A Survivor’s Story; Violence against women
Trigger warning
It was a week after my 22nd birthday when it happened, but I still remember what I was wearing.
It’s weird how with trauma a lot of the time details can be repressed, but for me I remember everything so clearly, like my brain was taking a video. For me, as is often the case with a lot of people who experience this, it was someone I knew, not someone I knew well, but still not something I would have expected from them. You often think that the person that could hurt you would be scary, that they’re someone you would avoid if you saw out in public, but often they’re not.
I don’t want to go into exactly what happened to me as I know it can be hard for some people to hear, but a week after my 22nd birthday I was violently raped which left me with physical injuries as well as ongoing mental health complications. I think something I find really difficult is using the word rape, I feel no association to it, I feel as though it says too much about what happened yet not enough, it doesn’t begin to explain the violence but it makes me feel vulnerable saying it to people I don’t know. I remember the pain, I remember feeling helpless and that feeling of pain and helplessness continued for many years after.
The next day, I felt confused. It was though I had to try and define what happened to me, but I didn’t really want to. It actually took someone else to tell me what had happened to me and to take me to the hospital. It was a weird feeling because during the attack I removed myself from my body and it took a while for me to become present again.
I guess what I wish someone had told me at the time was that it wasn’t about what you were wearing or what you said to them, none of of this is down to you and it is solely down to them.
There's a lot questions that I got asked in the early days which worsened the trauma for me like, ‘why didn’t you report it to the police’ or ‘why didn’t you just shout for help,’ ‘how many drinks have you had’. What I needed someone to say was ‘It wasn’t your fault you struggled to fight back, you were too scared to move, your body was just trying to keep you safe.’ Or ‘It isn’t your fault you didn’t want to pursue the legal route, after visiting the police station and hearing just how long it would take to take it to court and how even if you manage that, 95% of people walk free.’
I don’t want to be all negative in this story but it’s important to be honest about the impact otherwise, how will it stop? What I experienced still impacts me on a regular basis, I’m jumpy I can get triggered easily, for a long time I hated men and I couldn’t trust any of the ones in my life, it took a huge impact on my self-esteem it made me feel disposable. It led to a lot of substance abuse and lost days, weeks and months trying to put the pieces of my life back together and trying to redefine who I was. Life has got better for me, I went to therapy (quite a few times), I spoke to friends, I told my parents and tried to stop engaging in self destructive behaviours because it wasn’t bringing me any closer to the answers I was looking for. It also made me assess a lot of the relationships and made me a lot more comfortable cutting out people who weren’t adding anything to my life.
If I had to make a PSA to all those reading this, it would be that I wish that people would stop looking to the survivor for an answer as to why it happened, what happened to the survivor had nothing to do with them and everything to do with the person who hurt them so instead of asking why did it happen ask how can I help and how can we, as a society, stand up to violence against women.
If you or someone you know is experiencing violence, there is help available.
Here are some resources:
National Domestic Violence Hotline: 0808 2000 247
REFUGE: 0808 2000 247
Victim Support: 0808 168 9111
Rape Crisis (England and Wales): 0808 802 9999
