When I was a freshman in college, I received a letter at my dormitory from a local, well-known OB/GYN physician. The survey asked me to respond to questions about my experience having an abortion at the physician’s office.
I was stunned to receive the letter because I had not had an abortion. I was angry and horrified that someone had used my name to avoid giving the doctor their own. Apparently, you could obtain an abortion and pay with cash and not be asked to provide proof of your identity. A telephone call to the doctor confirmed that someone had used my name for her abortion. I was quite sure it was someone who knew me well; how else would she have known my mailbox number at our dormitory? If that person was afraid to disclose her identity, why didn’t she make one up? I concluded that she deliberately chose my name as an act of revenge, the reasons for which I could not comprehend.
I have not thought about that incident for a long time, but I recently read an article concluding that forgiveness is essential for the victim, not for the person being forgiven. Supposedly, doing so allows a person to find greater peace and hope, and increases his or her compassion for the wrongdoer. The theory is that forgiveness allows a person to release anger, revenge, and resentment.
There are only a handful of times in my life that I believe I was deliberately wronged or hurt, and I have no intention of pardoning any of the culprits. For example, men who assault and intimidate women do not deserve absolution. When I was a young mother, a naked man in a hot tub stood up and thrust his pelvis towards me, using his masculine physique to bully me. As a college student, I was once confronted by a teenage boy who was slowly riding his bike around the parking lot of a shopping mall while intentionally displaying his erect penis. He was hoping to terrify me; instead, I ran past him and reported him to mall security. A pedophile once stalked me and a girlfriend while we were walking home from the stable, driving slowly around us, block after block, hoping to entice us to get into his car.
Those incidents were horrifying, but my outrage eclipsed my fear. Emotional injustices by people I knew were harder to reconcile. When I was a young teen, the stable where I boarded my horse was having a horseshow. It was a small event, designed to display the riding skills of youngsters who took riding lessons there. One of my friends at the barn begged me to ride her mare in the championship class, for which she had qualified. I did not want to; I felt she should have the privilege of performing. My friend told me that she desperately wanted her horse to be showcased, but she felt overwhelmed and could not compete. I was a confident rider, and I knew her horse well, as I was the one that had trained her as a filly.
She finally coaxed me into it, and I rode her horse in the show. I do not recall the outcome of the event, as the experience was obliterated by what happened as I dismounted in the barn afterwards. Her parents approached me, screaming at me and accusing me of denying their daughter the chance to ride. I was humiliated and scared by their vociferous language. I knew I had done nothing wrong. I looked at my friend, expecting her to explain the circumstances, but she looked meekly away. I felt betrayed. Her parents had the choice to ask their daughter why she had not ridden the horse herself, but they did not. It was far easier to take out their wrath on me.
I remember another painful experience while being driven in a carpool to the stable when I was thirteen years old. My older sister had recently died in a car accident while riding in our family car. One of my carpool mates reported that her father had told her that we should have owned a safer car. I wondered then, and I ponder it now, how that man lacked a vestige of kindness or compassion in making that statement to his daughter. I did not hold a grudge against my friend; she was just dutifully reporting her father’s words. But instead of modeling benevolence in the face of someone’s tragedy, he demonstrated inhumanity.
I was fortunate. I was not systematically abused, assaulted, or bullied as a young person. I did not grow up in poverty or where substance abuse dictated the family dynamic. These events were stressful and made me angry and sad, but I do not feel traumatized by them. They have not impeded my pathway to a joyful and grateful life.
I have moved on. Which is why, twenty-five years ago, when some women friends hesitantly told me that there was a rumor circulating that I had worked as a stripper prior to going to law school, I could mostly laugh it off.
But to be clear, I have a message for people who lie about others, or who make up stories to cover their own fears, or who cannot act kindly in the face of someone’s trauma, or who use physical intimidation: I do not excuse you.
I may have gotten over it – but I will never forgive it.