could help me.
Alcoholics tend to isolate. Depressives tend to isolate. Agoraphobes specialize in isolation. Speaking up about this has been hard because it goes against things that feel ancient to me, modes of being that feel primal.
I know how it feels to be disappointed by an artist or artists you admire. It sucks. Fandom can be a beautiful thing. It can be a place to find genuine friends, not just because you like the same thing, but because you feel similar feelings. Maybe you’ve been through similar stuff. Maybe it helps you to laugh or cry or sing along with whatever it is you adore. That can be lifesaving.
I didn’t want to shit on anyone’s good thing.
I couldn’t hear the voices on that podcast or see the logo. Sometimes I came across it accidentally and I would shake. I saw a bumper sticker for it on a car and I had to lay down for a few hours in my room. It was daylight, which was good, because nighttime used to remind me of some bad things. That’s so sad - I’m a Scorpio, dammit. I should love the dark! I usually do! Except when I remember.
I once agreed to do a podcast that I hadn’t realized was on that particular podcast network. I honored my commitment and had a wonderful time. I thought I must be a stupid baby for still being so shaken up over something that had happened a decade prior. I thought I should get over it.
I’ve never been able to listen to that episode. Those hosts of the particular show I was on - they are good guys. They had nothing to do with what that other man did. They had no way of knowing about it. They didn’t know until they read the story in RS. They have been incredibly kind to me. They have my respect and my gratitude.
I think some of the women who came forward first must be around the age I was when it happened to me. To those women: I do not know you, but I know her, the young woman I was. I know how that young woman worked so hard to not breathe loud enough to wake up the person she loved who terrified her.
I remember that young woman thinking, “If he assaults me further, I hope it doesn’t hurt too much.” I remember her thinking, “I can’t yell for help. I don’t want to wake up his roommates. I don’t want to embarrass him or myself. I don’t want to bother them. I don’t want to make this their problem.”
Reading the article was wild because it says folks knew back then about me and somebody else getting hurt. It was an open secret, according to the article. I guess I shouldn’t have felt so embarrassed.
I remember thinking I was “so lucky.” No broken bones. No bruise. No rape. Why couldn’t I just get over it? I legitimately loved that guy, in the way that it was possible for me to love somebody back then.
Those long hours of waiting for the sun to come up…those are frozen in my mind. I had a night last week where I lay in bed (not in New York) and felt like I was right there again, back then. Waiting for the sun to come up. Knowing people would be awake.
I told my psychiatrist I felt like I was getting the flu, had gotten hit by a truck, and also somehow had taken the shittiest time travel adventure ever. Turns out that’s “normal” for people with PTSD. I get it now.
If you other women who spoke up first had not done so, I would not have changed. I had done a lot to distance myself from that whole world, after years of fawning and pretending and making nice. I wanted so badly for it to have been a one-time thing.
I thought I was the biggest piece of shit the world ever revolved around (to borrow from a 12 step saying I’ve always thought was funny) and if it happened to anybody else and I found out it would be my fault.
There’s a narcissistic aspect to self-loathing. Those of you who spoke up made me get my head out of my own ass and really look at these past many years.
I read your stories and promptly experienced an onslaught of dissociation, suicidal ideation, panic, and more. I had felt these things at different times over the years but never all at once, in this simultaneous cacophony.
I thank these women for this painful, necessary gift. I cried a lot. I was afraid of the dark. I started using a nightlight or a candle again. I started triple checking all the locks. I’m lucky to have people in my life who have gone through this kind of thing. Others who never experienced this kind of thing were still willing to read about it and be kind. If anybody is interested, the Mayo Clinic has a good explanation.
Years back, I listened to The Body Keeps the Score on audiobook. I had nightmares. I tried to read it on paper and that was easier because it felt less intimate. I still tried to listen to it as somebody who wanted to learn about PTSD so she could help others. So she could understand her friends. I was still trying to compartmentalize.
But in the past two weeks, even before I was willing to talk to the reporter, much less before I was willing to use my name, I did not (fully) break down. I did not drink. And you know what? It would’ve been okay if I did. I mean, it would’ve sucked. I don’t want to pick up again. But sobriety isn’t about bragging on how many years you’ve got without booze.
Putting down the substance ain’t it. That’s important, sure. But you have to keep growing and working on yourself or you do the same garbage behaviors. At least in my experience. I don’t represent sober people or talk for them, ever. This is just me.
Other people would’ve helped me to get better again. My friends would’ve helped me.
If any of you are reading this - not just the women from this story, but folks of any gender who’ve been through any situation like this - and you did some things that harmed yourself just because you needed to not feel the feelings anymore - I love you. I got you. We always get to begin again, so long as we’re still on what my grandmother called “the right side of the dirt.”
I thank the women who spoke up for this painful, necessary gift. I have a higher power and a community that helps me. I love them. They carry me. I will try to do the same. And I may never meet or speak to these other women, but I wish them the best.
You don’t have to name anybody, ever, publicly. You can tell your diary or your friend or the wall or your higher power. You are no less strong for keeping your life private.
I am quieter and shyer in middle age. I sometimes sound very bold and brassy and outlandish but in truth I am a much more gentle and quiet person than I once was.
I like a slower life now, one that may appear duller and less glamorous than what I thought I wanted when I was younger. It was hard to decide to talk about any of this. I was afraid for what it might do to those I love. Imagine my surprise and gratitude when they told me to stand up and tell the truth.
I refuse to be complicit any longer. I’ve fucked up in plenty of ways in my life. I make my own amends, slowly and carefully, when I can.
We addicts do not get well when we are enabled. My empathy for one who needs help does not exceed my empathy for those who were hurt, or for my younger self. She was not able to speak up. I can do that for her now.
If you readers see yourselves in anyone in this story, please know that you can get better. There is help for you. Yes, even the folks who have done nasty things, or who have not spoken up when they should, or who will never tell the truth about what happened. You, too. You can heal.
Out of protection for my own health and sobriety, I ask that press refer future queries to my attorney. Thank you to the staff at the law firm of Carrie A. Goldberg, Esq. for your extraordinary and empathetic work. Thank you to my employers for listening to me, believing me and giving me time and space to be slower with deadlines.
Thank you to the people who loaned me the money to pay for an attorney (you know who you are, and that I will pay you back when I can) and those who gifted me money to do increased sessions with my psychiatrist and psychologist. A diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder is not something I wanted but I am so very grateful for it. It makes so much make sense.
Finally, I wish to thank Rolling Stone senior writer E.J. Dickson, chief research editor Brenna Ehrlich Enos, and the editorial and legal staff that worked with such diligence and care on this story.
Even writing this is scary to me. I don’t think I’m saying anything new here. But I’m still afraid. It’s like fear is a habit.
Fear isn’t always bad. Sometimes it saves your life. I’m glad I stopped moving that night. I’m glad I stopped fighting back. I’m glad I breathed so carefully and quietly. I’m glad I finally froze. I’m not ashamed of that anymore. Fight, flight, freeze, or fawn. Something in us wants to survive, and it makes a choice.
Please take good care of yourselves. And if you want to make something of your own, some piece of art that will be beautiful and entertaining and funny and help people, go do it.
Love,
Sara
National Domestic Violence Hotline
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Another favorite nonprofit: RAICES Texas
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