Rape Support Group
If you or someone you know has been the victim of rape, this is the place to find support and get advice. If you want, discuss your experience, share your feelings, and meet others going through a similar situation.
My "boyfriend" raped me on Memorial Day 2017. We were dating for about a month after we'd broken up from a long term relationship 2 years earlier. He had a history of being very emotionally abusive. We were sexually active. The day it happened we were fighting real bad. I was getting scared he was going to hit me or something. I left his room to go to the bathroom and calm down. When I came back he was under the covers with his pants off. He pulled me under as I kept yelling no. He pulled mine off and went to town on me like an animal. When he flipped me on my stomach, he took out his phone like he was recording or taking pictures and to this day I don't know if he really was or what he did with them. When he was done I ran out of his house and drove to my friends. I suffer from PTSD and get horrible flashbacks. I now am in a happy relationship and my PTSD is a lot better, but since the 1 year anniversary rolled around I can't get it out of my head. I've been crying myself to sleep and blaming myself for it. I knew he was mentally cruel and I shouldn't of started talking to him in the first place. I never pressed charges because it took so long for me to tell someone. I figured i needed to talk to other victims to help me through this. How the hell do I get this monster out of my head?
From what you have described, it sounds like this guy violently assaulted you. It is NOT your fault. You did NOT deserve this, you did NOT invite this, and just because you had been intimate with him before this does NOT mean he is entitled to violate your body whenever he wants, especially if you're screaming no at him.
To be honest, your story sounds awfully similar to mine. I was raped by someone who was my friend at the time, but I had dated him for almost two years when we were in high school. It was years after we broke up that he assaulted me, but it was still, like... I trusted him and he hurt me worse than anyone or anything ever has.
It took a really long time for me to get over it and in some ways, I'm not. I still have PTSD because of it, although it seems that time and lots and lots of work and working through it have lessened it's intensity. I don't have such devastating reactions to my triggers anymore, don't have as many flashbacks or nightmares (I do still occasionally have nightmares about him but they're much less frequent now), and I don't think about it all the time anymore.
Unfortunately, it's just something you will have to learn to cope with.
What helped me most was writing about it, dealing with my emotions, and talking to people here and there and reading the stories and experiences of so many brave survivors that have felt all the things I felt.
Sexual assault is one of the most difficult things to overcome. It's such an intimate and silent trauma. It's humiliating and terrifying and it really fucks you up and makes it so hard to let people get close to you. It's like having your sense of intimacy picked apart and left in pieces that don't fit together anymore.
You're not alone.
And I'm so sorry you're suffering.
It might be too early for you to hear this but one of the things that helped me was to stop thinking of him as a monster.
He's not a monster - he's a man, a human, who did something terrible and unthinkable to another human.
Stripping away the monster label is scary and helpful at the same time because it takes away his power, his bigness, his darkness... but it also cuts him down until he's a human, with the same capacity to hurt another human as any other human. Which can make everyone seem like a threat for a long time. It's in those moments that we have to force ourselves to remember that not everyone is a monster.
Monsters aren't real. Humans are.
All that said, if you ever need to talk at all, I would be happy to help in any way I can. You will find much support here.
And I hope we can help you heal. It's a process. But you already survived a year.
Let's make it two.