I'm just interested in opinions really. I am mulling over lots of difficult stuff from the past which happened a few years ago and it would help to know how other people interpret one particular incident.
I went on a date with a man during a very vulnerable point in my life. Long story short, we ended up sitting in his car kissing. We'd just met and had a drink in the bar at this point. He was repeatedly trying to put his fingers inside me. I kept stopping him and telling him no and he kept doing it. I don't have much trouble in saying that is assault. I was clear about saying no, he kept doing it.
I didn't want to see him again (!) but a week later I ended up inviting him to mine. As I said, this was an exceptionally vulnerable point in my life. I suppose I wanted some affection and it didn't matter where that came from at that point even if I was at risk of harm (yes I'm in therapy working through lots of this and I don't put myself in these situations now)
Anyway, he came over, we ended up going upstairs. I was consenting to having sex with him in the sense I willingly went upstairs with him and wanted to sleep with him. Very quickly he was being extremely rough with me. He didn't establish whether I was into that, he just got on with it. He was just rough to the point of being violent to be honest. I froze. I wanted him to stop as soon as I realised what was happening but I didn't say anything because I was in shock. I couldn't think straight. He was hurting me a lot. I was struggling to walk for a good three days after this event because my legs/vagina/pelvis felt so stiff and bruised and it was over a week before everything stopped hurting. I had bruises on my arms and thumbprints on my face as I remember it.
Obviously this was not a decent human being. I didn't see him again after that, I was very clear about telling him he was never to contact me again. I think if you are into (very) rough sex you do need to establish explicit consent. So in that sense it was vile of him. But I had consented to sex and I didn't verbally tell him to stop or say no so it wasn't rape.
I'm not needing to know how a court of law would interpret it as it's irrelevant. I'm just interested to know how other people interpret it personally. Would you look at it as assault or just a bad sexual experience? I'm not sure why it matters to me given I am clear he behaved very badly but somehow it does.