How Biting My Tongue Triggered a Dangerous Ripple Effect
A case study on the unexpected cost of silence
[Content warning: discussion of sexual assault and rape]
I have always felt at home in my grandma’s house. My father was in the military, so as we moved from state to state, Grandma Anne’s house served as a home base. No matter how far away I roamed, I knew that tiny yellow house would be waiting to envelope me with the smell of eucalyptus, the warmth of walls covered in framed images of me and my cousins, and the muffled call of cicadas and grasshoppers.
When I struck out on my own, I feared I might not be able to hack it. Grandma Anne encouraged me take as big a leap as I could: She assured me that, should I need it, there would be a room in her home for me to retreat to. When Grandma Anne passed three years ago, I worried that the house she’d used to shelter our family for sixty years would be lost with her, but it remains standing, cared for by aunts and ready to take me (or any of my constellation of cousins, aunts, uncles, and chosen family) in should we need refuge.
It only made sense, upon her death, that the family gravitated to Grandma Anne’s house. As the family matriarch, her house was a sanctuary for us all. It is something of sacred ground.
