Many wouldn't think someone so close to you could do any harm right? About a month ago I was in my sister's house with her husband and my brother watching the movie serie "Unbelievable", halfway through this serie my brother and sister eventually get sleepy and go to their rooms and I get left with my sisters husband. To make this story short I was sexually harassed by him even though I have made clear signs that I did not want to be touched and also told him various times NO, he continued and only hushed me when I tried to speak. I never liked being touched and now I can't even think about being hugged by someone, I haven't told anyone because I just can't bare the thought of maybe no one believing me or telling me it was just a nice gesture and I'm just crazy or something, another reason to this is because I just can't think about how my sister would think of me or see me. I haven't been back ever since and anytime he comes to visit I make sure to never come out and anything he touches I have to clean before I touch.

My great grandmother was around 92 years old when she passed away. Throughout my life I have seen her a lot since she lives relatively close (about 20-30 mins away). I moved away to florida for college in 2020. Fall of my freshman year in college covid was huge and my great grandmother wasn’t doing too well. Spring rolled around and my great grandmother had beaten covid and pneumonia. She was a very strong woman. I was about a month away from being home when she was put in the hospital again for covid symptoms. Everything seemed to be fine with her health but my mom asked me to facetime her cause she missed me. I facetimed her later that night and promised her I would see her in a month. She passed away about a week later while I was on spring break. It was slightly unexpected given her age and health condition. I was at the bar with my friends. Safe to say it changed my night around really fast. I was 3 hours away from my school with friends for spring break. My parents didn’t want to fly me all the way up the next day for the funeral and ruin the rest of my vacation because it was a decent amount of money to fly on such short notice. I watched the funeral from a room at my friends beach house. I couldn’t help but cry because of how awful I felt that I couldn’t be there. My regret isn’t that I wasn’t able to say bye. My regret is all the times I could’ve gone over there when i got older and had a car and chose not to because she lived so close and I thought I saw her enough with my family. When I got back home for summer break I went to her grave to honor the last promise I made to her. Just wish I could’ve did it in person.

• June 27, 2023