WARNING: THIS POST DISCUSSES RAPE AND MAY BE TRIGGERING TO SOME READERS.
Please take care of yourself and feel free to skip this one.
When I was sixteen, I was raped.
But it’s taken me twenty-seven years to even be able to call it rape, unpack all the complex feelings I had about it, and finally close that chapter of my life.
I’m not saying I’m “healed” or that the memories of what happened will never affect me again, but at this point in my life, I feel ready to close the chapter by sharing my experience, with the hope it might help others in a similar situation. But I fully understand that rape survivors are under no obligation to share their stories to help others—this is just something I feel I want to do, for myself.
When I was sixteen, I had a “best” friend who, honestly, was awful. She was two years older than me and encouraged me to do things I later looked back on with regret, such as skipping school, stealing, lying about my age to older men, and giving away parts of myself I never wanted to. But this post isn’t about HER. Though perhaps I will write a longer post about my experiences in the friendship at another date.
During this time, she was dating an older man (we had both lied to him and his colleagues about our ages), and we were hanging out at his house as we waited for him to come back from work.
He arrived home, and not long afterwards, an acquaintance of his turned up.
This acquaintance was in his forties and didn’t know me or know my age.
I was left alone with this acquaintance, and he kissed me. I immediately told my friend once she returned, and she warned me to stay away from him, that he was bad news.
Even with that warning, I accepted a ride home from him, while my friend stayed behind with her boyfriend.
On the car ride home, as we approached the road where I lived, I said nothing. I didn't tell him to stop. He drove on to a secluded area.
And that's when he raped me.
The following day, I told my friend, and she was outraged. She told her boyfriend, who was also outraged.
The man came into the workplace of my friend’s boyfriend, and my friend’s boyfriend told him what had happened was unacceptable. The man then said if he ever saw me again, he’d spit in my face. He was escorted out by my friend’s boyfriend and his co-workers.
I never saw him again.
In the immediate aftermath, I knew something bad had happened, but I didn’t have the language to express what I was feeling. Then the friendship fell apart, and all the negative feelings about the rape, but also about that friend, became tangled together.
I didn’t really think about or acknowledge what had happened for about four years.
I went to college, I met boys my age, I had “normal” experiences.
Then, in my late teens/early twenties, my mental health started to get worse. Around this time, I was in an on-off relationship with my (now) husband.
During one of our fights, I told him I had been raped when I was sixteen. At the time, and even until recently, I thought I had done this as “attention-seeking” behaviour. Now I think what is more accurate is that, during an emotionally difficult time, I told the truth to the one person who mattered—the one person who always saw the real me.
During a fight, I told him I had been raped when I was sixteen. At the time, and even until recently, I thought I had done this as “attention-seeking” behaviour. Now I think what is more accurate is that, during a turbulent time, I told the truth to the one person who mattered—the one person who always saw the real me.
He encouraged me to tell my mom.
A few days later, I worked up the courage to do so, and she was very understanding and sympathetic. She never pushed me for details or in any way made me feel like it was my fault. She just listened and comforted me.
After that, I didn’t speak again of being raped for many years.
My (now) husband and I went on to move in together, raise our son, and have another child.
As he was one of the few people who knew I had been raped, I always felt comfortable talking to him about it. But I always referred to it as sexual assault. One day, he asked me why I didn’t call it rape—and it was then I realised I had hesitated to call it rape in an attempt to make it sound and feel less serious to me.
But it WAS serious.
Since naming it what it was—rape—other truths have started to settle with me. Looking back, I can see how wanting to fit in, struggling to say no, people-pleasing, and spending around five years in an emotionally abusive friendship all contributed to my vulnerability that night.
I am not moving the blame.
The man who raped me is entirely at fault here.
Maybe I wouldn't have accepted a ride home from him, or perhaps I would have told him to stop the car near my home, if I hadn't been so... I can't think of the right word.
Accommodating? Compliant? So accustomed to pleasing people and going along with what they wanted that standing up for myself didn't feel like an option?
But perhaps the outcome would have been the same.
I'll never know.
The other thing I have reflected on is the role my friend played. Again, the fault lies solely with the man. But she was two years older than me, and I can’t help but wonder why she didn’t stop me from taking a ride home with him. Why didn’t she offer to pay for a taxi for me or something?
But then, perhaps she was scared of her own boyfriend’s reaction if she had “challenged” his acquaintance. Or perhaps she genuinely thought I’d be okay.
We will never know.
I don't blame her for what he did. But I can acknowledge now that my friend failed me that night.
What I DO know is that it wasn’t right. He was forty; I was sixteen. And even if he believed me to be twenty or older, he still took advantage of someone vulnerable.
But I also know it wasn’t my fault—not for not saying no, not for accepting a ride from him, not for being neurodivergent and having a tendency to people-please.
He didn’t know these things about me, and yet he still chose to offer me a ride home, drive to a secluded location, and rape me.
Now I can look back, twenty-seven years later, and, well… I will never ‘be at peace’ with what happened, and I wish it hadn’t. But I don’t lie awake thinking about it. It doesn’t affect my relationship with my husband. It only occasionally comes into my mind, and when it does, I can process and deal with the feelings.
Twenty-seven years ago, something was taken from me without my consent. I can't change that.
But this story belongs to me.
I get to decide when I tell it. I get to decide how I tell it. I get to call what happened by its name.
I was raped when I was sixteen.
It happened to me, but it does not belong to the man who did it.
And now, on my terms, I'm closing this chapter.
I hope that if anyone reading this has experienced something similar, they are finding their own way towards healing, whatever that looks like for them.
If this post has brought up difficult feelings for you, I have included some support resources below.
https://rapecrisis.org.uk/get-help/want-to-talk/