My DH and I have been together for 22 years, married for 13 years, we have 2 DC. Our relationship has always had tensions around him being somewhat psychologically abusive etc but over the years I guess I’ve just put up with a lot. This incident happened just over 2 years ago we had a night round at a friends house, something we don’t normally do as we don’t tend to socialise much. The kids were staying at grandparents that night so we had drinks then I got a little too carried away drinking so we decided to leave the friends house and go home. When we got home we got into bed and my husband wanted to have sex, I didn’t cos I get resentful feelings about his past attitude when I have a drink, so I was saying no then he grabbed my hand and put it on his D, I pulled my hand away but then I must have changed my mind and ended up having sex with him. When I woke up the next morning I woke up feeling very upset and unsettled, filled with this overwhelming feeling that my DH had raped me but I couldn’t remember anything at all just this horrible shame and horror and fear. I had work to go to so I got up quickly getting dressed without trying to wake him and sneak off to work, he woke up and he was saying ‘what’s wrong babe?’ I just said ‘nothing’ then said I’m just off to work he was kind of shouting after me but I just ran out the door. The walk to work was awful, I kept trying to remember what happened but all I could remember was him saying finish or finished and I felt like I had said no to him and felt him on top of me. I got to work and all day I was upset, I was sore down below like I’d never felt before even after rough sex but I still couldn’t remember.
After work I went home and went straight upstairs, he came up and sat on the bed with me, I was crying, asking him what happened, he was like ‘you were on top me of for about 40 mins etc etc, can’t you remember?’ I really could not remember any of that, all I could remember was him on top of me. I kept saying to him I’m sure he was on top of me and eventually he said after I was on top he was on top for a little bit. I told him he was being too rough and he said well so were you being on top. I told him I could remember him saying the word finish or finished and I could swear I was saying no. He swore I never said no and didn’t know what I was talking about the word finished. I just took what he was telling me as the truth and after we talked I checked my watch app for pulse rate at the time I would have been on top and it checked out with his story for how long I’d been on top for so I accepted and told myself to forget about it.
I got on with life, but in these last 2 years it has been a real struggle and I have felt I have lost myself, even asking myself who I am, I felt worthless last year around the same time of the said event, and this year it has all came to a head, again around the same time of the said event…I had a small breakdown and have been attending councelling, I thought our problems were around him being controlling, anger outbursts so I was trying to deal with that when suddenly one evening about 4 weeks ago now DH and I were alone in the house, he decided to go up to bed which I felt relieved about, I sat and wondered why I’m feeling like this…then bam!!! This flashback appeared from that night what happened all came back to me. After I’d been on top, I came off him and lay down but I’d started laughing…and laughing, he asked ‘what are you laughing at’ and I said ‘you’ and he asked me again and I gave the same answer. The next thing I knew he was getting between my legs I got a shock cos it happened quickly and I thought the sex was over…I asked him ‘babe, what are you doing?’ He said ‘I’m not finished’ and I said ‘no, wait’ he didn’t stop, then I must have been trying to get him off me and I said. ‘ what are you doing, no, wait, no’ but I was powerless I then felt him put his body weight to weigh me down, I think I dissociate or possibly pass out here, I remember coming to and him hurting me with his painful thrusting and horrible noises coming from him aggressive not like he would normally be, I just lay there, floppy for a while then I thought if I try to go along with it he might ease off so I did and not long after that he came, I was relieved but scared, he seemed to be leaving me alone so I tried to roll over to turn in bed and face the wall but I couldn’t turn, it was then I realised my hands were being my back and I needed to sit up a bit to release them then turned to face the wall and pulled the covers over, I fell asleep.
Back to sitting on the sofa I couldn’t believe that memory had just come back to me, it felt so real like it was actually happening to my body, the last weeks have been hell since, realising that my DH actually raped me, I was a wreck and had a huge panic attack when he came near me I had to tell him what I remember now and he is denying all of it!!! I was waking up ever morning shaking, it’s eased off a bit now. I’ve even told my MIL she is siding with him, he is making out that I’m mentally unwell, I do suffer from anxiety and depression so I have been on medication for years for this but this is not something I’d make up! My own mum has been more supportive but she seems to think I need to give him another chance. I really don’t know what to do, I got him out the house he stayed at his mum and dads for 2 weeks but he is back in our house now, we are not sharing a bed, we don’t sit in the same room together. It’s a total mess really, the kids really missed him when he was gone and kept asking questions, now he is back it’s like limbo, nothing has been resolved, I don’t think I can afford my own house and with Christmas coming up I feel should stick it out. It’s really cutting me up that he did this to me…he’s never been violent like that before, he can lose his temper but I never though he would do this. I think he loves me, but now looking back over the years I can see how abusive he has been and I’ve been letting him do this to me all this time, I do have some self respect but also think of the good times and I hate the thought of breaking up the family unit because of this one incident. Anybody who can help or who has been through this please comment. Thank you for reading. Xx