The Ripple Effect

All names have been changed to protect the identities of those involved.

I met Ignacio at a queer Valentine’s Day party my freshman year. We were Datamatches who had decided to meet, and we danced and chatted about life between surreptitious shots from the vodka bottle hidden in his jacket. He was kind, handsome, and ended up becoming a series of firsts for me: First date, first romantic relationship, first sexual experience.

One particular conversation stands out. I mentioned that walking to the Quad alone at night made me nervous; Ignacio looked at me and my broad shoulders and told me I had nothing to worry about—I was not “waifish” and could protect myself.

He was right. I have never been bothered while walking through Cambridge Common at night. Ironically, when I was sexually assaulted, it was not in a dark public park or hidden alleyway. Two weeks after Ignacio told me we should stop seeing each other, I went to a party in Adams to try to “move on.” I left feeling confused, scared… and a survivor.

In 2013, a year when the conversation surrounding sexual assault on college campuses was picking up speed at Harvard and elsewhere, to be sexually assaulted felt like a cruel joke. Should I report? What would happen next? Would anyone believe me?

***

Those first few months post-assault I lived on edge. I was perpetually scared; I felt I could not trust anyone, especially other gay men. I worried that something I said or did would give me away, that I would let someone know that I was damaged.

That summer, I went home and slept sixteen hours a day, leaving bed occasionally only to eat. I tried to tell my parents and friends, but the cultural expectations of masculinity forced the words back down by throat. I came back in August forty pounds lighter, furiously determined to ignore what had happened despite my growing anxiety and fear.

It was on my third day back that I saw Ignacio again. We had tried to remain friends, but the onset of trauma-induced depression and anxiety burned those bridges. Yet seeing him again brought a sense of peace; here was someone I knew I could trust. Perhaps it was because I knew he would not hurt me—after all, we’d already shared consensual and positive sexual experiences. But now, I was no longer thinking about romance or sex with him; all I knew was that with him, I felt safe.

I tried to see him as frequently as I could. It was completely one-sided, but the peace I had around him made me ignore his lukewarm responses to my messages. Using increasingly unrealistic excuses, I continued to abuse his time and unwilling friendship for two years to get snippets of tranquility. It’s impossible for me to understand the full impact of this abuse on Ignacio, but I know it was overwhelming. Several of our mutual friends told me to stop contacting him, that he could no longer handle the amount of pain I was thrusting onto his shoulders, pain he did not understand.

In a last ditch effort for his attention, I disclosed my survivor status to him. To his credit, he responded “correctly”; he was supportive, caring, and did not pry. But as I continued to spiral further into depression, my relationship, or lack thereof, with Ignacio also deteriorated as I relied on him more and more. At first he was receptive, likely due to the guilt that can be associated with refusing to support a traumatized friend.

Eventually though, Ignacio had enough. He requested that I stop; stop trying to contact him and stop finding reasons that we needed to speak. Despite my pleas, Ignacio would not respond to me again. I never heard much from him again, but whispers about Ignacio’s “crazy ex-boyfriend” would float by me for the next two years.

***

I eventually began to heal. My assailant’s graduation helped, and the team responsible for my treatment at Counseling And Mental Health Services helped me learn to cope with my depression and anxiety. I can date without anxiety, I enjoy my relationships with others, and—most important of all—I usually feel safe. I have been very lucky and am grateful to the multitude of resources I found at Harvard. (That being said, Harvard’s mental health services and sexual assault policies are still imperfect and I certainly recognize and support survivors with experiences different from mine.)

Though healing came with a bevy of positive outcomes, it also meant acknowledging what I had done wrong with regards to Ignacio. Being sexually assaulted had paradoxically made me ignore his sense of safety and his agency. I was passing on to him the burden of my assault without his consent. I had presented him with an unfortunate choice: To unwillingly engage in emotional labor to exhaustion or to abandon a struggling friend for the sake of his own mental health. In truth, for Ignacio and for others in similar situations, this may not feel like a choice at all. The societal pressure that comes with supporting a friend too easily renders the two options into a non-choice, forcing people to shoulder burdens that they are unwilling or unprepared to bear.

It’s important to recognize sexual assault and rape as illnesses of a community and to acknowledge that the whole community must come together to support survivors; however, I latched on to a single relationship like a life jacket, drowning the man who was wearing it. The negative impacts of sexual assault seeped from me and pervaded Ignacio’s life—it’s hardly surprising that he chose to disengage, to escape while he could. While I have since forgiven myself for what I did to Ignacio, it’s apparent that he has not.

I can hardly fault him for his decision. Often, we are told to support our struggling friends without rest, to forsake our own health for theirs. However, this type of support comes at a high price—one that Ignacio bore until I imagine he had nothing more left to give. It is through this slow, creeping way that the effects of sexual assault, depression, and other mental illnesses move from survivors and patients to friends and family, whose emotional labor comes at the expense of their own wellbeing. Our mental health resources—still inadequate for supporting patients—are similarly lacking for the support networks of survivors, meaning friends and families must give of themselves without thinking of the repercussions. What happens when no one has anything left to give?

Editors’ Note: We made the decision to run this op-ed anonymously due to the private and intensely personal nature of its content. It is our hope that this piece will bring to light issues that affect members of our community.

Readers should also note that online commenting has been disabled for this piece in an effort to help protect the author's identity.

—Nelson L. Barrette and Ryan P. O'Meara, Editorial Chairs

—Mariel A. Klein, President