Flanked by candles lining the wall of the Free Speech Pavilion on the Naperville Riverwalk, two women shared personal stories of pain and turmoil with friends and strangers gathered Saturday to mark the beginning of April’s Sexual Assault Awareness Month.
“I was completely broken. I felt dirty and worthless,” recalled Meggie Zayas, who said she endured sexual assault while in a dysfunctional relationship that started when she was a student at North Central College in 2011. “My grades were slipping. I completely lost interest in everyone around me.”
Zayas organized “Illuminate the Riverwalk: Honoring Sexual Assault Awareness Month” to support fellow survivors and enlighten others to recognize the warning signs.
“I did it here because Naperville is very affluent, and people think it doesn’t happen here,” said Zayas, who emphasized she thought she was immune to manipulation because she was a high achiever in the suburbs raised to be assertive and independent.
That scenario was reiterated by Jessica Coffey, who said a supervisor of her dormitory forced himself on her while she was living on a research scholarship and studying abroad in England. “He had pursued me, and we went on a date. He came into my room … I said no, and he wouldn’t stop,” Coffey said.
Because he had keys to all the rooms, she said she lived in fear it could happen again — but she never reported it to authorities.
“I told a neighbor the next day it was a bad experience. I didn’t realize it was rape until a year later,” said Coffey, who graduated from NCC in 2014 and performed at the Naperville event Saturday night. Accompanied by Keith Bondi on acoustic guitar, Coffey sang “The Fighter,” a song about overcoming tragedy from the Los Angeles band In This Moment.
Zayas said the band “helped me a lot through healing. They’re empowering. They’re a female-fronted metal band.”
Zayas used the song’s title as her motto in a self-published book about overcoming sexual assault. She filled the book with profiles of survivors like Coffey, featuring photos she took and stories she wrote to portray them as powerful and not as victims.
“It was like photo therapy — telling my story and having her write it for me,” Coffey said.
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Zayas said she continues to struggle with overcoming “a lot of anger and flashbacks and panic attacks” as a result of coercion suffered at the hands of two boyfriends.
Zayas said she was 20 years old when she started dating a man who eventually controlled all aspects of her life for the next three years. After escaping that boyfriend, she said she got pulled into a physically abusive relationship for another year.
“These issues are difficult to hear and to talk about,” said Zayas. “That is my story and why I want to do this. I have nothing to be ashamed of. I did not cause it.”
But Zayas said other victims “are still being shamed and silenced. We need to educate people to know it’s not the victims’ fault. Without our community, we wouldn’t have the ability to share our stories. We are making strides,” added Zayas, who said she hoped to make the gathering an annual event.
Zayas said she is now in a healthy relationship — living with her fiance, working as a manager at an insurance agency and promoting sexual assault awareness and healing through her Reclaiming Me movement, which includes her book, blog, speeches, workshops, self-defense classes and her upcoming photography exhibit at the University of Illinois at Chicago.
Zayas concluded the event with a call to action, asking those in the audience to support the Violence Against Women Act, targeted for budget cuts by President Donald Trump’s administration; Title IX’s sexual assault victim protections, opposed by Republican lawmakers; and Illinois’ rape crisis centers and women’s shelters, which have been cut off from state funding.
Diane Moca is a freelance reporter for the Naperville Sun.