Grooming: A Reflection on My First Relationship

At the current age of 26, I’ve been through my fair share of traumatic moments and experiences, with each having their lasting impacts. I think one of the most powerful tools I have gained through my own healing journey is the power of perspective and the narration we tell ourselves. So often with trauma, we continue the narrative of a situation that aligns with how we initially experienced it. In doing so, we may invalidate the damage others have done to us. By switching the narrative and having perspective, we can better understand the magnitude someone’s actions had on us.

In the past month and a half, I’ve started to reflect on a specific situation I was in 12 years ago. Through this reflection, I started to reconstruct the story I have told myself since I was 14. I finally now am coming to a place of understanding that my first relationship was nothing more than me being groomed. So here it is, the truth and nothing but the truth.

When I was 14 and a freshman in high school, I joined an after school activity that quickly became my introduction to my artistic and expressive self. I quickly was accepted and befriended by the members and faculty. I was overwhelmed in the best way possible. So overwhelmed and excited, I soon became part of a situation that spanned over three years: my first relationship.

At this point in my life, I had not accepted my sexuality nor had any appropriate sexual experienced. I was still discovering who I was and what it meant to possibly be gay.

My instructor at that time was 19 years old and openly gay. He took a strong likening to me once I joined the program. We developed an instant friendship and a large part of really looked up to him. He was great at his craft and he saw potential in me. No one had ever seen potential in me.

About 3 weeks into the program, our friendship began to grow outside of school. He sent me a text message inviting me to hang out with him and his friends after-school on a Friday night. He mentioned there would be alcohol and weed there. I remember thinking to myself “I’m getting invited to an adult party with my instructor? How cool!” And so, I went.

So Friday night comes along and I find myself hanging out with a bunch of college kids smoking and drinking. I remember feeling so nervous yet calm at the same time. I wanted his friends to like me and I was reminded by him I had nothing to worry about because, as he often told me, I was mature for my age.

A couple of hours go by and at this point we are all pretty intoxicated. A few of his friends go off and do their thing, which left us two alone. I remember feeling a rush and nervousness. We start goofing off and pushing each other, which soon became into play wrestling. I find myself on the floor with him on top of me and staring right at me. There is a second of stillness and then we began to make out. We take a moment’s pause and he tells me “I was hoping to do that all night”. His friends eventually walk in on us and pretend they didn’t see anything and leave us to continue. We left it at making out and I soon find myself waiting for the bus at 11pm filled with butterflies, excitement, and disbelief.

I would never have guess that night would be the start of not only me coming out as being gay, but instantly join my first ever relationship and it was with someone over the age of consent who was also my instructor. How could this possibly go wrong?

At first our relationship was top secret and we did our best to make sure no one knew. Eventually, people started to piece things together and found out on their own. It got to the point where all students in the program knew and simply accepted it as is. Some thought it was gross because we were gay, some thought it was cute because we were gay, and very few brought up the hugest red flag: that this relationship was illegal. We honestly did a pretty horrible job at trying to hide it. We would always be sitting next to each other on the bus for field trips, we were always showing up and leaving together, and had many moments of being caught being alone in a space. I remember very specifically a teacher at my high school walked in on us kissing and said “I’m just going to pretend I didn’t see that”. The teacher walked away and it was never brought up again.

Our relationship grew to the point where I was introduced to his family and even spent many nights at their place. They all fully knew my age and my dual relationship with him. One of his brothers was even a teacher at a local high school. And nothing was ever said and done.

Now, for the relationship itself. And this is probably one of the most difficult parts to try and reconcile with because I had never seen myself a victim to any of his actions. But 12 years later as I look back on it, I feel so differently about this.

I want to preface this by saying something I feel strongly about and some reading this may disagree with this point of view. I do not in any way feel, think, or believe, I was raped or sexually assaulted. I knew what I was doing and I understood what was happening. Now, the tricky part is the idea of consent and if I’m legally even able to give it. I am still processing so much of this situation that I don’t think I have answers for all my emotions yet. What I will say is that in the present moment, I feel like I was taken advantage of and groomed emotionally.

There was never anything physically abusive about the relationship, but there was a lot of controlling that happened. For instance, I was not allowed to look at a guy if he passed by. If someone was walking by that was attractive, my boyfriend would use his hand to turn my face away. If a guy on T.V. was shirtless, I was also not allowed to look. There were periodic phone checks where I would hand over my phone and he would go through it to be sure I was not talking to anyone else. The jealousy and control over my body was intense, but at the time I viewed it as normal and even somewhat romantic. He was “protective” over me, right?.

Another dynamic that was incredibly unhealthy was the power dynamic of our relationship and how he would have authority over me while in school. I had a really difficult time trying to separate my emotions for him as a boyfriend and my emotions for him as my instructor. I won’t lie. It was fucking hard. One second he is yelling at me in rehearsal and the next second we are walking home together holding hands. I took rehearsals very personal. If he validated me in rehearsals, I felt he was also proud of me as a boyfriend. If he yelled and critiqued me in rehearsal, I would feel upset with him as my boyfriend. It was a constant internal battle trying to differentiate the dual relationship and how the power dynamic would play out.

At that time, I never said anything or made a big deal about it because I wanted to prove I was this mature person he kept referring to me as. I could handle this, well at least that’s what I kept telling myself. In hindsight, I honestly just have so much care and compassion for that 14 year old self. What 14 year old is able to understand and hold firm emotional boundaries, especially when the adults around him couldn’t?

Overtime, my self-esteem really started to be impacted. I could no longer handle the constant shift of power and dynamic. I remember just feeling extremely depressed about my performance in rehearsals and then be expected to cuddle up with the person who just finished berating me. And I think this is really why I consider this relationship to be emotionally exploitative and a clear example of grooming.

We dated for three years. Three years of dealing with the jealousy, the controlling behaviors, the power inequity, and others knowing what was happening and ignoring it. We eventually broke up my junior year of high school, which also happened to be his last year as my instructor. He left the position and we separated for a reason I actually can’t seem to remember. But whatever reason it was, blessed be for that.

For a very long time, I felt pretty neutral about the entire situation. I never thought anything negatively about the relationship or him. We’ve even exchanged a few check-in Facebook messages over the years. Yet, 12 years later and I’m beginning to experience a huge shift in my understanding. So, why the sudden shift and why now?

This really began when Demi Lovato released their new song “29”, which details the singers very public relationship with a 29 year old celebrity while she was 17. The song is raw and honest. Lines like “thought it was a teenage dream, just a fantasy, but was it yours or was it mine?” and “finally twenty nine, seventeen would never cross my mind” really made me question the entire relationship. After the release, fans began to share their stories of being involved with someone older than them while being a minor. And once I started hearing other people’s stories, I really began to ask myself “Was I groomed?”

Since my first realization, I’ve been spending a lot of time challenging a narrative I’ve held onto for 12 years in order to make room for the truth. I’ve reflected on how the control and jealousy of this relationship conditioned me to think this is an acceptable demonstration of love. I’ve looked at the various and current relationships I’ve held and how I have perpetuated control and jealousy, because that is what I was taught. I’m working on realizing how this relationship in particular shaped the way I view polyamory, self-worth, and affection.

I am in a weird state where I am feeling emotions around this situation I have never felt. I am feeling anger. I am feeling sadness. I am feeling regret. I am feeling disgusted. I am feeling used. And I feel disappointed. I am angry at the individual that thought it was okay to do this. I am angry at all the adults who were aware of this and did nothing to stop it. I am angry that I’m just now realizing my first relationship was unhealthy and wrong. And I am angry with myself for letting this happen.

If I have learned anything in my 26 years of life, it is that in order to heal, we must feel. And so I am allowing myself to feel everything and anything that may come up around this. I am still left unsure on so much. I have no idea how I personally feel about this individual anymore and have no idea how to categorize what I went through. I do not feel like a victim and what happened was not okay.

I feel so much sadness for that 14 year old boy who just wanted to feel loved and seen. He may have found what he thought was love, but I am so grateful he would go on to experience love in its true form. I wish I could somehow convince that 14 year old boy to not get involved in this, but I honestly do not think he would have listened. Mostly, I wish more people tried to protect this 14 year old boy. That part hurts the most.

In the present moment, I know one thing and one thing for certain: I hold one person accountable for this and one person only. I may have been aware of my actions at the time and swore I was fully agreeing to the relationship, but I was not emotionally mature enough to understand how damaging this would be in the long-term.

I am learning to have forgiveness towards myself and understand it was not my fault. I am learning to forgive those around me who normalized this relationship as they were still children themselves. And I am learning I do not need to forgive those who hurt me in order to heal.

We need to do better at protecting our youth. This should not be happening. Grown adults should not be shopping for eye candy at a school. Children deserve to be protected by adults, not used by them. We as a society need to stop sexualizing and normalizing inappropriate relationships and start protecting one another. We need to look out for our youth, especially when no one else is.

I’m Jesse Escalante. I was 14. He was 19. He was my instructor. And it was wrong.