I was raped by someone I’d know for ten years. I was raped in the home of someone I called my best friend. I thought of my rapist as a good friend; a kind, funny person; someone I didn’t know to be scared of. We were at the house party of my best friends. I’d stopped drinking around a year before but stupidly gave into the pressures of those around me. I got blackout drunk, I could barely remember my name, I had no concept of the time passing; I was a mess. I left my friend upstairs asleep after she’d been sick. There were three other people in the living room staying over so I joined them. I took the last spot on the sofa until he came over and told he it was his spot. Drunken and barely conscious I told him just to share with me—we were good friends, he knew I was in a relationship so no chance of any problems right?
Wrong.
He proceed to pull my dress up and move my underwear to the side. He tried to finger me as I lay there silent and limp. He then pulled me on top of him and forced himself inside me; I remember struggling to grasp what was happening and not being able to get the words out to tell him no. He rolled on top of me, I was sobbing silently, my head lolling to the side, never moving my body. He asked repeatedly if I was on the pill, over and over again. I couldn’t answer so he must’ve assumed yes or just that it didn’t matter. We never kissed, I never said I wanted him, we never flirted, my clothes never came off; there was no denying it was rape. After he raped me he slept whilst I sobbed beside him.
The next day he messaged saying he felt like a bad person, I just begged him not to tell anyone what happened. I went to church in a daze. I remember trying to find a reason that it was okay what happened, that he wasn’t capable of doing that. It wasn’t until the following Monday when I was emailing my boyfriend who was serving a mission for our church that it really dawned on me what had happened. It killed me having to tell my boyfriend what happened, but he was what motivated me through the next few months. My bishop’s wife took me to get the morning after pill and later my bishop organised for counseling and constant support for me. I was put on antidepressants. Despite all this help, the months following my rape were the worst of my life. I jumped if males came near me. I couldn’t cry or talk to anyone properly. To the world I was fine but inside I felt like I was suffocating, unable to find a release for what I felt. I turned to smoking and self harm in an attempt to feel something other than crippling numbness. Five months after the rape I overdosed. After being taken to hospital I had to tell my mum what had happened. Things got better from there for a little while. Then my rapist then came into the pub I served at. The panic attack he caused and the anxiety that followed were unbearable. Nowhere felt safe anymore. I ended up going to the police and reporting him, and then moved four hours away to live with my boyfriend’s family. Despite working with the police, my rapist was never charged or convicted. In fact he was never even questioned by police, something that I’ll never understand.
I’m now married to the man of my dreams, the one who stood by me through it all as continues to do so. I still have flashbacks and I still hate to go back home to the area my rapist is in. I’m not friends with anyone from that party anymore. I’m not numb from the pain he caused on a daily basis but even almost two years on he continues to taint my life.
I was raped and my rapist has never been accused of what he did to me. He lives out my dream of being in the army whilst I lost any chance of that dream happening when his rape pushed me into deep depression. As hard as I try to rid myself of the rape and him, I’m realizing now that it will always be a part of who I am.
This will be the first time I have spoken out publicly of what happened to me.
