Have I been sexually assaulted?

[MollyMalone2801]

Hi,
Weird question. I was in bed with the guy I've been dating the other night and we had sex. It was really painful and I kicked him away from me because the pain was intense. He was nearing climax anyway so came back and entered me for not very long, probs 30 seconds or so, maybe a minute, just enough to finish. It was horribly painful, and I was pushing on his stomach. He told me at the end that it had been stressful for him and I actually apologised, but the more I think about it, the more I feel that it just wasn't ok. I feel really weird. I dont think he's a criminal or anything, and I get that he was caught in the moment, but he really hurt me. I can't seem to make sense of it. He's talking like I was in the wrong but if someone told me they were hurting I'd stop immediately. Am I being too sensitive?

I can't believe there are still debates about what consent is. OP, I am very sorry this happened to you. Yelling and pushing him away - and trying to push him away the second time - indicates you did NOT consent and what this man did was rape. This was not your fault. You did nothing to feel guilt or shame over. The shame belongs to the man who attacked you.

[quote Beentherefonethat]@CodenameVillanelle I’m not projecting anything onto the op.[/quote]
I have been in the same situation as op before and I couldn’t call it rape which is why I asked the question I did

I'm afraid projection is what this is. It's not helpful to her or you.

I’m going to leave your thread op as I seem to have derailed it.

My sincere apologies if I have offended or upset you in any way. Wishing you the very best

@CodenameVillanelle nah, wasn’t projecting. I was explaining why I asked a question.

@Beentherefonethat I'm really grateful for your feedback and insight. I didnt know what label to give it. He wasn't some scary monster who grabbed me down a dark alley. He's a handsome and normally caring, fully functioning member of society with a high flying career, and I'm sure there'd be women out on the street who'd be looking at him as a great catch. But he did what he did and I feel really weird about it. Was it just me? Was he a dickhead? Was it something worse? All I knew was that I hated it and I suddenly didn't feel cared about.

I'm sorry to the victims of sexual assault and rape on this thread. No person should go through the feeling of fear and vulnerability as you all have.

I’m so sorry OP, he is a horrible predatory man and the more you say about the rest of the sexual experience the worse it gets. He had no interest in your consent, this is obvious from the blow job incident. The fact he was trying to gaslight and manipulate you afterwards makes it 100% clear that this was deliberate. A decent man would’ve stopped to ask if you were okay, made sure you were happy to continue etc. Not carried on anyway and then blamed you for being in pain and ruining his experience. Men like this make me sick to my stomach.

@MollyMalone2801 they are often charmers, it’s part of the act. I’m so sorry this has happened to you. You are certainly cared about, just look at all the lovely posters here giving you support and a hold hold

I'm really sorry to hear what happened OP. I've had similar experiences and similar feelings. I really feel that we lack enough words to describe these experiences, I think language can really let us down. I've tried for years to find the words that felt like they fit, the closest I could get was non-consenual, violating and sexually coercive.

I always found the silence in being sexually abused the most disturbing, I almost feel like if I were being assaulted the sky would have fallen in but there was just silence and confusion and everything seemed so normal except for the turmoil I faced inside. It's a real tragedy of being split in half between a world that looks the same but the feeling that everything is different. I'm not sure I'm making much sense but you can call what happened what you want and you might find the language changes over time. It's yours to define in anyway you want.

Oh OP what an absolutely horrible experience for you. No you did not do anything wrong. He is a rapist and he absolutely should have stopped the second it became apparent that you were not enjoying intercourse in that position. The holding your head down and making you gag while he was enjoying a BJ from you is also abhorrent behaviour and definitely shows a complete disregard for you. This is not how anyone should behave with someone they care for and had you continued the relationship I'm sure he would have escalated his behaviours. Just be kind to yourself 💐

@Colourmeclear that's exactly how it was. It was surreal and quick which was confusing. And its someone I was attracted to and cared for, which meant it was hard to understand. I've been thinking about it all day and thinking maybe there were flags. I had an old engagement ring on my right hand and he told me he didn't want me to wear it anymore. He used to get upset if he WhatsApped me and I was online but the ticks from his message didn't go blue because I was chatting to my friends. He used to ask me questions via text and if I missed the question, he'd send the question back with a big question mark. He'd get upset if I didn't message him back straightaway. He'd email me at work all day so we could still speak when I didnt have access to my phone. He'd tell me he should not have to ask me certain things, that I should just tell him. He was a proper nob about some car park attendant who asked him to move his car in between two lines because he said he parked over the edge in case some eejit parked next to his beloved car and hit it. He told me to remove my exes (my DS dad) photos from my house. He said I didn't take enough photos of us, he took them all the time. He told me he was a bit needy so I overlooked it all but looking back at it now, there were signs.

Sorry for the verbal diarrhea guys, I just want to make sense of this and I dont feel ready to tell my friends or family because I don't know what their reaction would be.

Please report this. He will do it again. Look after yourself. Do you live together?

@MollyMalone2801 reading your latest post yes in hindsight these were all huge red flags. It all points to someone who saw you as his property to with as he pleased. Not someone capable of a normal loving relationship. I'm so sorry that you had to find out the way that you did but be very glad that he is now out of your life for good. You will get through this in time and find a partner deserving of your love x

@itsgettingcoldoutside no, thank goodness. We both have our own properties.

Had op said stop and he carried on then it was absolutely rape, no question and she’d have a definitive answer.

Beentherefonethat I believe you are wrong. Very, very wrong.

I was forcibly gang-raped at fifteen. It was horrific, humiliating situation in which the youths concerned mocked and jeered at me, making out I was some kind of freak, so that by the time they'd finished with me all I was afraid of was that anyone else would find out and could join in that mockery. THEY should have been the ones who feared others finding out! The fact that I'd internalised that so effectively is something that amazes me even now.

What I don't do is assume that others' experiences of rape - and I'm terribly sorry this has happened to you too - are going to be an exact match for mine. There's no doubt but that to be held down and have enforced obscenities inflicted on you, as I did, is indeed rape. But that doesn't make other instances of this crime any less clear-cut or the lines between consent and 'not-consent' any murkier.

The yardstick - legally I believe - is 'enthusiastic consent'. Your definition seems to be that to qualify as rape a sexual act has to go against an outright utterance of the word 'no', and that any other aggravating factors do not matter. That just isn't the case, and I doubt there could be any stronger indication AGAINST enthusiastic consent than an unwilling partner physically fighting you or pushing you off. This can be looked up online if need be, but the waters here are not as muddy as some of your posts above tend to suggest.

I also understand where the OP must be coming from in this situation. I've spoken to other rape victims and also seen them post on Mumsnet. Many are not sure in the first instance as to whether what they suffered was actual rape. More, when it related to a partner they had loved and cared for, understandably didn't want to accept that it was rape and went through a very unpleasant process indeed - sometimes a slow and painful one - along the road to recognition of that fact. Of course they don't want to believe their partners capable of such an atrocity, and they internalise that shame upon themselves.

The incident described in the OP aboves was unambiguously rape. I'm sorry - there are no murky waters, no blurred boundaries, no distinctions. Anything short of enthusiastic consent is rape.

This on its own will be a hell of a lot for the OP to process. But questioning whether or not what she experienced was rape seems to be downplaying the seriousness and enormity of what's happened here. I don't believe that's helpful for her at all.

To the OP, your only call right now is to look after yourself. You don't have to report it. (I was told that if I didn't do so, if my rapists did this again it would by MY fault. It wouldn't. The only people who bear culpability are the rapists). You don't have to tell your family. You don't have to do one single thing you don't want to do.

I do, though, suggest you get help and support in coming to terms with what's happened. Rape crisis could be beneficial here. Take your time, take care of you, and allow yourself chance to process it. After that, whichever course of action you take is up to you. There are sometimes very good reasons why women don't report, and having been one of them I'd never stand in judgement of any one of them because of it.

Take care of yourself

Yes it was abuse. Kind of sounds like rape to me. Did he really need you to say a loud & clear 'no' in order to not penetrate you again???? No he didn't. He knew you didn't want him to do that.

Hope you'll never see him again. I think he's a danger to women and I'm sorry to hear you had this experience.

[quote MollyMalone2801]@Beentherefonethat I'm really grateful for your feedback and insight. I didnt know what label to give it. He wasn't some scary monster who grabbed me down a dark alley. He's a handsome and normally caring, fully functioning member of society with a high flying career, and I'm sure there'd be women out on the street who'd be looking at him as a great catch. But he did what he did and I feel really weird about it. Was it just me? Was he a dickhead? Was it something worse? All I knew was that I hated it and I suddenly didn't feel cared about.[/quote]
He was a rapey dickhead. Most violence towards women happen to them by a man they already know - mostly intimate partners and family members. He really isn't that caring if he did this, not towards women anyway. I can't imagine doing what he did if I were a man. God knows what else you had in store for you if you continued seeing him. He'd see that as acceptance of abuse and I wouldn't be surprised if there were even worse experiences down the line.

@MarieIVanArkleStinks I'm so sorry that happened to you, its absolutely horrendous. Horrendous. I'm in tears thinking about someone going through that. I don't want to report it. It would be my word against his. Publicly, he is a confident, self assured, very high up in his field of work, good looking - he just isn't the type of person you'd look at and think they were like that. And I hate the thought of my sexual history being scrutinised and brought into question, even if my exes support me, which I know they would, I'd still feel mortified. I put myself in that position and I'm acutely aware of it and I feel the guilt and shame of that, even though I logically know I didn't do anything wrong.

@MollyMalone2801 it's a horrible experience to have been through especially with a man you trusted, he sounds unpleasant. Most women are raped by friends, dates, husbands, family members, I see why you're saying that you're not sure , being abused by someone you care about , liked or loved is a horribly confusing and conflicted place to be.

Molly, you Must do whatever it takes to help you feel better. You have a few options.
Most importantly I think you should seek some support from a rape crisis centre. Forget what words do or don't describe it, you need support and they will offer it. You really need some TLC- this kind of thing can unsettle you in unexpected ways.

You can, if you want, inform the police. They can check his name. For all you know there are a host of women with similar experiences. It may help others in the future.

But most importantly, look after yourself. I'm really glad you have exes you can turn to- that's really healthy.

I have just read the rest of your comments about how controlling he was, please report this man, how he treated you and will treat others is not ok. His behaviour is abusive and he will do the same to others.

OP I'm truly sorry. The last thing I want to do is make you any more upset. I shared my story, partly to try to help others who have also been raped, but mostly to show that there is no 'hierarchy' of seriousness when it comes to such a crime. People so often think: well what happened to me wasn't as bad as what happened to X - or I'm not 100% sure of what actually did happen to me - and mitigate it in that way, thinking that their experiences don't count for as much.

This isn't true. It just doesn't work that way. The event I've related isn't the only instance of sexual assault I've experienced during my life, although it is the most serious, at least by any legal definition. But however it occurs, its effects on its victims is just as terrible. It's the same crime, with the same aim (abuse, power and control) and has the same devastating effects.

This happened a very long time ago and I'm fine. The point I wanted to make is that the criteria for judging what happened are very straightforward, but it doesn't suddenly cross between an intimate, consensual act and criminality with the mere utterance of the word 'no'.

I really hope you are okay.

Sorry missed your other comments, getting some support right now is all you need to do none of this is your fault.

The word stop isn't a safe word ffs that protects you from rape. Can't believe people think that because you didn't SAY stop (kicking and crying out is a pretty good indicator?!) that somehow this makes you to blame.

He's vile.

Thanks everyone. I think the strangest thing about it is that he wasn't apologetic and tried to make me feel like it was my fault. That's why I spoke to exes about it. They said they didn't recognise the girl that he was portraying me to be. We'd not been seeing each other that long and had only just started sleeping together really but I felt pressured which was stressing me out and in turn making me feel tense. Like nothing could just happen organically. He wanted a blow job, then it wasn't enough, be wanted to come in my mouth, then that wasn't enough, he wanted me to swallow it, and I just wasn't ready for all that with someone I'd literally just started sleeping with. And I felt that when he held me like that, it wasn't just that he was caught in the moment, I felt like there was a bit of frustration that I wasn't just giving myself completely to him straightaway. But things like that take time. You become more comfortable with your bloke over time and able to be more and more adventurous and intimate. He just wanted everything here and now with no effort or emotional investment.