I said no to sex. My ex-boyfriend ignored and raped me and I have had to deal with the trauma

It took me three years of carrying a heavy burden while walking about life like all was fine. But was it? At least, that’s what I had told myself dozens of times that I had begun to believe it.  I had pushed the whole incident too far in my mind that some days, weeks even, passed without it coming up. Until a trigger would come up, then we got back to that night.

My story didn’t fit the normal narrative that we think of when we hear someone say they were sexually assaulted. How then was I even to begin talking about it? It wasn’t like I was caught in a dark corner on my way home, or I was drugged into a hotel room by my abuser. It was by someone I knew. Someone I trusted. My boyfriend.

The longer I waited for what I thought to be “the right time to speak,” the harder it became. Besides knowing what had truly happened, I had never even admitted those words out loud to myself. So when I finally told someone, there was a relief.

Soon after telling them, I decided I could as well include that part of my story in a piece I wrote for my blog. After I wrote it, I sent the draft to the person whom I had told and asked if I had revealed too much. My blog is called Unveil and I have created a community of people who are striving to live life fully without masks or cover ups. It would be unfair for me to live masked up while I call on my tribe to bear it all.

I knew the minute I could tell the world, my “shameful” secret will be out and real. I didn’t want it to be real, real. And maybe if I kept it to myself, I could deny the hurt that was threatening to swallow me whole. But pretending away reality never makes things better. It just causes you to implode on the inside while smiling on the outside. That’s no way to live.

So after deep thoughts I shared. Not knowing how people would react to it. I mean, my family would also find out about the incident in that piece. That’s how much guarded I was with this deeply erosive secret.

The night it happened

I can still recall what I wore on that night. It was one of my long floral dresses that I often wore for Sunday Services. We hadn’t been out on a date for a while and I was to travel to the village and stay over for a month. We decided we could meet up, hang out, enjoy each other’s company then I could leave the next day for upcountry.

It started as a real chill and beautiful night. We went to a fine restaurant where we ate, laughed, had meaningful conversations then ate some more. It was a lovely night.  Or so I thought. I was in my final year at the University, he was working and six years older than I was. 

Once we were done, he suggested that I go to his place since I was to leave early the next morning, which was a few hours away. I mean, I trusted him. I had been to his place before, so I didn’t think much of it. We got there; spoke some more as we had so much in common. Then it happened. I still had my dress on. He came onto me. I mentioned I didn’t want us to get there. Which was not new as we had had the sex talk before. But he didn’t listen. I thought he was just fooling around. Then I knew he wasn’t. He pushed me on my back on the bed, held my hands tightly, and that was it. It was happening. My mind was trying to go in circles how we moved from a lovely night to a night I am going to dread for the rest of my life. The moments following that are blur, but certain details will forever remain clear, like how fearful I became, how I could feel rage brew up in me. I wished I could run, flee even but I couldn’t. He let me go when my whimpers became louder.

After it happened, I blamed myself over and over insisting that if I left him sooner, I wouldn’t have found myself in such a situation. I was hurt and confused. I went to his living room and cried. Soon after, I left. I was confused as to why he could have done that to me.  I didn’t know how to label the ordeal, because when you are forced down and your hands held down by someone you love who is so much heavier than you are, it is hard to fight back. Was that abuse? I wasn’t sure.

Knowing your perpetrator complicates matters. It’s the reason most people don’t report their assault, and it’s why I didn’t know I was assaulted in the first place yet I knew I had been violated. I didn’t consent to anything.

To date, I am not sure why he decided to do it. To abuse me in that way. Maybe because he knew if he asked us to cross that line in our relationship I would say no. Still, he made that decision without my input. In that moment, it wasn’t about us, it was about him. It was saddening. I had been betrayed.  I thought he really cared about me, but this didn’t feel like something someone who cared about you would do. But I still wanted us to be okay. So I acted like his girlfriend.

I did what most girls do and continued on. I didn’t know that it is incredibly common for sex between people who love each other to be non-consensual.

I never went back to his place after that. But we could talk on phone. We met briefly maybe twice in town before I broke up with him. 

Greater than the pain that happened that night, was the pain that entered my soul. Sexual assault is so widespread, a fact that has been denied for so long that I think it is about time we taught our sons and men what consent is.

If I had gone out, then someone forced themselves on me the way he did, maybe I would have told someone sooner. But in the context of our relationship, I was disempowered and unable to firmly state that what had happened to me was sexual assault. My consent was not any less important because we were dating.

So many girls have nights like mine – or worse. Some girls wake up to a friend or boyfriend having sex with them. Some girls are violently attacked in public or in their own homes. Or worse; raped. Any time someone comes forward about being sexually assaulted in some way, there are so many opinions about it. In my case, some might say it wasn’t a big deal as we were dating. Or that it was my fault since I was at his house.

Isn’t it sad that when a girl says she was sexually assaulted; our first instinct is to think she’s probably lying? We demand for “perfect victims” who better not have put themselves in a compromising situation like being home alone, or been hanging out in a party, or dressed in skimpy clothes.

The facts in my situation are pretty clear to me: He forced himself on me in a way I hadn’t consented to.

Even after seeing a therapist, actively working on my healing, there are days when it’s still difficult for me to share this story. I only do it because I think it’s important that in our continuing public dialogue about sexual assault, we don’t forget about relationships and all the messy and grey forms that an incident like this can take.   BY DAILY NATION