The Story I Never Wanted to Tell

TRIGGER WARNING: #metoo

April was sexual assault awareness month, but for me (and too many others) awareness and remembrance is part of the everyday weight of existence.  As a sexual assault survivor in a society shaped by rape culture,  I am always hyper aware of the looks that are put on my body. I tighten when someone touches me and I often can’t breathe in a doctor’s office. Over the years I have figured out ways to “act normal” and maintain when seemingly simple things like going into a doctor’s office for a physical or an annual appointment triggers an anxiety attack.

As part of my survival strategy, I have trust and commitment issues. This has not hardened me to the world - I am a loving mother, a warm partner and still a full sexual being, but I just don’t trust most muthfuckas - why should I? The pain and trauma I carry runs 30 years deep on my skin and inside my bones. So here’s one of my #metoo stories and yes, I have more than one. This is the story I never wanted to tell, but I told it anyway. On Facebook.

Facebook is the place where, until recently, I have known all of my virtual friends. It’s a strange mix of current colleagues and homies, former students and  professors, friends from college and high school, family members (who don’t unfriend me because I’m too radical) and of course, former love(r)s turned “Facebook friends.” It is in this mix of people that I find support, comfort and acknowledgement, so I share stories. On the best days I feel heard and on the other days I can hold a mirror up to my stuff and be called out and called on  in the most loving, funny, accepting and meme filled ways. That environment of acceptance makes my storytelling safe.

So here’s the story I think I’ll share one last time: I am one of the 16,000 women who survived sexual assault by George Tyndall. Tyndall was a gynecologist at the Student Health Center at USC from 1989 to 2018. I reported him 30 years ago, but no one believed me.

The first time I saw Tyndall I was 16 years old. I had never been to a gynecologist, and I had never had sex willingly.

When I was 13,  I made out with boys and survived a junior high school sexual assault by the star soccer player. I thought it was my fault because I had invited him over. It was less than two minutes of quick pain and bright blood that thankfully didn’t stain my mother’s couch (a couch that matched the one in the living room set of the original Roseanne TV show). The sound of my mother’s car pulling into the garage caused him to get off of me, zip his pants up, and run out. 

A few years later, I was a summer student at USC, in a film school program for high school students and freshman film school hopefuls. I lived in Parkside, which ran along the Exposition side of campus. I made good friends, lots of short films, and relished in the freedom of being away from home. The diet of Pepsi and pizza didn’t sit well with me and my tight jeans and I developed a UTI. It burned so badly that my friend Vick convinced me to go to student health to get help. I went for a walk-in appointment not knowing  what to expect. I left silent. Paralyzed. Traumatized. I told the nurse at the desk that they should have a woman gynecologist and she said something like, “Dr. Tyndall is the doctor here,” and brushed me away.

I locked myself inside my dorm room bathroom and didn’t leave for four days. My friends got the university to open the door. I was lying in a ball covered in towels when they got me out. I told my Mom. I told the USC housing people. I told someone at the film school. 

The school officials told my Mom that I was “overly dramatic” and “afraid to start freshman year” and one said I was “a good storyteller.” My Mom didn’t believe me. She didn’t want me to go to California anyway when I could study at a perfectly good film school in New York. I heard from a family friend that she was telling family members that “I couldn’t cut it in Los Angeles.”

Instead of moving into the freshman dorms, I packed up and headed home feeling devastated and defeated by my dreams. It’s taken thirty years for me to feel heard, believed and redeemed.

Rewind two years. 2019. A postcard from the USC Tyndall settlement arrived. I threw it away. Then they emailed me and I went into a panic.

How did they find me? How did they know? Did they have a record of my visit? Did the nurse or front desk lady document my story? Are they guessing? Why won’t they just leave me alone? No one believed me then so why should they believe me now?

I thought maybe someone wanted me to speak so they could make more money but then I read more closely: a $215M settlement had already been made. The more of us who came forward, the less that each of us would be awarded. I wondered what would be gained from my story.

Why do they call him Dr. George Tyndall? Is he still a doctor?

Then I thought about how many women might have come after me. I couldn’t get out of bed. I know that it wasn’t my fault-- that he did this-- but I felt the burden of not being believed. If I had been more credible, if I had been more vocal, if I hadn’t crawled back home… if, if, if… then maybe there wouldn’t be so many others.

I read every word on the settlement website and scoured the news articles. They still called him Dr. Tyndall. He practiced at USC from 1989 until 2016. That’s a long fucking time to hurt us.

I didn’t reply to the email or fill out the postcard until the deadline. I signed it. No story, no recounting, no rehashing, no nothing but some night terrors. Then an envelope arrived.

I cashed the $2500 check, but standing in the line at the bank I got hot. I felt my body start to itch and sweat. Tears rolled down my cheeks, but I wasn’t going to get out of line. I took the receipt and ran outside -- I needed air.

I paid off a credit card, got my kids new shoes, and thought that was that.

I was on the set of ROSWELL NEW MEXICO, my favorite CW show. I was directing my third episode of television and it was lunchtime. I went to my rental car instead of my trailer to pretend to eat lunch.  I blew cold air conditioning on my face and sobbed.Then I took out my laptop, connected to the production office wifi, and typed my story.

I told all the details - the cold walls, his clammy hands, his jokes that I couldn’t be a virgin, and his comments on my breasts. I remember his gloveless hand inside of me. I wrote it all.

I meant to save a copy but I clicked submit before I could change my mind.

I went back to set and lived my best alien soapy dreams.

Then someone from the settlement claims office called me and said it was time to decide if I wanted to make an official statement on the record. A panel of experts would listen to the recording, which would remain sealed but part of the official record, and the panel would determine my award amount.
I didn’t want to do it, but something told me to ask how many women. She said she couldn’t tell me but blurted out, “ a lot.” I pushed. 1000? More. 1500? More. 15,000? More.

It took me several months to breathe through the weight of the number. I had to forgive myself for them. And yes, I know it’s his fault but knowing that thousands of women were violated after you is a lot to carry. My 16 year-old shoulders had done their best,  but it wasn’t enough. 

So I went on the record.

I answered questions. I cried. I sobbed. I had to take a break. I told all that I could remember.

My oldest friend sent me flowers. She believed me then, she believes in me now. It’s important to be listened to when you are reliving trauma.

And the waiting began.

Another check arrived. I opened it in the car because I didn’t want my kids to hear me.

I bartered with myself - if it was more than $15,000 it was worth it. (Not sure where that number came from, but it’s what kept my hand from shaking too much to open the envelope.)

I tore it open and it was more than the amount I thought and more than I had ever held. I called my old friend sobbing. I was shaking. All I remember saying is, “Someone besides you finally believes me.”

I went to the bank and it was closed - it was a holiday. So that check sat on my desk for days while I stared at it. My kids wanted to go shopping, but I’m not spending it on something small. I’m using this money, what I feel like is blood money, to plant roots for me and for my kids.

The USC administration told my Mom I had a vivid imagination and told good stories. Devils. My Mom did not believe me. I forgave her before she died, but for years I suffered in silence.  Survivors of sexual assault should be believed--and treatment for us should be free and accessible. 

Re-telling my story on Facebook and again here has been healing and that’s why I share. I also am realizing that in a way these screenshots from Facebook offer receipts. I think because I have spent thirty years not being believed, I gather my words and screenshot because they have become part of my personal archives and evidence that my voice and my story matters.

There’s always more to the story, but that’s for another day and another essay. 

USC made this statement:

Tyndall surrendered his medical license in 2019 yet many of the news reports still called him Dr. Tyndall until news of our historic lawsuit hit the press recently.

The last line hits hard: Tyndall faces 35 criminal counts of alleged sexual misconduct between 2009 and 2016, which means he’ll never be prosecuted for what he did to me.

He has pleaded not guilty and is free on bond.