Later in the decade, my mother dumped one of her boyfriends. He then came to her apartment one night, broke in, and raped her. As he got in bed, she was in the middle of a flashback. She cried and said "No," and he had sex with her anyway. When she tried to tell him later that what he'd done was unacceptable, he informed her that because she'd pursued him during their relationship -- because she was the one who originally asked him out -- a rape case would never stand up in court. My mother met my dad many years after these incidents. Mom first told me that she'd been raped in my late teens, because she was considering telling her story to our church congregation, and she wanted me to know before she did that. The full stories came out during intermittent conversations in my twenties. I love both my parents with the fire of a thousand suns, and let me tell you, I've spent an unreasonable amount of time fantasizing about murdering the men who attacked my mother. I doubt I could find the first guy, but I could probably find the second, and in my early twenties I often imagined shooting him in the head. (Don't worry, Mom, I don't think about that anymore.) Within the last few years, I started thinking about asking Mom's permission to write about her experiences and my reaction to them. I always shelved the idea because I felt that it wasn't my story to tell. Last year, the topic came up in conversation, and I finally asked permission; she said yes immediately. I double-checked her consent twice this year, and she said yes both times. Still, I was hesitant, and I only got around to it now -- for Mother's Day. I also asked her to review this piece, and to feel free to veto anything within it. I am doing my best not to co-opt or appropriate my mother's story. But her story and her life have shaped mine, intimately -- including my views on gender issues, and my course as a feminist activist and writer. A few years ago, a widely-read Harper's article by established feminist