After his sister Sherry was raped, the speaker felt rage and helplessness. At 19, he realized he couldn't undo what happened but could work to prevent it from happening to others. By 20, he was speaking publicly about sexual assault prevention.
I grew up with 3 older sisters, and we were very close. Vicki, 8 years older. Rita, 6 years older. Sherry, 4 years older. 10 years after this picture, Sherry's one of the leading athletes in the United States. Goes off to a major university, full-ride scholarship, ends up having an incredible athletic career. I looked up to her. After 4 years, she graduates college, same time I go into college. I'm coming back to my dorm room one day after practice. There's a note on the door. It says, Mike, call home immediately. So I run back to the phone, 'cause back then you didn't have cell phones. You had to go to a phone. 'Cause that phone call was my mom informing me that my sister Sherry had just been raped. 4 hours earlier. I felt the rage, I felt the anger, I thought what I was going to do when I get my hands around his neck. I struggled for months. One of the cruelest things we can do to ourselves is try to make ourselves figure it all out. And I finally recognized, wait, I cannot reverse what happened to my sister, but I can do a lot to stop this from happening to other people. I was 19 when I had that discovery. I was 20 when I started speaking.
