From Wall Street to Sexual Assault Survivor Advocacy: Sharon's Story

I want to jump ahead a little bit because I also remember you mentioning that after 9-11 happened, you found yourself reevaluating everything.

You had built this career.

You had gone to business school with your husband.

You had already started a family.

Again, career, family, priorities.

What shifted for you in the days and months following 9-11 that you think changed the trajectory of where you were heading?

Yeah, and this is an interesting timing for this question, because we just had the 25th anniversary, which I found particularly emotional and difficult, as I'm sure anybody who experienced 9-11 felt.

But, I mean, I had three little kids, and they were living in Larchmont, and I was working at 85 Broad down, you know, in Wall Street.

And I think for the first time in my life, I was scared.

Like scared, meaning we're not safe here in this country, right? Like we've never felt like that as Americans.

You don't really feel that way.

And it definitely made me empathetic for people in other countries that feel that frequently.

I remember that going through my head.

But for the first time, like post 9-11, I didn't want to get on subways.

I had panic attacks from time to time, right? And I felt...

really badly leaving my young children at home because I had friends that died that day and some who were moms, all who were parents, some who were mothers and left small children.

And, you know, you do reevaluate and you say, is this worth it? And is it worth feeling this way every day? Without really any idea for how long those feelings would last because it happened there, right? You couldn't really separate the two things.

Yeah.

I can understand that.

Yeah.

I mean, I can't imagine being in close proximity to that that day and then having friends that didn't make it and here you are evaluating choices and feeling unsafe.

And I mean, I know as a mother, your kids are always the priority.

So I'm sure that was a really difficult time having built this incredible career and suddenly you're questioning everything.

Absolutely.

And I think, you know, as women too, we feel this extra burden of, oh, I've built this great career and here I am, I'm sitting in this great seat at Goldman that I fought really hard to get.