Today in Texas it is Sexual Assault Survivors Day. I have been both aching to write this post, and putting it off because HOW do you put an experience like this into words. This is your trigger warning: this is a post about sexual assault and rape. This is MY experience. I am not a therapist, and I do not know the answers for surviving. If you are struggling with your own story, I am here for you and can suggest things that I have done, or share my experience but that is all I am qualified to do. I just know that I deal with the repercussions of my experience every day and that is has been made more manageable by a few different things over the years: drugs and alcohol, sex, dissociating, and more recently- therapy, God, meditation, other peoples stories, and books that have opened my mind and my heart to the powers of healing. I love to live my life out loud, but this trauma created a kind of sickness and shame that felt I needed to keep to myself for a long time. Some of the repercussions will last forever and have become a part of my existence. Shame will not be one of them.

AGAIN! THIS IS A TRIGGER WARNING.

THE FOLLOWING CONTAINS DETAILS OF RAPE/SEXUAL ASSAULT.

When I was 17 years old I went to a high school party. I drank A LOT, and found myself inebriated pretty quickly. It was always a little hard to put the pieces of the night together. I blamed myself for a long time for the happenings of that night because I was so drunk. I had consensual sex once that night, in the beginning. He was one of the most attractive guys at school, and older than me so I was feeling pretty accomplished. The rest of the night is mostly flashbacks:

In the backyard trying to get some space and sober up: pinned against the sidewall by someone I knew who quickly put his fingers inside of me while I was trying to get away.

I was followed into a bathroom, where the same guy pushed me down and put his penis in my mouth. I remember struggling to get away, opening the door and stumbling out.

I ran outside. Again, to try and pull myself together and hopefully sober up- which wasn’t going to happen at this point. I was followed by a different boy, one I had kissed at school once or twice. He caught up to me down the block and around the corner, where I collapsed from drunkenness and where he proceeded to have sex with my motionless body. What I remember most about this is how desperately I wanted to speak, yell, move, run. Instead I froze.

When it was over and I could move again, I walked back toward the house. I didn’t want to go inside, so I laid down on the sidewalk and passed out, when I came to, two of my class had their hands down my pants. I scrambled and ran inside, looking for a place to sleep.

A few hours later it was morning, I woke up in between two boys. One put his hand down my pants and I was FINALLY sober enough to get up and get the FUCK out of there. I waiting in the living room for my ride. On the way home, I told him I thought I might have been raped and instead of believing me, he said “I’ll check in with the boys and see what happened”.

Well, as you can imagine, it was denied. He told me he believed them and we never spoke again. I don’t recall what I did afterwards, if I told any girlfriends or if I kept it to myself. What I do know is that I quickly began to cope. First, with alcohol which turned into years of severe alcoholism, then I went on a rampage of creating new sexual experiences as to gain “control” of my sexuality (as you can imagine, that wasn’t the case, as I had done no healing and often found myself with sick men because, well, I was sick). Both of these continued into my mid twenties. I am grateful for my solutions to my trauma. I am SO GRATEFUL that they were there to get me to the healthier solutions I have today.

It took from 17 to 31 to really look at this and how it has impacted my life, my decisions, my relationships with others and WOW, my relationship with myself and my body. I feel fortunate to have affordable mental healthcare through my employer, giving me the opportunity to dive deep with someone that I can talk to every week if needed. I recognize that this isn’t available to everyone and that it is a PRIVILEGE. I also recognize that this kind of work is HARD. It is EXHAUSTING. I don’t know how I got to a place where I could even fathom taking this road, and it almost broke me. Maybe it did, I don’t know because I was already broken, but it definitely changed me.

I’m not all better or anything. I still make questionable decisions around men and I still do things to dissociate, but I have a different kind of awareness. When I do these things I have a new kind of understanding. I know I am surviving, I am coping with things that humans aren’t supposed to experience. I More importantly, I am kinder to myself. For SO LONG I thought it was my fault for being so drunk. I thought that rape was only rape if you fought back or if you had scrapes and bruises to show for it. Thanks to the stories of others and the newer media that has begun to share other types of stories, and thanks to those on social media sharing their own, I know different now (Shout out: Promising Young Woman, The Body Keeps the Score).

This is a part of who I am. I have to tell men I date not to touch me or kiss me when they walk me to my door. Every little thing is on my terms. I have to make a big “dramatic” decision to do anything physical. However each time I do those things, regardless of their reactions, I HEAL A LITTLE MORE AND I LOVE MYSELF A LITTLE MORE. This. Is. About. Me. I am a survivor, and this is what that looks like. I AM A SURVIVOR and this is my journey.

Love y’all.