39.
“He was my assistant basketball coach. I met him when I was 15. It wasn’t until my senior year — I was 17, he was 23 — that we worked together consistently enough to develop a relationship. It started near the end of basketball season. I kept it a total secret. We would meet up in parking lots to make out. I confided in a close teammate who was very close with our coach, and she got so angry with me that she cried. She accused me of ruining her future coaching relationship with him and told our entire team. The season had ended by then, but it blew up my senior year. Everyone hated me except my closest friends who were on my side. I lost long-term friendships, and even our head coach — who was best friends with our assistant — told me to apologize to my teammates. I realized then that I was not in the wrong and that my coach was the one who bore responsibility for what happened. It had a massive impact on who I am as a person in my adulthood.”
“We had started texting when he had begun seeing another coach that I knew. It was just chatting and joking, but eventually, they called it quits, and he told me he had feelings for me. I remember being over the moon because my entire team, as teenagers, crushed on this guy. I had told him I was a virgin and didn’t mess around with a guy who wasn’t my boyfriend — so we never had sex.
Oh, and he didn’t leave me alone after everything. He’d periodically reach out to me when I started college — even to the point of trying to meet up with me a few weeks before his WEDDING.
Only one person from that period ever apologized. But the worst part is that when discussing it with a very close friend from high school who is a very committed feminist and caring person, she still said that I was mature for my age then and that it wasn’t a big deal. Sometimes, I still question if she’s right, but I don’t think she is.”
—Anonymous, Washington