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As I sat in my chair on the floor of the legislature, it struck me: I knew all too well why women stay silent. For over 35 years, I’ve been one of them.

I grew up in suburban Burnaby, the youngest of four kids in a community where it seemed like there were four children in every house. The road up the hill was teeming with kids walking to school, and then back home for lunch at noon.

In 1978, nobody drove anybody anywhere. You either hoofed it, or when you were old enough, took a bus.

It was back in the day when there were lots more kids than parents around. The days before chronic over-scheduling, when kids were allowed to waste time and wander.

I don’t remember everything from my youth, but I do remember all of the sexual advances from strangers: getting flashed, groped, spied on. Things that no person should experience, let alone a young girl or teenager.

Most of all, I remember the time a stranger pulled me off the sidewalk into the bushes. There was no doubt in my mind that he wanted to hurt me.

I’ll never know what might have happened. What I do know is that I never told anyone about it.

It was a sunny day, and I was walking to work at my first job. A man suddenly jumped out, grabbed me and pulled me out of sight into a deep copse of shrubs.

He didn’t say anything. I don’t even remember what he looked like.

I remember wondering where he had come from, and why I hadn’t seen him. And I remember being very scared.

Luckily, it didn’t last long.

When he pulled me down the little slope, it must have shifted him off balance. He loosened his grip for a moment, giving me a chance to wriggle away, clamber a few feet forward, and get out of the bush.