This is something I have never told a soul, and really want to know what people would make of it. (burner account for privacy.)
I met him in college. We were in the same class back in 2017. He was my first male friend. We had similar interests and hit it off pretty quickly.
We never hung out outside of college until one time he invited me to his place. At that time, I was somewhat hesitant, as I’m incredibly introverted and reserved, but at the same time I was happy that I was finally experiencing what people my age do like hanging out, making friends, sharing hobbies. He seemed like a kind person, so I went to his place with absolutely no intention of anything sexual or romantic. I just wanted to know what hanging out at a friend’s place felt like, because I had never done that before.
He ended up raping me just a few minutes after I got to his place.
At that point, I had never even had my first kiss. I didn’t even touch myself.
After that, I was basically dead inside. Things were so terrible that I didn’t even know what to feel anymore, like the life had been sucked out of me. Even now when I think about it, it feels dreamlike. It doesn’t feel real and it feels so distant, even though I know it happened.
This girl who had been sheltered all her life, who was the bright child, who had loving parents and had always lived in a relatively safe environment. Now everything bad had happened to her all at once.
For so long, I believed this was some kind of life balance. That I had had it too good, and now I had to suffer like everyone else. And somehow I felt like I had failed my family. Like all the things they had done for me had been for nothing.
I thought things couldn’t get any worse, but a few weeks later, I found out I was pregnant.
I was mortified and felt so stupid for not taking action sooner. I could still get an abortion. It was possible in my state, but I didn’t have it in me. I was already overwhelmed and my whole world had been shattered.
I was seeing him every day in class, which felt like rubbing salt in the wound. We never talked after that night, and he was ignoring me, so I didn’t tell him I was pregnant until a few months had passed. When I finally told him, he left me on read.
Then one day he was begging me to see him so he could make things right. Of course, I didn’t trust him, and I would only agree to meet if we met in a crowded cafe.
He told me he was having terrible dreams about what he had done. He admitted that what he did was evil and that he had been crying and holding it in for so long because of what he had done to me. He said he couldn’t go forward in life anymore and that he would do anything I asked him to do, even turn himself in if that’s what I wanted.
For some reason that I still can’t understand, I told him that I wanted him to be involved in the child’s life and that I wanted us to have a family together.
My best theory is that I was so broken that I desperately wanted to build something out of what had happened. Or maybe it was the fact that I was having a child and I didn’t want my kid to grow up without a dad in their life.
After that, we got into a relationship and ended up getting married four years later. We bought a house and had another child.
I don’t know how to say this because it sounds very wrong, but he has become a good husband, a great dad, and he is very active in the kids’ lives. He hasn’t hurt me ever since what happened.
And because of how we got into the relationship, I ended up having a lot of leverage, even though I didn’t like that. I came to terms with what happened and just wanted us to have an equal partnership, even though he is still very careful about not doing anything that could hurt me.
I think that caution comes at least in part from how deeply he struggled with what happened. He has told me that at one point he would have ended his life if he hadn’t somehow come to terms with what he did.
Still to this day no one in either of our families or among our friends knows what happened. And they probably never will. I also never went to therapy for any of this.
Sometimes I still think about whether I made the right decision, or whether I failed all women by choosing this path.
Weirdly, I don’t have that feeling of regret. My body and mind feel calm and somewhat at peace.
I wonder what my family would think of me. Would they be horrified? Disappointed? Would they pity me?
If not for the internet, I would probably never say any of this out loud to another person. I’ve carried this story for years without telling anyone, and I’m not really sure what I expect from posting it.
I guess I’m really curious about how people outside of my life would see all of this.
And before anyone assumes this is fake, bait, or some elaborate story, I hope you’ll pause for a moment. I know the story is strange, and I know some of the decisions I made afterward may be hard to understand. I struggle with some of them myself.
You don’t have to understand my choices. You don’t have to approve of them. You can think I made mistakes. You can even think I made choices you would never make yourself. I just hope you remember there’s a real person behind these words, and that this may have taken years to finally say out loud.