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As is the case for most survivors of sexual violence, Oriana Schatan's attacker was not a stranger, but someone she and her family knew well. "Keith was our babysitter. He lived next door to us and they were great family friends of ours. He was even an alter boy, which was one of the reasons my parents trusted him. Never in a million years would anyone have thought that he could have done this. But when I was 5 years old and he was a sophomore in high school babysitting us, he raped me for the first time. For two years it happened two or three times a month, always in my parents' bedroom, whenever he was our babysitter and no one was around. He made me promise not to tell anyone, and said that he would kill my cat and me if I did. I kept this inside me for two years."
"When he went away to college I thought it was over. But his family still lived next door and when he came home for Christmas break he saw me riding my bike and said something like "Hey, I saw your cat today? -- it was his way of reminding me that he could still hurt us if I spoke up -- and something just snapped in me. I ran home and in front of my entire family, on Christmas Eve, I told them what had happened."
"The police advised my parents against pressing charges because they thought it would be too traumatic for me. My parents severed all ties with that family and got me into counseling right away. Keith's family moved but my father kept looking for them and 18 years later confronted Keith's father, who said something like "Keith is married now, and has three daughters. The past is the past". I think about those little girls all the time and they are one of the reasons I want to speak out."
It took Oriana years to come to terms with what had happened to her. "For a long time after it happened, I blocked this out. My parents got me all the help that was available then. We are a close-knit family and just having my family's love was important. But there was a lot I never dealt with. When I was 15, I started to have vivid nightmares about the rape, but in my waking life I really couldn't confront it."
"It was not until I was in my late twenties -- very recently -- that it all came to a head. I was talking to my parents and I said Keith's name and suddenly the floodgates just opened. Maybe I was finally ready, but my memories of what happened were clear in a way they had never been, so clear that I could almost smell the gardenias outside of my parents' old bedroom, where Keith raped me. Strangely enough, that doesn't haunt me. It is still one of my favorite scents."
"I have started seeing a counselor weekly to deal with this. Has it been painful? Yes. These memories are awful, I cannot believe that someone could do this to me. Sometimes I can't believe that I have lived through it. But I'm allowing myself to feel my feeling, to flush my fear, to make peace with my past. In a bizarre way, the vivid details I am recalling are almost beautiful, because they have explained so much about who I am today. I am more confident now, knowing that there are reasons for my patterns. Remembering what I have gone through reminds me of how far I have come."
Oriana believes there is a lesson to be learned from her experience. "If you want to help someone who tells you they have been raped or abused, you should never push for healing to happen sooner than it does naturally. No one can just "get over" this. Everyone has their own time. Mine took almost two decades. Someone else may have been ready right away, but I wasn't. The most important thing of all: Learn to listen. What a rape survivor has to say may be hard to hear, and it won't be fluid at first, but if you give them time they will find their rhythm and their own words. Don't turn away, even if you want to. I know hearing my memories breaks my Mom and Dad's hearts, but my parents have been my rock through this. They have so much guilt about what happened to me, but they have set that aside to really listen to me. My mother especially is my pillar of strength."
1 out of 3 girls and 1 out of 6 boys will be sexually assaulted before the age of 18. It's a fact that's not lost on Oriana, who says, "There are so many of us, men and women who are grown now but have lived through this. I see the community of survivors as a brotherhood or sisterhood, holding hands and uniting to show the effects of rape and abuse. Maybe if more of us speak up and stop treating rape as a taboo subject, people will finally listen.
"For me, choosing to embrace this has been an important piece of the puzzle. But I didn't feel this peace until I felt the solidarity, unity and compassion of groups like The Voices and Faces Project. I am still healing and I think some part of me always will be. There will be difficult days ahead. But today I can celebrate my own strength, and lend my hand to someone else who is just starting their journey."
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