A Forever Face of Rape

I was raped three years ago today.

36 months.

156 weeks.

1,096 days.

1,576,800 minutes.

94,608,000 seconds.

I used to be an unfuckwithable badass. Then, I was brought to my proverbial knees.

Please consider this a trigger warning, as well as an uncomfortable but important story I will forever continue to share.

Mine.

During the wee hours of January 29, 2016 in an affluent neighborhood of Nashville, I woke up to my best friend’s boyfriend of five weeks raping me while I slept on her couch. Sleeping on this bestie’s sofa is something I’d done 4,209 times without a second thought before. I’d arrived around 9pm in mismatched pajamas, distraught with eyes so puffy from bawling over a friend’s death a few days prior that I looked as if I’d been fighting Rocky Balboa. I went to her for company, solace and what friends do best for each other – support.

Why can’t my lips get puffy when I cry instead of my eye lids?! WHY?

Her young son was asleep, her large, lovable pit bull mix jumped on my lap and her boyfriend of 35 days poured us generous glasses of wine while we watched Pretty in Pink. After more tears, lots of laughs and three glasses of vino later, I watched the two of them go to her bedroom, as I snuggled in after taking a sleeping pill, putting my glasses across the room on the coffee table, along with my phone.

A few hours later, in darkness so deep it rivaled a haunted house, I groggily awoke on my back to something very heavy on my chest, with my arms down by my sides, my pajama pants at my knees. There was hot breath and a human head in the right crease of my neck. There was an unwanted, unwelcomed and disgusting rape taking place. The rape of me.

Upon gaining my bearings and piecing together what the hell was happening to me, I silently freaked out, put my hands up on his chest and hissed, “what the fuck are you doing?” Without uttering one word, he retreated from my body, stood up and walked back into the bedroom where his girlfriend was sleeping. Through the fucking door that had been wide open the entire time – if my friend had woken up, she would have seen the rape occurring, due to the closeness of her quarters.

Scared shitless at what could happen during a confrontation with a man I barely knew, my first thought was of the sleeping four-year old in the next room. I was frozen. I didn’t know if Shane the Rapist was awake, passed out or going to come back out to finish what he started…or worse. My glasses and phone were across the room. I barely was able to muster the courage to pull my pajama pants up for fear of making noise. I remained a statue on that couch for at least two hours – until the sun came up.

Looking back as I hustled out of that apartment, I now know that I was in shock. Deep shock. And, I didn’t know what the fuck to do. Did that really just happen? What do I do? Did that just really happen? Where do I go? Did that just really happen? Who should I call? Did that really just happen? I was desperate to tell my girlfriend but wanted to do it while she was away from her boyfriend out of fear of what he may do to her.

When she was at work a few hours later, I called and told her to sit down as I had something life changing to tell her that would have a great impact on the both of us. Then I went on to say that I awoke in the night with her boyfriend of five weeks, having sex with me. Her initial response was, “did you finish?” Did we finish?

HOLY FUCK.

She immediately went home to him and called me back saying that she believed him when he told her it was consensual.

This was my first encounter with victim blaming. From my best friend.

My second encounter with victim blaming came from Shane the Rapist himself via a text to me after that phone call.

WISH I WOULD HAVE TOLD HIM NO?

I WAS FUCKING DEAD ASLEEP.

After taking a sleeping pill with three glasses of wine and being unbearably sad the entire day with endless tears coming from my eye holes, I was out cold. He had sex with what was basically a corpse instead of turning to his girlfriend he was next to in bed and tapping her on the shoulder for a piece of ass. He got up out of the bed and came to the couch. He knew exactly what he was doing. Oh and a side note, as soon as I was conscious enough I did say no. I said fuck no as I pushed him off.

My third encounter of victim blaming came from, once again, someone I held close to my heart. I couldn’t believe my best friend’s stance.

I ruined her life because her boyfriend raped me.

To read about the rest of the day Rapegate began, please click here.

Shattered.

My life was shattered in a matter of mere minutes.

My joy was robbed without my consent in seconds.

My trust in almost everyone gone in a few fleeting moments.

A rape counselor at the hospital said, “there is going to be a before rape in your life and an after rape in your life.”

And she sure the fuck was right.

A lot of my post Rapegate life.

As the days, weeks, and life in general went on around me, I couldn’t help but feel like I was responsible for “letting” myself be raped (how fucked up is that?). I was ashamed, embarrassed, disappointed and disgusted with myself. Insecurities formed I’d never experienced along with adjustment disorder, PTSD, chronic fatigue and severe stress.

In an instant, Shane the Rapist turned me into a girl who could no longer withstand being in my own mind.

He stole my stone cold solid pride. My life long unwavering sense of confidence. My will. All in one act.

The weight of profound grief is and can be all consuming. I was a stranger to myself and struggled to fight the will to get up out of the bed on a daily basis. I never wanted to die per se but you bet your motherfucking ass I wished my eyes wouldn’t open most mornings because the pain seared into my soul was unlike anything I have ever experienced. I didn’t really care about much of what I once did – a clean Mini Manse, washed hair, painted nails, working out, decorating for holidays, celebrating anything, taking a shower and so fucking on. Thousands of hours of sleepless nights. Panic attacks out of nowhere. And luckily and not so luckily, I was unemployed and looking for a job when Rapegate began.

What my laundry pile has looked like the last three years.

My sink has resembled that of a restaurant for years.

The most mundane tasks feel like climbing Mt. Everest.

Trauma happens in various of forms in this life, as we are all too aware. Loved ones die but it’s inevitable that we all have expiration dates. People desperate to be parents sometimes cannot conceive. Illnesses and disease that have no cures plague us. Auto accidents occur resulting in life altering injuries and changes. Children are molested. The endless cycle of domestic violence. Life is cruel. Trauma is brutal.

I’ve been in therapy for most of the last three years. It is hard as fuck. It is hard as FUCK. It is hard as FUCK. If you find yourself in a state after any kind of trauma where you can feel comfortable reaching out to anyone that you can trust, it will be for your benefit. I promise.

This program saved my life.

I started therapy with my Rapegate hero, Sheila every Thursday afternoon. We began with Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and then later, EMDR. I’ve done countless hours of reflecting and homework and revising my thinking that I wanted to give the fuck up and just pretend Rapegate never happened. But for me, that was not an option. Once I started, I had to keep trudging ahead because trauma isn’t truly stored in your brain. It’s stored in your body. It’s why I’m unconsciously bouncing my knee to the ceiling right now. It’s why I stuttered for a solid 15 seconds until my boss finally finished my sentence yesterday. It’s why I have been inexplicably tearing up every few hours the last week.

One thing for people to understand whether or not you or someone you love has been raped, recovery will be a long struggle. Being a survivor isn’t something you do once. Being a survivor is waking up every day and doing your best to carry on. It’s a journey, not a destination. I mean fuck, I’m sitting here awake three years to the day later because my body won’t let me sleep on my Rapeversary at 4:00 am. The body remembers. The body stores trauma.

I was raped before the #MeToo movement began and when I first shared my story, I could not believe the droves of people who reached out to say they, too, had been victims. And not just women. Some I’d never met in person, only virtually but they felt comfortable enough to reveal their truth and I was honored to listen. Speaking your truth is an unbelievable weight lifted. Speaking your truth also makes it very real and that is scary as fuck.

Then you live with triggers that fellow survivors and I deal with on now, a daily basis. I can’t know and don’t know when it will hit. Not sure if being woken up in a startling manner will make me punch someone in the face. Not sure if a news story will make ice run through my veins. Not sure how provoked of a poked bear I will become over injustices occurring on a daily basis in our judicial system. Not sure if my ears will start bleeding when I hear a person defending a sexual assaulter. Because believe you me, they do it once, they do it again. And why wouldn’t they if society doesn’t think the punishment should fit the fucking crime?

Six months in jail for sexually assaulting an unconscious woman behind a dumpster because the judge didn’t want to ruin his life. Fuck the victim.

Four counts of sex assault? No prison time? Eh, fuck the victim.

But then again, America also voted a self-described pussy grabber into the White House and that’s just the fucking norm these days. AND. IT. SHOULDN’T. BE. If you think that’s OK, you are part of the gigantic problem of rape culture that this country has, so fucking stop it. Your children are watching.

And yet, we question over and over and over and over why victims don’t come forward at the time of their sexual assaults.

I. FUCKING. DARE. YOU.

The thing is, it takes a fucking village to overcome any type of trauma – and my village is as strong as an army. In instances such as the one I survived, it’s an experience I can hopefully convey to others and create awareness. Over 70% of all rapes occur between acquaintances (it’s an even higher percentage if you add in rape by family members). I never once thought I was putting myself in danger by going to my ex-best friend’s house to grieve a loss of life, only to start the unraveling of my own grief of life as I once knew it.

Instead of gaining comfort by reporting, I became a statistic that is all too familiar. My treatment as a rape victim by the Metro Nashville Sex Crimes division is and was no less than abhorrent. I was re-victimized by the very people supposed to help, support and guide me. Hundreds of hours were spent by yours truly following up with my detective and some of her peers, chasing information and answers that should have simply been provided. It exhausted me to my core. My rapist walks free because it was a “classic” scenario as my detective brought to my attention –  a he said/she said. And still, we question why victims don’t report.

The cost of being a rape victim has a tremendous impact for those who do (and even those that don’t) report it to authorities. Missed work, therapy visits (if you can afford it), police follow-up, doctor visits (that are required every six months for two years, just to be sure you didn’t contract HIV) prescriptions (for mental problems or STD medications contracted during rape), etc… is at an estimated $122,461 per victim according to a 2017 National Sexual Violence Resource Center . Pocket change.

I’m currently in surthrival mode –  that space in between surviving and thriving and I owe it to my support systems of thousands. You guys rock my world. Truly. You are my lifesavers from one to a million. With your help the last three years, I’ve become one hell of a survivor through your letters, texts, phone calls, cards, gifts, flowers, financial assistance, sharing of your own stories – I know I’m not alone. This is a horribly isolating trauma that reduces you to a solo existence. You feel like an endless burden. But I know I’m not alone. I think of the many who haven’t had the ability, freedom or support to breakthrough to the other side of rape.

You are not alone. You are never, ever alone. My once again unfuckwithable badass has your back and mine.

Thank you from the bottom of my heart. You will never know what it means.

XOXO –

CBXB

 

 

 

 

 

A Face of Rape

This is my story of an act of rape that occurred to me in the early morning hours of January 29, 2016 in an affluent neighborhood of Nashville, TN. I have been unable to write about the details in hopes that the case would make it to trial, which unfortunately, like thousands of others, it did not. But now the muzzle is off of my mouth which rivals the size of a Tyrannosaurus Rex, so look the fuck out.

Please consider this a warning for any trigger it may cause, as well as an uncomfortable but important story to be told.

Mine.

Pre-rape: Captain of Confidence.

Four hundred and eighty days ago, I found myself without a career I had fostered for four years (the stab wounds in my back are still bleeding a year and a half later, which is most definitely a post for another day), a broken immediate family and received word that someone who was like a sister to me died suddenly in a car accident.

This life is living it up above us now.

In between this news and her funeral a few days later, I was raped by my best friend’s boyfriend of five weeks while I sought solace and comfort at her house.  I found myself not wanting to be alone an evening after finding out about my young friend. Always having her door wide open for me, I traipsed over in my mismatched pajamas to hang with my gal pal, her pit bull mix, her four-year old son and her boyfriend. Something I had done 1,197 times before (especially before the boyfriend was in the mix). I knew I was going to stay the night, sleeping on her couch with the pit bull who thinks she’s a lap dog.

Sleeping Beauties.

It was around 9pm when I arrived with a face swollen from bawling, hair looking as if I was hiding rats within it and a need for comfort so large, I would have stood on the side of the street with a sign that read “hug needed”. My bestie ushered me in, told me her adorable son was in bed already but poured me a glass of wine and we sat and talked, laughed, watched a movie and she just let me cry. Sweet pit bull and the boyfriend were also in the 600 square foot vicinity but us two gals carried on as usual, not paying much attention to anything other than the two of us (cause us self-centered bitches gravitate toward one another, ya dig?!).

The boyfriend refilled our wine glasses and after about three hours, we all decided to hit the hay. I took a sleeping pill, set my glasses and phone on the coffee table across the room and went to bed on the couch while watching my bestie and her boyfriend go into her bedroom together as I settled in on the couch I knew so well.

I mean, if this isn’t sex on a stick…

A few hours later, in darkness so deep it rivaled a haunted house, I groggily awoke on my back to something very heavy on my chest, with my arms down by my sides. Initially, getting my bearings and remembering where I was, I immediately thought it was the sweet pit bull who always slept on my chest with her ass to my face. But as the seconds ticked on, I realized there was a human head in the crease of the right side of my neck heavily breathing. It was my best friend’s boyfriend having sex with me. NON-CONSENSUAL SEX WITH ME.

In what felt like 10 minutes (but was more likely .000000004 seconds), I silently freaked out, put my hands up on his chest and hissed, “what the fuck are you doing?” Without uttering one word, he retreated from my body, stood up and walked back into the bedroom where his girlfriend was sleeping (sounds like someone who has a bit of experience in this, yes?) – into the fucking door that had been wide open the entire time.

Since this traumatic event, I’ve learned that you either fly, fight or freeze. I was frozen solid to the couch with my pink polka dot pants at my knees and all other parts of my pajamas in tact. Scared shitless at what could happen during a confrontation with a man I barely knew, my first thought was of the sleeping four-year old in the next room. While I wanted to get up and beat the living shit out of The Rapist, I couldn’t remove myself from that couch. Being blind as a motherfucking bat, my glasses and phone were across the room. I didn’t know if he was awake, passed out or going to come back out to finish “the job”.

So I laid there until it was light, which must have been at least two hours. At sunrise, I busted my ass across the room, grabbed my spectacles, phone and bounced the fuck out now trying to piece together what the fuck happened and how in the fuck I was going to tell my best friend. I wanted to do it while she was away from The Rapist and her kid was out of the house, so I texted her to call me when she got to work.

I also called two close friends who wanted to know why in the hell I was calling them before 7am (when I typically sleep until noon) for advice. I love a crime show – especially Forensic Files Friday night on the HLN network and knew not to shower or wash my clothes (which are still in my living room, waiting for the Nashville police to collect them). But did this really just happen? What do I do?

I know I’m a hot mess…but really?

The reality set in when my bestie called from work, I told her to sit down as I had something life changing to tell her that would have an impact on the both of us. Then I went on to say that I had awoke in the night with her boyfriend of five weeks – now known as The Rapist, having sex with me. Her initial response was, “did you finish?” Did we finish? HOLY FUCK.

This was my first encounter with victim blaming.

My friend and I hung up while she took time to process the information I had provided. Minutes later she called me back to tell me that The Rapist was sitting right beside her and she’s “not hearing the same story I’m telling.” Oh, no fuck.

• I wouldn’t sleep with an ex-girlfriend’s ex-boyfriend – let alone my best friend’s current love interest. Girl code bitch.
• Why is it OK if we did have consensual sex (which we did NOT). Kick that motherfucker out and cease being my pal.
• WHY WOULD I LIE? We’ve been best friends for years. You’ve known this man for 50,400 minutes.

I believe the call ended with me tearfully trying to shout “fuck off” and two seconds later I receive this text from The Rapist:

Hmm…”wish I’d have told him no.” I WAS FUCKING DEAD ASLEEP. After taking a sleeping pill with three glasses of wine (which mind you, he poured) and being unbearably sad the entire day with endless tears coming from my eye holes, I was out cold. He had sex with what was basically a corpse instead of turning to his girlfriend he was next to in bed and tapping her on the shoulder for a piece of ass. He got up out of the bed and came to the couch. He knew exactly what he was doing. Oh and a side note, as soon as I was conscious enough I did say no. I said fuck no as I pushed him off.

Shattered into emotional fragments from shock, awe, disbelief and utter dumbfoundedness, I called my sister who immediately turned into a rescue responder. She called my dad, told me to call my doctor and told me to give zero fucks about a friend who didn’t believe what I was telling her.

A real face of rape.

My dad left work and arrived at my mini manse while I was still in my rape pajamas. We were like Tweedle Dee and Dumb, as neither one of us knew what to do. I had called both my gynecologist’s office and general practitioner. In lieu of knowing not to take a shower or wash my clothes, I had no clue where to go. Roll up into a walk-in clinic and casually ask to have a rape kit performed? The fuck? I finally got through to my gyno’s office and they told me to go to an emergency room.

We chose to go to the ER where both of my doctor’s practice. I was admitted, the police were called, and my blood was drawn only to be told after three hours that rape kits were only performed at one hospital in Metro Nashville. I encountered SIX medical professionals and was admitted to the hospital before being informed of this practice.

That’s cool. The worst day of my life needed to be drawn out three more hours by fucking professionals not knowing the ropes. Seriously a fucking shit show.

Of course, like a fucking comedy shit show, my dad couldn’t find his car in the massive hospital parking lot we’d started in, his battery on his key fob was dead and so the responding officer ended up taking me in the back of his patrol car (you can’t sit up front, ever) to the hospital that conducts all Nashville rape kits. So many firsts for one day – losing a best friend, being raped by her boyfriend of 35 days, sitting in the back of a cop car and getting a rape kit performed.

This cop car ride was waaaaaaay more fun – and only a few months prior to my rape.

With a dead phone, hoping my dad was finding his way to the correct hospital, and stripping down into a paper gown, the responding officer left me in the very competent hospital staff hands. When the Davidson County Metro Sex Crimes Detective arrived, I gave her my recorded statement to which my second encounter of victim blaming occurred when she said, “so you didn’t scream?” Oh no, I’m sorry I was too busy being in shock by a foreign object inserted into what the current President of the United States refers to as a pussy (that you can grab if you’re a star!), concerned that a four-year old would wake up and walk into an incident that would scar him for life.

While I sat and had pubic hairs plucked for my rape kit, The Rapist was very busy on social media, posting this photo on his Instagram account:

Please pay special attention to the fucking relaxing hashtag.

A rape counselor arrived. My rape kit was conducted. My dad waited six hours in a hospital waiting room with Barbie, the heavenly rape counselor. And when it was all over, she came in to the room with me and said, “there is going to be a before rape in your life and an after rape in your life.”

And she sure the fuck was right.

In minutes, The Rapist stole my joy and innocence of loving life.

Well, what innocence I had left.

In mere seconds, The Rapist stole my trust in almost everyone.

Seriously. Leave me the fuck alone.

The Rapist made me feel like I was responsible – ashamed, embarrassed and disgusted with myself. Insecurities I still fight to this day in the form of adjustment disorder, PTSD, chronic fatigue and severe stress.

How did I left his happen to me?

 In an instant, The Rapist turned me into a girl who could no longer withstand being in my own mind. I gave up my beloved yoga, my running, my reading, my TV watching…and cried in my closet.

At least it’s pretty in here.

The Rapist stole my pride. My confidence. My will. All in one act.

Cries for confidence I never knew I could lose.

My will to live never left me but I must admit most nights I wished I wouldn’t wake up in the next morning. What helped me take moment by moment and live to fight this ass hat of a rapist were my two little loves in Iowa. I would lay in bed and watch videos of them all day long.

Life savers one and two.

I also had fur babies and reason to put one foot in front of the other (even if it was just to feed their ungrateful asses).

Life savers three through seven.

The thing is, it takes a fucking village to overcome any type of trauma – and my village is as strong as an army. In instances such as the one I survived, it’s an experience I can hopefully convey to others and create awareness. Over 70% of all rapes occur between acquaintances. I never once thought I was putting myself in danger by going to my ex-best friend’s house (again, a story for another day) to grieve a loss of life.

Instead of gaining comfort, I became a statistic that is all too familiar. My treatment as a rape victim by the Nashville Davidson Metro Sex Crimes division is and was no less than abhorrent. I was re-victimized by the very people supposed to help, support and guide me (again, a story for another day). Also, the cost of being a rape victim has a tremendous impact for those who do – and don’t report it to authorities. Missed work, therapy visits, police follow-up, doctor visits, prescriptions (thank GOD I have health care), etc… is at an estimated $152,000 per victim according to a 2008 National Alliance to to End Sexual Violence report.

With all of this being said, I immediately went on defense mode with the help of my closest allies – and folks who have become my closest allies (and also dropped folks who I thought would be my closest allies – again, a post for another day). I dubbed my rape as “Rapegate” in order to having to avoid saying “that thing that happened to me…” Now we all just refer to it as Rapegate, as will I on this blog from here on out. It felt funny trying to post about fluffy matters of nail painting and weekend shenanigans the way I did before with something so heavy hanging over me that I couldn’t talk about outright.

I’m currently in survival mode, with the next step being thriving mode and I owe it to my support systems of thousands. You guys rock my world. Truly. You are my lifesavers eight through one million.

My new suit of armour compliments of college pals and happily married hotties HJ and CC.

With your help throughout this past year and a half, I’ve become one hell of a survivor through your letters, texts, phone calls, cards, gifts, flowers, financial assistance, sharing of your own stories – I know I’m not alone. You’re not alone. We’re not alone.

Aftermath face of rape – a Nasty Woman and proud of it.

So here we go, CBXB readers and supporters! I’m taking you on my Rapegate journey that won’t be hashed out in every post but when I do, humor will be tucked in here and there – like how to become a beached whale while eating your emotions. Or how to shit your car while talking to your pharmacist at the drive-thru because being raped has given you a severely nervous stomach. There’s nothing funny about rape. But finding a reason to laugh has been my saving grace.

And so have you. I thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Now let’s get to thriving!

CBXB