*TRIGGER WARNING-discussion of rape*
I was supposed to write my first full post on working women and feminism today. But lately, I’ve had something slightly more important on my mind. There’s been a lot of talk about rape in the news recently. From the Fox news reporter telling women in the military that they should expect to be raped to Virginia condoning government rape, I’ve been feeling pretty triggered lately.
That’s because 4 years ago, when I was 18, I was raped. It’s not something I talk about, or even write about, often. But it occurred to me that if all of this talk about rape in the news had left me feeling vulnerable and triggered, surely someone else felt it too. So I want to use this post to talk about the psychological effects of rape, from my own standpoint.
I know some of you must be wondering how this could affect me 4 years after the fact. There’s seems to be a perception that people just “get over” being raped in a short amount of time. But I’m here to tell you that that simply is not how it works. Granted, every person is different in their reaction. Personally, I didn’t start feeling severe effects until months afterward. But I began experiencing severe mood swings and frequent panic attacks.
At the end of my freshman year here at JMU, I tried to kill myself. I felt as though I had no control over my own life, like everything was just spiraling downward. I went over the nights I was raped over and over again in my head, trying to figure out what went wrong. I had myself convinced that it was my fault. I just felt like I couldn’t take it any more.
Luckily, I have a strong support group of friends and family who were there for me through every step of my recovery, even through a semester I took off from school. I also had a great therapist who spent months working with me, teaching me that I do have control over my own life and that things don’t have to be so bad. Thanks to her, I was able to return to JMU after a semester off ready to take on the world.
Since then, things have been pretty great. I’m able to maintain healthy sexual relationships and as time goes on it gets easier for me to trust people. But sometimes, I still show symptoms of the immense psychological damage that rape can do. The worst are the flashbacks. I’d gone months without one, but in the last week I’ve been having vivid flashbacks while having sex with my boyfriend.
Now, let me explain about flashbacks. They aren’t just quick little snippets of memory flashing through my brain. For up to five minutes, I’m taken back to those moments. My boyfriend stops being my boyfriend because in my mind, he’s one of the assholes who raped me. I feel the same crippling fear I felt four years ago. It is completely and utterly terrifying.
But it’s also incredibly frustrating. I want nothing more than a normal sex life. I wish I had lost my virginity in an awkward night with my high school boyfriend, instead of having it taken from me without choice. I want to be able to have sex without ending it curled up in a ball, hyperventilating for what feels like forever. I wish I didn’t have these flashbacks that leave my boyfriend looking confused and frustrated because he has no idea what to do. I just want to tell him to hold me and tell me that everything’s okay but sometimes I can’t even get the words out.
I’m sure you’re all wondering at this point how I deal with this. Honestly, some times I don’t know what to do. I can try my best to not watch shows that feature rape jokes, or movies with explicit rape scenes. But I can’t always control the news. And as a feminist activist, rape is something I have to hear about a lot. And weeks like this often end with me having increased flashbacks. I wish I had more advice to give, so that I could tell all the other survivors out there how to handle it. If any of you readers have advice, please share it, I know I welcome it. But sometimes, the most important thing is to remember to just keep breathing.
ShoutOut! James Madison University 
Hi femistorian. I just want to thank you for posting a personal story to the blog. I’m sure it’s tough to even think about that event in your life. It also seems like it would be tough to post that story to the world. I think it really puts this political situation into perspective, at least for me, I hope everyone else. That Fox news report was probably the most egregious example of offensive reporting that I have seen probably ever. I could imagine that as a victim of sexual abuse, to hear someone say that it is your fault when you are trying to work through it yourself must be difficult. I know you say you don’t know what to do, but it sounds like you’re doing a good job of taking care of you. I think therapy or even just talking about things like this can really help. I left school for about a year and a half and felt some similar emotions to what you described above, although with a different situation. The thing I had the hardest time with was seeing the end or just constantly worrying that things weren’t getting better fast enough. Being back in school has definitely helped. I try to just keep my head down, work really hard and I’m starting to realize that it will pay off in the end. Again, thanks for telling us a story about you (instead of your story)! It’s really respectable and inspiring that you are willing to share those details with us.
LikeLike
Thank you so much for the kind words eszenyme. This was pretty hard for me to write about because it’s such a private part of my life. But I think it’s important for someone like me, who’s an activist and survivor to share their experience, in the hopes that someone who’s going through the same thing sees that it does get better.
I completely agree about the Fox report. It was really upsetting for me to hear, and further proof that we do in fact live in a rape culture. And how insulting was that to men, to say that they are so incapable of controlling themselves? Hopefully one day we can change the discussion around rape in America.
And thank you for sharing that you also took some time off from school. I have a hard time talking about that as well because it feels embarrassing, going off the proverbial beaten path of academia. I’m glad to know it’s not just me.
LikeLike
I know what you mean when you said it feels embarrassing to admit you took time off from school. I still feel like that and I’ve been back for over a year now. It just makes me feel like even though I’m getting the same degrees as everyone else, it’s tarnished or something because I didn’t finish the first time around. I also feel like people, even my extended family, look differently at me now that I’ve left, like somehow my goals aren’t as legitimate or I can’t fulfill them because I chose to leave school for awhile. I go see my family over Thanksgiving and Christmas and no one really asks about school or what I’m doing, or at least, when they do they don’t pay attention to my answers. They especially don’t seem as proud of me anymore. To be honest, it really does make me sad. Even my parents don’t really seem to understand how hard I am working right now and I feel like each accomplishment I reach is just no big deal to them. To me, it’s a huge deal because 2 years ago, I never thought I’d get into the honors program, for example. I just didn’t have the grades or the focus. So, it really gets to me a lot of the time. But, I try to remind myself that I’m doing this for me and not really for other people. The more and more I tell myself that, I think the more and more I believe it. But, it would be nice to have a little more support.
LikeLike
Thanks for sharing your story. It’s sad but people need to hear the truth.
LikeLike
I agree with eszenyme. Thank you for sharing your story. It was very brave and strong of you to tell others about your experiences. That Fox news reporter does not understand the trauma that sexual abuse victims go through and how much more traumatic it is to have the blame put on them. Society already tends to blame the victims and makes it harder for them to recover. She had no right to say that and it is truly horrific that she can have those kinds of ideas.
I’m happy to hear that you had/have such strong support behind you. The support of your friends and family always helps to give strength. Again, thank you for sharing this with us and allowing others to see that you survived so that others can have hope.
LikeLike