Racehorses and Dancing with the d’Evil—Digging to

At the end of basic training summer, I was sitting on standard-issue wooden chairs in our company’s counseling room, sweat rolling down my back, pooling at the waistband of my black athletic shorts. It was brutally hot and humid with no air conditioning. Even with the mandatory open door, I was nervous to be in a room alone with any male cadet, but it didn’t help knowing I was letting down my favorite squad leader, Cadet Mackenzie (Christopher).

“People don’t want me here. I don’t ft in. Nobody likes me. I’m going home, sir,” I haltingly announced.

Christopher told me I shouldn’t quit because if I did, the people who didn’t want me there win. He asked if I was a quitter.

“No, sir!” I wanted to believe it. So, I stayed.

Back then, girls had a snowball’s chance in a frestorm of succeeding in the fourth-class system at the military academy. Fraternization—every cadet’s terror—was being accused of crossing the strict plebe/upper class, superior/ inferior social boundary. Observing friendly “frat” daily between male peers and their male command, I concluded my upline leadership seemingly hated or feared me. Cadets acting kindly or even marginally friendly in their interactions with me were threatened with “fratting” and often became my worst haze nightmare. One junior felt terrible about my treatment during basic training but explained that helping me risked his future. The “problem child” pariah, I became an outcast shuffed through multiple squad leaders throughout the school year.

On evenings when I should have been studying, different upperclassmen commanded me to stand at attention for hours in their rooms, wasting precious time. Sometimes, it was chilly standing against wardrobes opposite

open windows, my white athletic shirt pulled taut across my chest and tucked into a mandatory “dress-off” into my shorts. Ashamed as they tittered and pointed to my body’s natural response to the cold, I was overwhelmingly relieved when allowed to leave.

Saturday mornings before four-hour calculus tests, other team leaders prepped their plebes with equations and “remember this” theory. Not mine. Entering Thayer Hall in tears of frustration, I wondered if higher math would get me kicked out of USMA. It wouldn’t. That test came second semester.

One Night Changed My Future

Fourth-class freshmen male cadets were often funny and f irty, but honestly, females considered them buddies and brothers-in-arms. Cadet dating was weird, doomed to fail. There were a few cute boys, but I wouldn’t have wanted anything to hurt my chances of being a respectable leader.

During basic training, one plebe freshman seemed to like me, but his circles were not my circles. We were in different classes, companies, and barracks. Until that fateful week of spring break when all the upperclassmen were allowed to leave and every plebe required to stay, I saw him only a few times.

Without upperclassmen present, spring break dance parties busted into hallways from the basement rooms below the barracks. Acting like silly, “normal,” nonmilitary college students laughing and enjoying life without the usual restrictions, we had the most fun we’d had since reporting that f rst steamy summer day. The plebe from basic training must have spoken to me at one of those parties. He was cute, so I’m sure I smiled, but

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when the party was over, everyone went back to their rooms to prepare for Taps.

Details of that night get hazy at this point. Cadet rooms had no locks at that time, so when he knocked and entered without permission, he startled my roommate and me already in bed. He asked if I wanted to go somewhere. I anticipated another dance party, so I reassured my roommate I would safely be back soon. I’d never ask her to lie about my whereabouts because in the military, you don’t put your roommate in that position, and I truly believed I would be back. The thought never occurred to ask where this cadet was taking me before we left.

After a while, I remember asking him in the hallway, “Are we going to another party?” giddy at the thought of dancing again.

“You’ll see.”

What happened next still swirls as dream-state surreality. He led me down labyrinths of stairwells and underground tunnels through unfamiliar hallways, so when we arrived at what I now suppose was the Fourth Regiment’s barracks, all direction and bearing was lost on me. Confounded that no one patrolled these halls, I kept following.

Entering a room, I immediately knew it couldn’t be his. No patrols, no roommate, and messier than any plebe’s room, it must have been in an upper-class area. I should have bolted the second he shut the door, except . . . I didn’t realize it was an option. He was a football player, a top cadet in our class, and clearly in control.

When he began kissing me, I thought he wanted to make out a little and go dance. Surely, there’s no harm in kissing a boy, right? He was cute, desirable, and more importantly, he wasn’t in my company.

My mind fashed back to an event earlier in the week: one of my company peers, a huge football player, pinned me against the wall behind his door trying to kiss me. The lights were bright, the hallway noisy. Yelling expletives, I squirmed and shoved, ducking under his massive arms and out of the room. With other cadets in proximity, he easily let me go.

This was different. No one was about, and he didn’t turn on the lights. Although my eyes had adjusted to the dimness, I hadn’t seen the blanket between the beds. In my confusion, with shirt and clothes thrown suddenly to the foor, he quickly progressed to pushing me down onto the blanket.

Begging him again and again not to do this, I desperately asked him to use a condom. Make no mistake, my begging was not sexual foreplay, and asking for protection is not saying yes. My mind caving to the inevitable was somehow strategizing staying ahead of a potentially more devastating consequence. The terror of pregnancy ending my military career trumped being raped.

He refused.

When he was fnished, I lay unmoving on that blanket, paralyzed with shock. How had this happened to me?

Unsure what to do next, I considered leaving but quickly realized I had no idea how to fnd my room. Fearful of cadet patrols catching me and more fearful of the discipline I’d receive—walking hours in full military dress—what could I do? I stayed.

A loud double knock and a bright fashlight startled me. I gasped. The patrolling security offcer strode in, spotlighted me, and quickly backed out of the room. He yelled for us to get dressed.

My regiment’s security had found me. In my company, I was unaccounted for at bedtime, so they searched every room, every barracks to fnd me. The other cadet had covered his bases. No one reported him missing at Taps.

How did I return to my barracks? It’s blurry. I only recall showering in my company’s latrine, scrubbing my skin to expunge the flthy way I felt and smelled. Lying naked on a towel atop tiny, unyielding, military-approved tiles, I cried myself to sleep.

“We didn’t know where you were,” my roommate said. “I told them you went with him.”

Early that next morning, he knocked brusquely, entering my room again without permission.

“You will not speak of anything that happened last night. Not a word. You won’t tell anyone anything. Do you understand me?” His words hit like kill-shot bullets directed at my soul. Standing still as a statue, I gazed out my window at the Washington Monument on campus.

At this point as I write, my brain echoes my trauma therapist’s words: “Where are you feeling this in your body?” The honest answer? I feel my heart exploding for all I lost with my next words:

“Yes, sir.”

The day I gathered enough courage to explain the night’s events to a lieutenant colonel, he shamed then blamed as he informed me that men’s hormones run faster than women’s. “You should have known to leave,” he said. “It was your own fault.” According to him, I guess I got what I deserved.

Let me be clear, what I faced there was not acceptable. It never is. But misogyny is hard to break when it’s the status quo and you are powerless, whether as a frstyear plebe at a military academy or a pioneering female in a male-dominated culture.

My favorite aunt and uncle supported me at the conduct board trial. After grilling me for details of that night, my lawyer uncle swore and said, “Leigh Ellen, you have to say something. Tell what happened to you.” My automated, programmed military response: “I am responsible for my actions and the actions of those around me.”

“Cadet, do you have anything to say in your defense?” Silence rang in my ears after the tribunal offcer’s question. Shaking my head, I whispered, “No, sir.” Across a barrier, I remember my uncle’s and aunt’s loving faces becoming downcast with disappointment after the judge’s pronouncement. We were both kicked out but allowed to stay until the end of the semester to complete our freshman studies.

Until I mentored other college rape victims years later, I never realized how unjustly I was dismissed from West Point. After confessing this to my uncle, he looked at me with kind, understanding eyes and said, “I know. We’ve always known.”

Redeeming the Shame

“Why didn’t she just leave the room? Why wouldn’t she report it?”

When I’ve heard others speak these words, I can’t tell you how many times I hid behind my plastic mask, silent, too afraid to betray that I’ve been “that” girl.

Predatory grooming is a form of learned helplessness and trained powerlessness. It’s like a baby elephant that’s

chained to a stake and repeatedly attempts to escape. While she’s little, the chain and stake hold her in place. Once grown, at full size and strength, she could easily pull up the stake to break the shackles, but she has learned helplessness. Isolated, broken, trained, and exploited, she can no longer use her special God-given elephant gifts of beauty and power. Human grooming and intimidation that encourage, overlook, ignore, or enable predatory behavior—like the learned helplessness of the little elephant—perpetuate continuing abuse cycles in places like military academies.

The culture at the military academy solidifed an aspect of the plastic princess I became by reinforcing earlier grooming and learned helplessness. Now, when my own beloved West Pointer asks me why I didn’t leave the room, I can explain why.

You wanna kill a dangerous snake? Don’t play pattycake. Crush its head. That’s what Jesus did.

In Genesis 3:15, God said to the serpent, “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her off-

Learned helplessness is a spring; he shall bruise your state that occurs afer a head, and you shall bruise person has experienced his heel” (ESV, emphasis a stressful situaton added). This has been repeatedly. They come to believe that they are unable to control or change the situaton, so called the “frst gospel” in Scripture because in this verse God shows that they do not try—even although satan will bruise when opportunites for the heel of Jesus at the change become available.2 cross, ultimately Jesus will crush his head.5

Update on the Military Academy “The women in the Class of 1980—the frst to include female cadets—were able to say unequivocally they were treated diferently because of their sex. They spoke of the assaults and harassment they faced both at the academy and once they entered the Army. “Brig. Gen. Cindy Jebb, who now serves as the Dean of the Academic Board at West Point, arrived two years later as a member of the Class of 1982. Looking back at her cadet career she said, ‘I think it’s safe to say we were probably all sexually harassed.’”3 As recently as February 2022, Washington Post Pentagon correspondent Karoun Demirjian reported more than 130 documented sexual assault cases (a 48 percent increase from the previous year) at the three US military academies.4

I could never get past the shame, blame, and guilt I experienced from others who abused me, but this momma elephant is fnally learning her strength and identity in Christ to fnd her voice. Borrowing courage from women who have spoken up to put entertainment moguls, morning talk show hosts, and millionaire fnanciers behind bars, I hope to blaze new paths, encouraging others to speak up and stand shoulder to shoulder in these battles.

Verses to Consider

Genesis 3:1–15 Romans 3:21–26

She Seems So Normal podcast

Sexual Assault Support Resources

Use your smartphone camera to scan and go directly to these resources.

Rape Abuse and Incest National Network (RAINN)

If you or someone you know has been affected by sexual violence, RAINN’s sexual assault hotline offers free, conf dential, 24/7 support in English and Spanish at 1-800656-HOPE (4673) and online at RAINN.org y en español a RAINN.org/es.

National Center for Victims of Crime

ChildHelp Child Abuse Hotline

1-800-4-A-CHILD (1-800-422-4453)

Victim Connect Resource Center: 1-855-4-VICTIM (1-855-484-2846)

National Teen Dating Abuse Hotline: 1-866-331-9474