Madelene Sagstrom has been on a healing and self-discovery journey for the past five years. She took another step down that path Monday when she shared on social media her first camera interview in which she discussed sexual abuse as a child. The video was made by the LPGA as part of their Drive On campaign.
For 16 years, Sagstrom kept the secret. She didn’t tell anyone. And he ate her away inside.
“I didn’t like who I was,” Sagstrom said in the video. “I couldn’t even put body injuries on my legs because I hated my body so much because of what someone else did to me. ”
Sagstrom grew up in Enkoping, Sweden. One day, as a 7-year-old girl, she visited the home of a male family friend. She often made the trip with her brother, but that day she went on her own. It was during that trip that Sagstrom was sexually abused. She remembers the abuse happening at the same time, but she tried to push it out of her mind and dismissed it as not being a big deal. Others have been far worse, she would tell herself. She threw herself at golf. She linked her self-worth to her performance on the golf course.
“Golf turned this thing that captured all my energy,” Sagstrom explained. “When I played good golf, I was a good man.”
But as Sagstrom worked with her coach and mentor, PGA and European tour player Robert Karlsson, to manage her feelings on the golf course, it prevented her from finding the deepest underlying cause for the her emotional outbursts.
“This had come to my mind. I was like, I don’t think that’s important. Let’s put that aside, ”Sagstrom said when she thought about the abuse. “But he kept coming. He kept coming up. And I was like, maybe there is something. Maybe I should tell him. ”
In a hotel room in Greenwood, South Carolina, in 2016, Sagstrom shared the secret with Karlsson. The tears that followed and the emotional release she felt, were unresolved for the first time in more than a decade.
“I found it a relief for her to talk about it,” Karlsson said in the video Sagstrom shared on social media. “It was emotionally strong for me to trust her.”
In 2017, Sagstrom shared his story publicly for the first time. She took part in a Swedish campaign, “Inte ensam, aldrig glömd,” which translates to “Not only, never forget.” As part of the campaign, Sagstrom revealed on Facebook the abuse she suffered, the pain she suffered and her path to healing. First and foremost, Sagstrom hoped that the message would be a comfort to anyone, who was like her, having lived with the mystery of sexual abuse. She wanted them to know that they are not alone. Sagstrom says so much at the end of her recent social media video, which includes a phone number for a sexual assault hotline.
That message was the driving force behind Sagstrom sitting down with me for her first on-camera interview about the abuse, which was used in the video she shared on social media.
It was January 2020. Sagstrom had just won for the first time on the LPGA Tour at GainGA LPGA and was keen to use its platform to help others. After she won, Sagstrom wrote a letter to her young self and shared it on Instagram. The letter was very visual and moving. The letter opened the door, just cracked, into Sagstrom’s personal discovery over the past four years.
“I know it’s easier for you to be tough on yourself, to be skeptical about it and not to think you’re good enough,” Sagstrom wrote on Instagram. “Try the little girl, be nice to yourself. You are so much more than you can imagine right now. You are as deserving and as perfect just as you are. “
Shortly after Sagstrom posted that letter on Instagram I first learned about her Facebook post in 2017. I contacted Sagstrom about sharing her letter with herself as a video. Then, I quietly suggested the idea of sharing his basic story of sexual abuse. Sagstrom was ready.
That first meeting was over a year ago. The past 12 months have been a time of discovery for the 28-year-old as we work together to share his story. We sat down for her formal video interview in October 2020.
“It’s an emotional experience. Every time I talk about it, it gets so hard, ”Sagstrom said of its growth over the past year. “Every day I go out and my story, and my history, and who I am, I grow. ”
On Sunday afternoon, Sagstrom took another big step. The day before her story was shared with the world, she met the media. Through Zoom, she described her journey and answered questions with deep insight, with evidence from the work she has done on her five-year journey toward healing. While there is no way she can fully prepare for the media attention her story garner, she has kept to herself as well as she knows how for anything to come next.
“I’m definitely ready for it,” Sagstrom said of sharing his story. “I’m ready to get a label and break out of that label because I’m so much more than just this story.”
Sagstrom admits she has good days and bad days. She is not fully healed, but she has come a long way in dealing with the sexual abuse she suffered 21 years ago. And, she hopes that anyone who watches her story will know that they too can embark on their own journey towards healing. One step at a time.
“What I want to share with people is the steps I took after that. These are the decisions I made for growth, ”said Sagstrom. “I hope people see my story as an inspiration to work through anything you go through. ”