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Break the silence that surrounds sexual assault, sexual harassment, interpersonal violence, relationship abuse, stalking, hate crimes, and identity-based violence. Share your story here on our anonymous blog.

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Because this blog features stories of interpersonal and sexual violence, we offer this *content warning* as a way of caution. We also ask that you do not reproduce any of the content below, as the authors of these personal stories are anonymous, and cannot give consent for their stories to appear anywhere other than this blog or at a Project Dinah-led SpeakOut event.

Thursday, October 8, 2015

My ex-boyfriend was abusive. I was so entrenched in rape culture that I couldn't see it until a year after we were broken up.

He was controlling, jealous, and very scary when he got mad - although he never hit me. He just attacked my sense of self, my emotional state, and my mental capabilities. I was completely dependent on him for my self-esteem, just how he wanted it. He was financially dependent on me, but somehow it seemed that he called all the shots. He would be terrible and mean to me one day, leave me begging for his attention, and then the next day he would call me crazy. The day after he would act normal, and take me out on an expensive date (that I paid for), making me feel guilty for wanting to save money. I tried to forget the bad times and only believe in the good.

He took my virginity. I had thought I wanted to have sex with him, but when the time came I wasn't actually ready. Oh well. Once we did the first time, he would never take no for an answer whenever he wanted to again. I didn't realize this was rape. 

Over and over again, he would use me as a sex object. Only there for his pleasure, unless he needed something else - then I was there as his personal bank or his verbal punching bag. He depleted me in so many ways that made me increasingly dependent on him for all of my validation.

I didn't know he was abusive. I didn't know he raped me. If you asked me why I stayed, I could only tell you that I didn't know I had to leave. 
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1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I just wanted to tell you, you are not alone in surviving something like this. I too, did not leave because I didn't know that I needed to. When I finally was able to, I was in debt because of him, had lost friends because he isolated me so completely, emotional abuse had escalated to sexual assault, and I had to move half a country away to feel able to escape. Now that I've moved back to NC, every time I'm on 64 east of Raleigh and see a white pick-up (what he drove), I have to pause to calm the panic that tries to overtake my mind. I'm sorry that you went through this, but I thank you for sharing your story and helping me remember I'm not alone.

March 31, 2016 at 6:23 PM

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