On 3 Jan. this year, Oddy Grullon’s life changed in an instant when she was assaulted while on a morning run. Now she is turning her trauma into triumph for the Cayman Islands Crisis Centre in the hope it will help her to heal as well.
Grullon, an avid runner, is set to take on a four-marathon challenge – one a month – to raise $15,000 for the Crisis Centre.
“This is a challenge to generate awareness while inspiring strength, endurance, bravery, and resolve in other women,” Grullon said in an interview with the Cayman Compass.
Her first race will be the Revel Big Cottonwood Marathon in Salt Lake City, Utah, on 10 Sept., followed by the Chicago Marathon on 9 Oct., the New York Marathon on 6 Nov., and culminating in the Walkers Cayman Islands Marathon on 4 Dec.
Grullon has secured full sponsorship for all four marathons through Walkers, AMR Consulting Engineers, Mykonos restaurant, Citco and her employer Kirk Freeport. She has created a fundraising page for the Crisis Centre.
Running as therapy
While it may seen ironic that Grullon has chosen running as her path to promoting awareness since she was jogging when the attack occurred, she is finding it therapeutic.
But Grullon said she is haunted by what happened.
“I had a fracture on my left leg that took me out of running for more than eight weeks. But that did not stop me from speaking out and putting my face and name in the spotlight in order to raise awareness in the community. All because I did not want this to happen to any other female,” she said.
A 26-year-old man has been charged in the matter and the case is before the court.
For the Cayman Islands resident, the challenge is her way of taking back control of what she loves to do and making it her own once again.
“I went through a lot… nightmares, lack of sleep… [thinking] safety first, stress, trauma… So that made me think, ‘Wait a minute Oddy, you cannot get stuck in the dark, you need to come back to your life and back stronger,’” she said.
Grullon immediately turned to running.
“Running reminds me that I am strong and helps me to keep my mind and my body busy and focus on something else. That’s why I decided to put this challenge together and run four marathons in four months,” she added.
She said the training and running has become her therapy and has been helping her a lot.
“Just thinking about what happened to me wasn’t healthy for myself, but also through my story I want to raise awareness and empower other women to overcome the challenge they may have experienced,” she said.
She said she chose the Crisis Centre for her charity since it was closely aligned with her personal experience and what she wanted to do to empower women.
Her message to women, Grullon said, is simple.
“Just face the situation you have been through and do not let this push you back or push you into the dark. You can be strong. I know it’s difficult but if you put yourself [first] in your mind and your health, you can do it,” she said.
She said she is grateful for the support from the community and her sponsors.
More protection needed
Grullon also lamented the lack of protection for women in the community when it comes to sexual harassment.
Though there are laws in place, Cayman is yet to introduce a sexual harassment-specific act.
“I would like the government and the politicians to put more attention to all the harassment that we are facing… every female… not only adult women, but little girls to older women because we all [are] going through that,” she said.
Grullon said the situation is “very frustrating”.
“The reality is just because we are women we had to face this danger and on the road. It’s sad because we should be free to go to exercise in the road any time or any day we want but I believe we just need to be more careful and be ready. I know also it’s difficult… I never thought that something like that was going to happen to me… you just need to be ready and with your eyes open while you’re doing exercise in the road,” she said.
In April, Premier Wayne Panton, who has responsibility for gender affairs, said government expects to have a sexual harassment act enacted by the “end of the third quarter if not sooner”.
He confirmed at that time that instructions had been issued to the legal drafting team to update the 2015 sexual harassment bill.
As of 30 Aug. no bills relating to sexual harassment had been published in the Government Gazette for public comment.
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