--- title: C-SPAN Caller Shares Story of Sexual Assault During Christine Blasey Ford Hearing description: She said Ford's testimony made her think about her own experience when she was a child canonical: https://time.com/5408805/christine-blasey-ford-testimony-cspan-caller/ author: Abigail Abrams article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2018-09-27T18:13:04.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-03-31T11:45:20.739Z article:section: Politics og:title: C-SPAN Caller Shares Story of Sexual Assault During Christine Blasey Ford Hearing og:description: She said Ford's testimony made her think about her own experience when she was a child og:url: https://time.com/5408805/christine-blasey-ford-testimony-cspan-caller/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt16a03a1393e9ed2f/69893b54929fad178bbf1b04/christine-blasey-ford-brett-kavanaugh.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 5328 og:image:height: 2997 og:image:alt: Supreme Court Kavanaugh, Washington, USA - 27 Sep 2018 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: C-SPAN Caller Shares Story of Sexual Assault During Christine Blasey Ford Hearing twitter:description: She said Ford's testimony made her think about her own experience when she was a child twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt16a03a1393e9ed2f/69893b54929fad178bbf1b04/christine-blasey-ford-brett-kavanaugh.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # A 76-Year-Old Woman Called C-SPAN During Christine Blasey Ford's Testimony to Talk About Her Assault > Sponsored content. 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Brief is TIME's Washington newsletter, written by senior correspondent Philip Elliott. It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, three times a week. It reaches 85,000 subscribers with a 37.0% open rate as of August 2026. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters. by [Abigail Abrams](https://time.com/author/abigail-abrams/) ## Abigail Abrams Sep 27, 2018 6:13 PM UTC  Christine Blasey Ford testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington, on Sept. 27, 2018. Christine Blasey Ford testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington, on Sept. 27, 2018.Saul Loeb/AP/REX/Shutterstock—Saul Loeb/AP/REX/Shutterstock by [Abigail Abrams](https://time.com/author/abigail-abrams/) ## Abigail Abrams Sep 27, 2018 6:13 PM UTC As [Christine Blasey Ford testified](http://time.com/5408177/brett-kavanaugh-christine-blasey-ford-testimony/) in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday, detailing her allegations of sexual assault against Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, her story struck a chord with many women around the country. People posted reactions on social media and some called into C-SPAN during a break in the testimony Thursday morning, with some sharing their own memories of sexual assault. One woman, identified as Brenda, from Missouri, told C-SPAN that she had been molested when she was a child and that the testimony was the first time she had thought about her own experience in years. “I’m a 76-year-old woman who was sexually molested in second grade. This brings back so much pain,” she said on the call. “Thought I was over it but it’s not. You will never forget it. You get confused and you don’t understand it but you never forget what happened to you.” > [](https://twitter.com/cspan/status/1045357474751164416) She added that her family had helped her through her experience, but that hearing Ford tell her story brought back memories. “I was in the second grade. And it was a seventh grader at my school. And you know on rainy days they have you march around back then the school because they couldn’t let you out. And I would see him and I would get so upset,” she recalled. The woman said the incident has impacted her ever since. “I’ve had a weight problem my whole life because I was so afraid someone was going to hurt me,” she told C-SPAN. “I’m married, I have a wonderful family, I have a wonderful husband, I have a child and great-grandchildren and grandchildren,” she added. “I thought I was over this. And I have not brought this up for years until I heard this testimony and it is just breaking my heart.” The woman’s call also seemed to resonate with many, as it quickly spread across social media as an example of how many related to the experiences Ford was sharing on Thursday. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/5408805/christine-blasey-ford-testimony-cspan-caller/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/5408805/christine-blasey-ford-testimony-cspan-caller/"},"headline":"A 76-Year-Old Woman Called C-SPAN During Christine Blasey Ford's Testimony to Talk About Her Assault","datePublished":"2018-09-27T18:13:04.000Z","dateModified":"2026-03-31T11:45:20.739Z","description":"She said Ford's testimony made her think about her own experience when she was a child","url":"https://time.com/5408805/christine-blasey-ford-testimony-cspan-caller/","keywords":["Congress","Supreme Court","justice","onetime","Brett Kavanaugh"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt16a03a1393e9ed2f/69893b54929fad178bbf1b04/christine-blasey-ford-brett-kavanaugh.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Abigail Abrams","jobTitle":"","url":"https://time.com/author/abigail-abrams/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt16a03a1393e9ed2f/69893b54929fad178bbf1b04/christine-blasey-ford-brett-kavanaugh.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Supreme Court Kavanaugh, Washington, USA - 27 Sep 2018","caption":"Supreme Court Kavanaugh, Washington, USA - 27 Sep 2018","creditText":"Saul Loeb/AP/REX/Shutterstock—Saul Loeb/AP/REX/Shutterstock","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/congress/","name":"Congress"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/5408805/christine-blasey-ford-testimony-cspan-caller/","name":"A 76-Year-Old Woman Called C-SPAN During Christine Blasey Ford's Testimony to Talk About Her Assault"}}]}] ```