The weekend before my freshman year started, I was sexually assaulted in my dorm room by my boyfriend at the time. He had come to meet my roommate and peers, bringing flowers and charming everyone. We played cards with my hallmates until almost 3am, at which point my roommate insisted he not drive home. We had set boundaries previously about what was allowed, and he disregarded all my attempts to push him away, as well as every verbal “stop” and “no.”  I broke up with him two days later. But, as we worked together, I was still forced to be in close quarters with him for several months following the incident. My manager, who I told about the incident, collected a $40 bet on whether or not we would break up, but did nothing to protect me from his constant harassment and intimidation at work. Her response to the incident was, “Boys will be boys.”  After he moved out of the state, the trauma lingered on. I couldn’t be in enclosed spaces without hyperventilating, I had (and still have) vivid flashbacks of the event, I couldn’t eat or sleep normally, and I went from being a 4.0 student to barely passing. Being on campus was nearly impossible, and because of that my attendance slipped. My junior year, I failed all of my classes in my first semester, leading to a 3.5 year hiatus from school. I returned to CSU last fall (2020), and I was shocked to find that I was able to walk across campus and attend classes without being haunted by flashbacks. I completed my first semester back with a 4.0, was welcomed back into the honors program, and will be graduating in May 2022. While the impact of his actions still sit with me, they no longer control my life. I know now that I am resilient, I am powerful, and I am capable of succeeding, and he will never take that away from me.

-Aspen (they/them/theirs)