Anonymous Story: The Doctor (2)

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Many times, I tell myself that it didn’t happen, but I know it did. I sat across from my family doctor of several years, we talked for a while as we waited for my sister to return with her test result because I wasn’t the sick one this time, I had brought my little sister to see him. He asked about school and as I spoke to him, he walked over to where I sat and took his sit on the table that was between us earlier and began groping and fondling me. He put his hand inside my top and started out fondling my breast. I remember being confused about what was happening in that moment, I was too shocked to move or even fight back but before he could go further, my sister returned. I just sat there still completely shocked at what happened.

You see, if you ask me on a good day what I would do in such a situation I probably would say I’d scream or hit him or sue but I was there shocked and mute as a church rat. He assaulted my body that afternoon. As we left, I promised myself never to see him again and for days after that afternoon I had nightmares, but I was comforted by my decision… as we know, life never goes as planned. Days later I woke up unable to breathe, I was in a crisis because my asthma had come for me again and my family members who had no idea what I had suffered in his hands earlier rushed me to his hospital. He found a way to get the two people who came with me to leave.

He asked one to get me food because I needed to eat before he could administer intravenous injection and then he told the other one to go out to another pharmacy to get the intravenous injection as theirs had been exhausted. As they left, he sat down again and groped and fondled my asthma ravaged body. I was too weak to fight him off, too tired of men doing that to me, I remember pleading with him to stop but he wouldn’t stop. He did the same thing he did before and went further to my genitals. Even now, I can’t still say why I didn’t scream or fight harder. I just froze. I just couldn’t find the courage to tell anybody about what happened, I didn’t want it to happen… I just felt so powerless and after the second time I felt like people would judge me for allowing it to happen more than once.

I remember the doctor once told me on a previous visit before he began assaulting me, that as a 19-year-old I was a grown woman and it wasn’t possible that I could be molested and whatever sexual activity that happened in my life onwards is consensual seeing as I’m now an adult, if only I knew what was in his mind. I finally spoke up about it and watched those I told sweep it under the carpet and do nothing to help me feel safe or even ensure he paid for his crime. I never mentioned it again.

For the longest time I struggled with accepting I was molested. I believed just because I didn’t scream or fight him off or announce what had happened I had been a willing participant. I have struggled with the reactions of those I told, some days I want to hate them for doing nothing, most days are good and other days are hell. I trip over landmines of shame and self-blame in the battlefield that is in my mind, but I truly have hope I will be fine.

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