"It's estimated that 1 in 5 female college students will be the victim of rape or attempted rape. Of those victims, less than 5 percent will report the crime. Colleges may try to downplay events and/or keep charges hidden so their reputation won't be tarnished."
How It Happened
The assaults on me didn’t happen on a college campus, but they did happen while I was in college years. Since then I’ve done a lot of research. Apparently, what happened to me is very common, and I want to make it less so. Women are being sexually assaulted on college campus (and everywhere else) and people in positions of authority are either ignoring their plight, intimidating them into silence, or hiding evidence of the incident.
In many cases women are very familiar with their assailant, as much as 74% of the time. Nobody suspects their boyfriend, best friend, relative, or neighbor of being capable of those crimes until it’s too late. Don’t let it get you paranoid; just don’t put yourself in a compromising situation with a person even if you trust him. That is what happened to me. I trusted my boyfriend of 4 months, and was alone with him constantly unsupervised for 8 plus hours at a time. It sounds like heaven doesn’t it?
Of course we had consensual sex and it was great. Everything was perfect. Then I found out he was cheating on me with a girl I thought was my friend. At the same time, several other things came out about her. She hadn’t been in our circle long but everyone liked and accepted her; then we learned she had been having sex with several people in my social circle that were also in relationships. When it came out, many strong bonds of friendship and love were destroyed beyond repair; trust was broken. She left as suddenly as she had come, pain filling her place.
I questioned everything, especially her sexual background. I wanted to pick up the pieces with my boyfriend and get over this betrayal, but I wasn’t sure if he had contracted anything from her. So I told him we needed to avoid sex all together until I could be sure he was safe from STDs. He didn’t like being told what he couldn’t have, so he took it. He began to take advantage of me, and I began making excuses. Well I was so pretty; it must have been irresistible to him. Maybe he was so caught up in the pleasure he didn’t hear me screaming “No.” Maybe…Maybe…
I was raped several times over the course of 2 months, once anally, before I finally couldn’t bear to be in his sight ever again. He scarred me to my core; I was broken and empty and felt totally alone. When I broke up with him I confided in a close friend why I had done it. That friend blabbed.
In many cases women are very familiar with their assailant, as much as 74% of the time. Nobody suspects their boyfriend, best friend, relative, or neighbor of being capable of those crimes until it’s too late. Don’t let it get you paranoid; just don’t put yourself in a compromising situation with a person even if you trust him. That is what happened to me. I trusted my boyfriend of 4 months, and was alone with him constantly unsupervised for 8 plus hours at a time. It sounds like heaven doesn’t it?
Of course we had consensual sex and it was great. Everything was perfect. Then I found out he was cheating on me with a girl I thought was my friend. At the same time, several other things came out about her. She hadn’t been in our circle long but everyone liked and accepted her; then we learned she had been having sex with several people in my social circle that were also in relationships. When it came out, many strong bonds of friendship and love were destroyed beyond repair; trust was broken. She left as suddenly as she had come, pain filling her place.
I questioned everything, especially her sexual background. I wanted to pick up the pieces with my boyfriend and get over this betrayal, but I wasn’t sure if he had contracted anything from her. So I told him we needed to avoid sex all together until I could be sure he was safe from STDs. He didn’t like being told what he couldn’t have, so he took it. He began to take advantage of me, and I began making excuses. Well I was so pretty; it must have been irresistible to him. Maybe he was so caught up in the pleasure he didn’t hear me screaming “No.” Maybe…Maybe…
I was raped several times over the course of 2 months, once anally, before I finally couldn’t bear to be in his sight ever again. He scarred me to my core; I was broken and empty and felt totally alone. When I broke up with him I confided in a close friend why I had done it. That friend blabbed.
Thanks for sharing and stay strong dear!
Thank you for this wonderful advice. I will take it to heart.
Iwas raped in high school at about seven months into our relationship. I had said no and that i didn't want to but I thought he loved me, that he just didn't realize that I didn't want sex... I tried telling his father, hoping that he would help me report it, but I was called a lyer, a skank, and was shut out. At that time I was not living at home and had no where to turn but to my friends, but by the time I told my school counseler she said that there was nothing to be done since it had been almost a year, but sharing classrooms with my attacker was a hardship that I never wanted