the first time i was raped

 so, if the title wasn't clear enough, this will be about rape.

if you have experienced rape, please be cautious reading this post, please protect yourself and your mental health. some of this things may be triggering or cause flashbacks if you've been through a similar experience.

your safety is the most important.

i've never told this whole story to anyone before. i've told parts of it. but stories deserve to be told in their whole. you can't acknowledge the truth without acknowledging the WHOLE truth. when you leave out or dismiss parts, say they're not as important, it makes that part stay there and hold on still waiting to be seen and heard.

so. here it is. in the whole.

the first time i was raped i was 18 or 19. i don't remember exactly when, i already had my son, but hadn't moved for college yet. it must have been late 1999, early 2000.

my brother had graduated from community college and taken a job as a sheriff deputy a few hours away from where we grew up.

one weekend he invited me to come stay with him and his roommate. a rare weekend away for me, the closest thing to a vacation a single teen mom could get.

the night i stayed, my brother ended up getting called into work, so he got his roommate to agree to take me to dinner so i wouldn't be stuck just sitting in their apartment with nothing to do.

the roommate and i drove and hour over the 4th of july pass for dinner. it was a fairly nice restaurant. i remember it was all wood walls, like, logs of wood, and maroon table cloths. any place with a table cloth was fancy to me.

i had never met my brother's roommate before this. he was a regular dude, early 20's. nothing particularly stood out about him, i don't even remember his name. his dad was the sheriff so that's how he had met my brother and they ended up roommates i guess? never really new how that happened.

the guy was super intense right from the beginning. during dinner the conversation somehow turned to his plans for marriage and how he wanted to get married and settle down right away. it was a LOT. i remember my antennae perking up and being annoyed right away. being a teen mom, i had very quickly come to recognize what i called "white knight syndrome" where guys would try to "save" me or "rescue" me from my perilous plight. it was incredibly insulting. i was in college, had my own apartment, i was raising my son. i didn't need RESCUED. i didn't need SAVED. i wasn't baby daddy hunting to get some guy to take care of me, I WAS TAKING CARE OF ME. 

it had happened a few times before and i already knew very well how angry guys could get when you have to break the news to them that you're not a damsel in distress and you're not particularly interested.

this time was just a little more tricky since we still had to drive an hour back to their apartment FOR THE WEEKEND

i knew how to be polite but not answer questions, change the subject, try to avoid the inevitable awkward conversation of "no, thank you."

by the time we got in the car to head back over the pass, the guy was saying that i was the perfect woman and i was a perfect mother and would make the perfect wife. it was so incredibly uncomfortable. i had known this guy for 2 hours: one driving, one dinner. and he was telling me i would make his perfect wife??

i was creeped the fuck out. i was so uncomfortable but had no other way to get back to my brother's apartment and no way to get home and no way to...anything. i don't even know if i had a cell phone then. or maybe did but it wouldn't have had much reception. there was no uber, no lyft, i had to ride back with this guy so i just tried to keep as quiet as possible.

on the drive back the guy "suddenly remembered" that he had promised friends that were out of town he would feed their dogs for the weekend, it was on the way.

i don't know where we were. we turned off the highway and he drove 20 minutes up a dirt road into the mountains to a cabin.

any alarm bells that had started to go off were quieted when we got to a really nice big cabin/house. lights were on, inside was very nice. very country cabin, big kitchen leading to a great room with a nice couch in front of the fireplace to the left, and a kitchen table/chairs to the right. he went right in, all the alarm bells went away, this was ok. it was a real house. these were real dogs. it was ok.

 i sat down on the couch while he fed the 2 huge dogs, shepards i think, and he offered to pour me a soda (i wasn't 21 yet). it tasted weird to me, but it was a ginger ale and i didn't like the taste anyway.

but it turned. something started to seem odd. he was too familiar with the house, moved around like he was comfortable in it. it was a regular country house. i had several friends that had grown up dirt roads in beautiful cabin homes. i was a city girl through and through. but country homes were always so beautiful and elegant to me. but he was too comfortable...it felt like...like he had home court advantage.

things get hazy from there. i remember starting to feel not right. there was a bedroom to the right of the couch and there was a bed straight ahead as you walked into the room.

i did NOT want to have sex with this guy.

i had *just* had a baby. sex was traumatic and scary and life changing for me. i did NOT want to get pregnant again. i was also still very religious and conservative back then. i was not into casual sex with someone i had JUST met.

also, i didn't like the guy. i had no plans on ever seeing him again, ever. i just wanted to get back to hanging out with my brother for the weekend then home to my baby and work and school.

it didn't go that way though.

i told him no so many times.

i remember "just the tip" and "just a little more" and not much else.

i don't remember leaving that cabin.

i don't remember going back to my brother's apartment.

i don't remember much else of that weekend.

there was a cave in at the mine where the roommate worked and he was stuck underground the whole day, keeping me safe away from him until i left to go home.

i tried to tell my brother.

he assured me his roommate would never do that.

i somehow reasoned that the roommate breaking his leg and being stuck in a landslide was enough of a swift karmic punishment that i should just stuff it down and pretend it never happened.

because i thought i deserved it.

i mean, i was a teen mom. i was damaged goods. i had baggage. i was trash. i had sex outside of marriage before, obviously it meant i was "that way." i was LUCKY someone like him would even take me out to dinner. i was LUCKY someone "didn't mind" that i had a kid already, i was LUCKY someone didn't care that i was damaged goods.

these are the things that lived in my head. these were thing things people whispered that they thought i didn't hear. these are the things the ladies in the church said to try to be reassuring. this is the way my mom treated me. hell, my own brother didn't even believe me. he believed some roommate he'd had for a few months over me, his sister.

i was LUCKY any man was willing to sweep in and rescue me and that very thing infuriated me more than anything.

i've spent a LOT of years with those voices in my head. i was admittedly a bit quick on the eject button any time a date talked about taking care of me. being fiercely independent and PROVING i didn't need someone to take care of me became my main focus.

hell, it still is.

i've been trying to prove to everyone for 20 years that i don't need someone to take care of me. ESPECIALLY with someone who would treat me like that guy did.

well, i did not see that coming.

there's an old writing legend of the story taking a turn even the writer didn't see coming.

what do you know, that's a real thing.

i'm really struggling with control right now. it's been a month of unemployment and i've been on a few interviews but have yet to land anything.

i'm scared. i'm fucking terrified.

and i'm going to have to ask for help.

i'm going to have to say i can't do it on my own.

i knew that was going to be hard because i don't like to give up control, who does?

but it's been more than that. there's a looming sense of failure. there's a fear of needing rescued.

this feeling that saying i need help now somehow means i deserved to be raped then.

whew. that's a hefty one to unpack.

that's what happens when you stuff trauma down for 20 years. i doesn't go away. it just hangs out waiting for you.

i've been carrying that around for 20 years. that feeling of: if i fail it means i deserved it. i should have been grateful. i did need a white knight. i should have been glad someone was willing to tolerate my damaged, less than self.

whew.

but here's the thing.

it doesn't matter how "damaged" i was. it doesn't matter how much "baggage" i came with. it doesn't matter ANY of it. it doesn't matter how lucky some people thought i should feel.

I DID NOT DESERVE TO BE RAPED.

full stop.

i said no. i did NOT want to have sex.

end of discussion.

anything happening NOW, twenty years later, does not change that.

needing help now, in the middle of a global pandemic and record unemployment and record deaths and political and social unrest and unexpected unemployment does not mean i deserved to be raped then.

needing help anywhere between then and now would not have meant i deserved it.

time to let that one go.

bite your tongue

**TRIGGER WARNING: THIS POST WILL COVER RAPE AND ABUSE. PLEASE READ WITH CAUTION**

it's scary starting something you don't know how to finish. i don't have any answers in this post, just a whole lot of questions and mess. 

there have been...well, in my opinions, way too many women in the news lately talking about sexual assault. 

not way too many because they shouldn't be talking about it, way too many because it's HAPPENED to way too many.

i'm one of those women, and now i'm talking about it.

a few years ago i was raped. in my own home. by someone i know. by someone i thought was a friend. someone i've known since high school.

the rape was, well, a rape. details don't matter. they physical part of it i've dealt with. i'm fortunate enough to have a great counselor that helped me work through the trauma part of everything. i'm not scared of sex, i'm not scared of men, i'm not scared of going places alone. i AM slightly wary of drunk aggressive men, but that's just good sense in general.

the part i haven't been able to deal with is all the stuff that comes from being raped by someone you know.

the basic stuff is basic: you remove them from facebook, delete their contact information, cut off all communication and interaction.

when he text messages you at thanksgiving saying he misses hanging out with you, you delete the message and pour a shot of whiskey. when he messages you at new year asking for a fresh start you again, delete the message and yeah, probably another shot of whiskey.

then you just stuff it deep down inside and go about life.

but what do you do when it's not just someone YOU know but someone people all around you know? when he have a company whose logo you see all over town? when he's best friends with people you can't separate yourself from?

when you end up still seeing pictures on facebook of him out drinking, something he swore he would never do again because of what happened, because friends of friends tagged them or commented or because facebook likes to recommend people you really want nothing to do with (gee, thanks facebook, keep your recommendations to yourself why doncha).

and you don't want to say anything. you don't want to blow up a family. you don't want to cause a rift between lifelong friends. you certainly don't want to cause a rift with people you still have to work with. in my case, the guy who raped me just so happens to be friends with my son's dad. my relationship with the baby daddy is solid most of the time, tenuous or strained for legit reasons on occasion, but rarely has it been hostile. the relationship with my son is just now starting to come around, letting something like this out of the bag would be...well...a few steps back is about as polite as i can phrase it. through no ones fault. it's news no one wants to hear. news even fewer people believe.

i know.

because it's not the first time i've held onto information like this.

my mother's husband is...he's not a great guy. i grew up, from a very young age, being told how i needed to learn to please men. i was being groomed for abuse. i was told plenty of things a 12 year old girl does NOT need to know. when i was 18, in my very first apartment, with my brand new baby, he decided it was appropriate to not only stash his (extensive) porn collection at my house but also...partake in said porn. in my living room. in front of me.

i held onto that for years. i finally told my husband when i was married. he then turned it against me and forced me to tell my mom during one of our particularly bad fights.

i finally told my mom about it and her exact words were "...well, it already happened. what do you want me to do about it?"

then years later, when she asked me to go to therapy with her, she told her counselor "...well it's natural for him to want to have relationships with teenagers. he never had friends when he was that age, he's just trying to make up for something he missed."  shortly after that is when she decided to tell me that i'm a liar and nothing i say is or ever will be true.

and that's why i haven't talked to my mom in several years.

sometimes it's just better to keep the information to yourself. the fallout cost is extremely high.

the point of all this.

fuck. i don't know what the point of all this is.

at the start of this school year we started giving one of the kiddos friends a ride to school. every day i see his dad's rig parked in the driveway with the bumper sticker logo of the company of the man that raped me. seeing the logo prompted my kiddo to ask again why i quit talking to my rapist. it made him ask, again, when we would be able to buy a sweatshirt or a hat that he's been asking about for a long time. a few days later a post popped up on facebook tagging my rapist in a lovely three day weekend out on the lake with a mutual acquaintance. wife, kids, friends, sunshine, out on the lake having a great summer. and it popped back up to the top of my feed every time someone liked it or commented on it.

HOW DO YOU DEAL WITH THAT? how do you deal with seeing the logo all over town? how do you deal with seeing the posts on facebook? how do you answer people who asked why ya'll don't hang out anymore? i don't live in a small town, but it's small enough. eventually we're going to cross paths. then what do i do?

and my experience is really trivial.

think of all the women at fox news- their career, their goals, their ambition is controlled by tolerating the actions of asshole men. keeping the secret because it's what they need to do to keep going. when they DO speak out they're shredded by the media because it's easier to believe a woman is a liar and seeking attention than to believe a guy everyone looks up to is not what he seems. think of the women that tried to speak out against trump. think of all the women who tried to speak out against sports stars, frat boys, community leaders, ANYONE.

my mother's husband is, of course, an upstanding citizen. he's a leader at their church, a hard worker, they take in exchange students (good lord don't get me started on the risk posed to exchange students who have no idea what is acceptable or normal in a totally foreign culture).

of course she believes him over her own rebellious, promiscuous teenage daughter.

and, like i said, i don't know what the answer is. i just know it sucks. it really, really sucks to have to keep ripping that band aid off while still trying to hide the wound.

and i know i'm not alone and that sucks even more.

safe?

well, as the superstition goes, bad things come in threes.

i've taken my three punches in as many weeks. it's been a helluva run at my house it seems.

i've been hiding while i sort through each happening, but hiding hasn't stopped more from happening. nothing will stop more from happening.

as forest gump so adequately said: shit happens.

i'm fortunate enough to have great friends that understand both my need to talk out and my need to hide. i've been able to reach out to my sounding boards and support systems as needed to work through some really shitty stuff. i'm also fortunate enough to have a therapist that doesn't deal in traditional talk therapy- i do enough of that on my own and it only gets you to a certain point. she is trained in non-traditional therapies (you may remember me babbling about hakomi therapy lately) and understands the way the body processes and knows physical ways to deal with and eliminate negative experiences. AMAZING balance when i've reached the limit of what logical analysis can do.

aside from the friends and the therapy- WRITING is my biggest outlet. i haven't been writing because- well. it's hard. i don't want to talk about terrible things. i don't want pity. i don't want people to look at me different.

BUT I ALSO DON'T WANT TO HIDE AND KEEP IT INSIDE.

so. here it is. the ugly, horrible month i've had:

a few weeks ago i was raped. one week later my house was ransacked (not robbed, but they made a good mess). last night my son was stopped on his way home from school by a person asking him to get in their van and give them directions somewhere.

any one of those is a pretty nasty blow to a person's sense of security. all three of them together has me reeling. the ironic (?) thing is that i *just* went to my therapy yesterday to get better tools to deal with the rape and ransacking then i get home to my son being violated. still recovering from a left right combo and the universe lands a core body shot.

i don't know how to handle all this. i want to take my son and move far away and hide somewhere. i know however that shit like this happens everywhere. there is no "safe bubble" that we can move to. there is no place that is exempt.

but what do you do when every sense of personal security is stripped away and violated? i've learned tools to work on how i respond to the individual events, but how do you regain a sense of security as a whole?

i know people would say: GET A GUN. what the fuck good would that do me? the rape was someone i thought was a friend. someone that had been to my house countless times and just...i guess decided that respecting me was not on his list of things to do. a gun wouldn't have helped. the ransacking happened when i wasn't home- if there had been a gun on the property now they might have it. not great. and what good would a gun have done my son last night walking home?

i do the easy things- i've cut communication with the rapist. i make sure my doors are locked ALL THE TIME now. i'm researching personal alarms for my son to carry on his backpack (the leading contender).

but what do you DO? i'm the type of person that worries about having the cops at my house two weeks in a row and getting on some annoying citizens list. i don't want to go crazy and install razor wire around my property and adopt 6 junkyard dogs and a personal body guard to walk my son to and from school.

i don't know how to fight back against the unkown. the rape was...easy? to deal with. i knew the person. i cut contact. done.

but when you don't know who's been in your house. when you don't know what stranger is stopping your kid. how do you fight an invisible shadow? how do you feel safe again?

but i'm not giving up this fight. i'll keep swinging even if it's just at shadows. i'm going to make sure my son doesn't live in a bubble of fear. i'm going to make sure our house feels like OUR HOUSE. i'm going to not let one drunk asshole make me scared of being touched.

but like any fight, it's exhausting. i worry too much about burdening other people or sounding like a hotbed of drama by talking about it. so i bottle it up and try to deal with it as quickly and simply as possible. i have days when i feel safe again. then days when i don't want to open my curtains or look outside. and i realize i'm still at the epicenter. these things just happened. i'm still in the first few circles of shock waves. i think (and hope and beg the universe) that all the shoes have dropped for a while. we've taken our three hits. just like when death came calling. it took our three and we found a way to make it through.

i don't know if there's a point to any of this other than just pure brain vomiting. calling the demons by name and acknowledging their presence.

it's been a rough few weeks. but i'm still here. licking my wounds and hiding but still here. staying back and plotting/figuring out a battle plan, but still here.

i have the silver linings- at least my rape wasn't brutal and bloody and violent. at least my house wasn't robbed and destroyed and left a total loss. at least my son knew to run away straight home and i'm not contacting the milk carton company today. i have my pillars of support. i have my horribly morbid sense of humor that handles dark shit like this in a terrible but therapeutic way.

this too shall pass.

painfully like a kidney stone.

but this too shall pass.

did she _REALLY_ just say that?

i apologize in advance.

so. there are things that even _I_ am embarrassed to talk about. shocking, i know. but when has that ever stopped me before? so. hang on kids. this one is FUCKED UP.

i'm working on losing weight. and shockingly, i'm doing pretty damn well. totally just jinxed myself there. BUT, i've done 21 days straight of working out which is a LIFETIME record for me. it completely smashes my previous 3 day record (so wish i was kidding). BUT. i'm a little worried about losing weight. i mean, there are things a girl has to consider when taking on an endeavor like this. so here are the things i'm worried about:

#1: losing boobage. i mean...they're technically fat, right? what happens if i get all skinny and they go away? T.R.A.G.I.C. seriously. I LIKE THEM. i want them to stick around! i've heard several girls complain about losing size when they lost weight. and granted, mine have never *ahem* increased with weight gain...they've stayed the same size all these years, so i THINK i'm safe...but seriously...how tragic would that be?

#2: rape. oh yeah. i've thought about it. i mean how many times have you ever seen on the news where a fat girl was raped? sure they're slower/easier to chase down, but SO MUCH HARDER to hold down and keep still. plus, fat girls usually carry a big purse (it's hard to carry around a ham sandwich in a small clutch!) and we all know a purse it the first weapon of self defense. plus, 90% of the male population are attracted to skinnier girls...so...you know...that raises the risk. BUT, skinnier girls are usually in better shape and can either a) run away, or b)kick ass...and i'll be able to do both...so...you know, maybe i shouldn't worry about this. if it DOES happen though, should i be scared, or flattered? SO MANY THINGS TO CONSIDER.

#3: buying new clothes: IT'S DAMN EXPENSIVE TO BE HEALTHY! i mean first there's all the healthy foods that cost a crap ton of money. then you have to replace your wardrobe too?!?! i mean COME ON PEOPLE. my jeans are already getting baggy...I JUST BOUGHT THESE! and i really like them! well, did. now they make my ass look all whatever like i'm wearing a three day old diaper. SO DEPRESSING. i mean...SUCK. seriously. i can't afford to be skinny! damn gina! maybe if there was some sort of government incentive...you know...a dollar for every day i work out and a dollar for every pound i lose. that would be GREAT. totally just solved the nation's health crisis. i mean they're throwing money at everything else...throw in a few for me too!

so. yeah. i'm worried! also, what if it turns out my fat storage cells were also my sarcastic wit storage cells too? and they all dry up and go away? life. would. end. how many fat comedians were funny after they got skinny? well, i don't know any comedians really, so i can't answer that. BUT IT'S SCARY!