Ashley Graham Was Sexually Assaulted When She Was 10

Ashley Graham

Ashley Graham Was Sexually Assaulted

In a new interview, Ashley Graham (29) reveals that she was sexually assaulted when she first began modeling. At the time, she was 17.

There was an incident on set of a campaign job when I was 17 years old — I haven’t told this story — and there was a photo assistant who was into me. He was like, ‘Hey, come here,’ and he led me into a closet. And I was like, ‘What?’ I thought he was going to show me something. And he pulled me in, and he pulled his penis out. And he was like, ‘Grab it.’ And I was like, ‘No! That’s disgusting.’ I freaked out. And thank God I was closer to the door, and I just bolted out.

However this situation wasn’t the first time. When she was 10, an 18-year-old son of her parents’ friends allegedly forced her to touch his penis. She wrote about both situations in her book and admits that she didn’t tell anyone.

It was like, ‘Did I do something to provoke that?’ Or, ‘Did I give them a signal that it was OK?’ The insecure girl inside me was like, ‘Well, maybe I did something.’ To all those girls out there: No, you didn’t do anything.

Click here for Ashley’s book, A New Model: What Confidence, Beauty, and Power Really Look Like.

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