A Harvard student wrote about her rape. Here’s what happened next.
Since its publication nearly two weeks ago, Viviana Maymi’s story has been viewed more than 100,000 times.
Viviana Maymi, right, and her younger sister at Harvard.
Viviana Maymi hid a secret as she sat in a Harvard dining hall and watched her classmates react to this statistic: Nearly one-third of female seniors had experienced “unwanted sexual contact.’’
The Harvard senior, who was raped two years ago, had told very few people about the night she was assaulted. But seeing her experience boiled down to a number in a campus survey sparked something in her. Maymi returned to her dorm room and started typing.
Her story, “Here’s How I Was Raped,’’ was published about two weeks ago in The Harvard Crimson.
Since then, the story has been viewed more than 100,000 times on The Crimson’s site and has been picked up by other news outlets, including Business Insider and The Huffington Post. Maymi said she has received dozens of messages—positive and negative—from people who have read her story.
Many were from fellow female survivors who said they felt validated after reading about her experience. She’s given them hope that such a deeply scarring incident doesn’t have to define who they are.
“A lot of people told me that writing it was so brave,’’ she said. “But I didn’t see what I did as brave. I saw it as necessary.’’
She also received messages from an audience she wasn’t expecting — men. The men who reached out told her the story made them reconsider what is acceptable behavior while drinking and partying.
“Just getting one message from a survivor made it all worth it, let alone so many,’’ she said. “But getting messages from men is a great thing, too, because, hopefully, I might have helped prevent future assaults.’’
She has, however, gotten her fair share of hate mail in the form of Facebook messages and emails from strangers calling her a “slut’’ and “attention whore.’’ Maymi said those messages have only reminded her why it’s so important for assault survivors to speak out.
“I knew when I published the story that getting these messages was a possibility,’’ she said. “But I just can’t value the opinion of someone who’s not coming from a place of logical, reasonable thinking.’’
In her piece, Maymi describes how she was raped by a friend after attending a fall formal with him. They’d been drinking. She doesn’t remember walking back to his dorm.
“Next thing I do remember, I’m naked in his bed,’’ she wrote. “I see his face—he’s on top of me, he’s inside of me, he’s sweaty. I vaguely realize what’s happening, and I explicitly realize that I don’t want to be where I currently am.’’
Maymi said it took her many months to accept that the assault wasn’t her fault. She said her family, and particularly her older sister, have been incredibly supportive throughout the healing process. Maymi also received extensive support from the Harvard Office of Sexual Assault Response and Prevention and the university’s mental health services.
But she hasn’t reported the rape.
“There’s some social anxiety because I’m friends with a lot of that guy’s friends and I worry they would turn on me,’’ she said. “Also there’s a fear that the case would not go through even though I know the faculty at Harvard are concerned and horrified by the results of the survey.’’
She did, however, take action by publishing the story using her full name. Maymi eventually wants to attend veterinary school, but plans to spend some time working in a lab first. Because she’ll need to start applying for lab positions soon, she worried about how the worst night of her life would be the first Google search result for potential employers hoping to learn more about her.
She ultimately decided to use her full name to enforce the message of her piece — that survivors shouldn’t be ashamed.
“Hopefully anyone who reads it and is going to hire me sees that it’s coming from a place of strength,’’ she said.
Maymi is still channeling that strength by talking to her classmates about the article and the reality of assault on campus.
“There’s a nervous energy around some people bringing it up,’’ she said. “It makes them uncomfortable. And it should. Rape is a horrible thing.’’
But they are talking about it. She’s approached by students who want her to know that she’s helping others who have been through the same thing. They want her to know that instead of seeing just a number describing the assaults, they see a person.
“I wrote this because I want people to know they’re not alone,’’ she said. “And now that it’s out there, I’m inspired to speak out more. No one should ever have to handle sexual assault alone.’’
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