Crime
by Ginger Gorman
8th Mar 2021 3:27 PM
When the sexual harassment was at its worst, Julia Szlakowski woke up at night screaming in bed beside her-then fiance.
And wasn't just nightmares - the impacts bled into all corners: "My life was dismantled in every possible way. I was paralysed with anxiety. For a time I stopped going outside and interacting with people. I felt cold and I shook a lot.
"I had no appetite. I dropped about 20 pounds [9kg], very quickly, within a couple of weeks. The trauma had really gripped me.
"My whole body was just clenched like this," the 41-year-old explains from her home in the United States, bunching up her fists to demonstrate.