And thats why I cant stand hearing it.
At first, I didnt tell anyone.
Not my friends, my siblings, my parentsno one.
Gary Shrewsbury
I felt ashamed, even though I hadnt done anything wrong.
The assault rocked my sense of the world and my place in it.
And I was terrified that I might be pregnant with my attackers baby.
True Gretch: What I’ve Learned About Life, Leadership, and Everything in Betweenby Gretchen Whitmer
To my immense relief, I wasnt.
Other than that, I didnt talk about it, and I tried hard not to think about it.
My feeling was that bad things happen to people all the time.
Gary Shrewsbury
Better not to dwell on them, but instead just forge ahead as best we can.
Fast-forward more than two decades later.
If you got pregnant from an assault and hadnt pre- bought the insurance, well, too bad.
You couldnt buy it after getting pregnant, regardless of the circumstances.
This was not only cruel, it was absurd.
Did lawmakers really expect women to plan ahead for a potential pregnancy resulting from a possible future assault?
Passing this law was essentially requiring women to buy rape insurance.
This was a terrible loophole in the law, an end run on womens rights.
They just wanted to get the thing passed.
I was angry, and the remarks reflected that.
They were personal and emotional, but they did not include the fact that I had been raped.
Because no one on my staff had any idea that had happened.
The second time, the secretary announces that the bill is open for debate.
Staffers cant push that buttonit has to be you.
(When the majority is abusing power, this is a move they regularly deploy.)
The third reading is when senators get up to speak.
On December 11, 2013, the secretary announced the Abortion Insurance Opt-Out Act.
But the miscarriage had happened very recently, and the pain was just too raw.
Im sorry, he told me, his face drawn and tense.
I just cant talk about it.
I told him I understood, and then stood to walk back to my desk.
And thats when it hit me.
Yes, Jim had a personal story that might make a difference if he shared it that day.
But so did I.
How could I ask him to publicly bare his soul if I wasnt willing to do that myself?
With so little time, I had to get right to the point.
Then I asked what they thought.
Nancy immediately said, Dont do it.
It wont change any votes, and youll be making yourself vulnerable.
She knew the Republicans would vote party line, no matter what I said in my speech.
Beyond that, she genuinely cared about how this revelation might affect me.
She was looking out for me.
I turned to Bob, whose face was ashen.
I dont have any advice, he said.
I cant even put myself in your place.
You should do whatever you think is right.
We headed back into the chamber, and soon enough, it was my turn to speak.
I walked up to the lectern, my prepared speech in hand, still unsure what to do.
Thank you, madam chair, I said.
I rise for my no vote explanation.
Then I began reading my remarks.
This tells women who were raped and became pregnant thattheyshould have thought ahead and bought special insurance for it.
Ive said it before and I will say it again.
This is by far one of the most misogynistic proposals Ive ever seen in the Michigan legislature.
I delivered my remarks as deliberately and forcefully as possible, letting my anger show.
In the back of my mind, though, my thoughts were spinning.
For twenty-three years, I had pushed down the awful memory of what happened to me in college.
I never in my life imagined talking about it in a public forum.
Once it was out, there was no turning back.
My mouth went dry.
Yet, the longer I spoke, the more I realized I had to do it.
I spoke briefly about a woman named Jenny Lane, who had written a letter opposing the bill.
But over twenty years ago, I was a victim of rape.
At the mention of my daughters, my voice broke.
I was fighting back tears, but after taking a moment to compose myself, I went on.
I thought this was all behind me.
You know how tough I can be.
The thought and the memory of that still haunts me.
How extremehow extreme does this measure need to be?
I am not the only woman in our state that has faced that horrible circumstance.
I am not enjoying talking about it.
Its something Ive hidden for a long time.
When I finished my remarks, the chamber was absolutely silent.
I quickly turned and walked away from the lectern, my heart pounding.
Had I really just said all that?
Would it come back to haunt me somehow?
It would be on TV and in all the newspapers, that much I knew.
My mother had passed in 2002, so she would never know about the assault.
I didnt want them learning it from school friends whose parents might have been discussing it.
As soon as I could, I hurried back to my office and called my father.
He was stunned, and of course upset for me.
My dad and I have always been close, so this was a tough moment for both of us.
My wife was raped in college too.
But here was a person who understood, and still chose to vote the way that he did.
What hope did we have?
The next morning, I headed to workfeeling hollowed-out and depressed.
What had been the point of laying my soul bare like that?
Then, during my drive, one of my staffers called.
But its a heavy lift and weve got a big fight on our hands.
I wasnt wrong about that part.
I was determined not to give up until we got it off the books.
Over the next decade, we rolled up our sleeves and got to work.
And we galvanized voters who cared about reproductive freedom.
For the first time since 1984, Democrats won the governorship, the Senate, and the House.
With control of the legislature, we could finally repeal that terrible law.
Were tough and we fight back and we will win.
You come for our rights and we will work harder to protect them.
It was one of my proudest moments yet in politics.
Everyone is a lump of clay, she said.
When a lump of clay is hollowed out, it becomes a cup, a vessel.
I love the idea that when something is taken from you, whats left behind has a purpose.
For a long time, I wanted to ignore the terrible event that happened to me in college.
Ill always be grateful that I could use that bad experience for good.
Excerpted fromTrue Gretch: What I’ve Learned About Life, Leadership, and Everything in Betweenby Gretchen Whitmer.
Copyright 2024 by Gretchen Whitmer.
Reprinted by permission of Simon & Schuster, Inc.
