At the age of 16 Devin, a junior at Little Rock’s Philander Smith College, began a relationship with the man she said was her first love: a 21-year-old arena football player.
Her idyllic days with him didn’t last long, said Devin, whose last name has been withheld for this story. A year into their relationship, Devin’s boyfriend became violent. She told him she wanted to end the relationship. He tried to force her to have sex with him. Devin fought him.
At the time, Devin, now 21, wasn’t familiar with the term teen dating violence. Nor did she realize she’d become a teen dating violence statistic. In the nationwide CDC 2011 Youth Risk Behavior survey, 9.4 percent of high school students reported being hit, slapped or physically hurt on purpose by their boyfriend or girlfriend in the 12 months prior to the survey.
See Wednesday’s Arkansas Democrat-Gazette for more about teens and dating violence.