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Sexual Assault Ptsd after sexual assault by boyfriend, some of my story and questions

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Anonymously hurt

At first sorry If some sentences or words are incorrect. English isn’t my first language.

Lately I have been wondering a lot if my trauma is serious enough, and if I’m valid for having ptsd related symptoms I am having. I almost feel guilty as if my trauma wasn’t serious enough. Also because I rarely read stories similar to mine.

So my story short: I had a boyfriend from 16 to 19. Stayed with him every Friday to Monday morning. Abuse started soon after we got together, approximately 3-6 times a week for 2.5 years. My boyfriend wanted sex everyday at least once, but preferred two or three times a day. One of the thinks he used to do was refusing me to go to sleep, keeping me awake up until I was so teribily tired that I let him have sex with me. In those moments I was refusing he went furious with me or sometimes with himself, he used to beat up his own face for instance, when I would refuse. One time he cut in his chest. After I gave in I would just lay there, all frozen up with my eyes closed, hoping it would be over soon. On the rare nights he let me sleep he would have sex with me while I was sleeping and I would find out next morning or woke up. Also on the mornings after it would be the first thing he’d do as soon as he woke up, getting inside me from the back and having sex with me until he came. Sometimes, mostly during the day, he gave me permission to refuse sex as long as I have him oral sex. He also liked perform oral sex on me while I said no countless times. He also had a really weird thing he used to do that when he was agressive. He pushing me very rough against the bed, holding me tight I so couldn’t move, and suck by breasts. It was all so humiliating.

I have a few questions around this. I feel like he raped me countless times in situations I described above. Am I allowed to feel like this? Because in the end I always used to give in (after he got agressive towards me and/or himself). Then a questions regarding ptsd:
My therapist diagnosed me with this 5 months ago. I am still experiencing symptoms like intrusive thoughts and really intense triggers. I have moments of dissociation sometimes that gets as worse as feeling completely paralysed and unable to move at all. Sometimes I am having panick attacks where I get dizzy, can’t breath normally and feel like throwing up. Also I am unable to have any form intimate fysical contact. I completely freak out by even thinking about it.
 
I have a few questions around this. I feel like he raped me countless times in situations I described above. Am I allowed to feel like this? Because in the end I always used to give in (after he got agressive towards me and/or himself). Then a questions regarding ptsd:
Based on what you have described, he did rape you many times for 3 years. That is horrible trauma. I’m so sorry you have gone through this. You deserve help and support, and I’m glad you are working with a therapist to recover. Your symptoms sound typical for PTSD. You were traumatized for 3 years and it will take time to heal. Don’t lose hope!
 
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I, too, was sexually assaulted, a whole lot, by my psycho ex-bf.

I am still experiencing symptoms like intrusive thoughts and really intense triggers. I have moments of dissociation sometimes that gets as worse as feeling completely paralysed and unable to move at all. Sometimes I am having panick attacks where I get dizzy, can’t breath normally and feel like throwing up. Also I am unable to have any form intimate fysical contact. I completely freak out by even thinking about it.

All of that stuff happens to me too. It's completely normal for us, our bodies are just trying to protect us - they don't know that the danger is gone.

Lately I have been wondering a lot if my trauma is serious enough, and if I’m valid for having ptsd related symptoms I am having.

You are completely valid in feeling that way, and your trauma is serious enough - your trauma is serious - sexual assault is serious - that is a seriously bad level of violation.

Ugh I could just go on and quote your whole post but I'm going to show some restraint lol.
One of the thinks he used to do was refusing me to go to sleep, keeping me awake up until I was so teribily tired that I let him have sex with me. In those moments I was refusing he went furious with me or sometimes with himself, he used to beat up his own face for instance, when I would refuse. One time he cut in his chest. After I gave in I would just lay there, all frozen up with my eyes closed, hoping it would be over soon. On the rare nights he let me sleep he would have sex with me while I was sleeping and I would find out next morning or woke up.
Ok so like, pretty much all of this, and basically your entire paragraph after, and basically like -your whole post- is all stuff that has happened to me.

The sleep deprivation stuff... that happened to me too... and he took it so far at the end, that my mind totally broke from reality and I had a psychotic episode. It couldn't handle the sleep deprivation torture and the rape and the physical violence and everything he was using to keep me awake and scare me and f*ck with me. Ugh. It was horrible.

Your ex? He used sleep deprivation torture to rape you.
Yeah. I have sweaty palms typing this. Torture.
Torture.
Mine did the same shit.

Maybe you don't feel like it was actually torture - I felt the same way, and still kinda feel the same way - but it is. When I think of torture, I think of like, medieval dungeons, and stuff like that - I don't think about the stuff that was done to me, even though it was torture.

You're -so- valid in feeling this way. You are SOOOO allowed to feel like this - because you were, without any shred of doubt, sexually assaulted by him. He tortured you to rape you - you giving in was your body saving you from some really bad shit - because trust me, when sleep deprivation torture goes on and on, your brain stops working correctly, and that's really bad. You may feel like you had a "choice" but you did -not- have a choice - he forced you to have sex with him, by using sleep deprivation against you, and he pushed it until your body couldn't take it anymore. He didn't respect your boundaries, he didn't respect you as a person, he treated you like an object.

You are not alone in any of this, I am so sorry this has all happened to you, but I am right there in the same boat with you, and I know many others in this site are too.

:hug:
 
Thank you both so much for your answers. It brought me to tears. This was the first time really talking about all of this.

@Sweetleaf thank you so much for sharing your story. I am so so sorry for what you have been through. I hope you are having a good T and are recovering right now.
I haven’t really discussed details with my T and I have been so afraid that she would judge me/think I overreacted , that it wasn’t rape at all. Sharing your experience with sleep deprivation really helped me. It feels like it was a choice letting him have sex with me while actually I didn’t really have a choice, but that makes it hard and extra shameful- at least tor me. I have another question.. I wonder why my ptsd is so bad while all of these 3 years of rape I felt like ‘survived’ quite well. Only the last 6 months I got severely depressed and developed an eating disorder (from which I both recovered) and at the time I didn’t understand why. I mean, it took me 3 years to realise this was rape. It was after I left my ex when I told my best friend and she called this ‘rape’. After then everything came back to me and my ptsd started. Isn’t this weird that it started just then? Like, that her calling this rape was the beginning of ptsd for me? I keep feeling my emotions and symptoms are not valid.
Also I wonder if it’s weird that I feel like I am not able to remember much? Maybe I’m just too scared and blocking the memories I don’t know..
I remember that at some point in our relationship I lost the ability to cry and I am still experiencing issues with this. Could it be that I have been blocking my memories and emotions?
 
It’s not weird in the least that one word “rape” is what triggered things for you.

Delayed onset PTSD is very common. Many people go for years or even decades seemingly ok, only to be triggered by something as innocuous as a single word.
 
I hope you are having a good T and are recovering right now.
I just got myself a new T actually. Hopefully she is going to be much better than the old one - who really f*cked up really bad and made me revert back to how I felt when I freshly freed myself from my abuser.

I wonder why my ptsd is so bad while all of these 3 years of rape I felt like ‘survived’ quite well.
Isn’t this weird that it started just then? Like, that her calling this rape was the beginning of ptsd for me? I keep feeling my emotions and symptoms are not valid.

That's just how it goes, sometimes. I was with my abuser for 4 years, and it was only after freeing myself from him that it all "clicked" and I went from denial of what happened to me, being abuse - to realizing "hey that was domestic violence and abuse" and then days later "holy shit, was that rape? holy shit all of that was rape!" - you are not alone in having a delayed admittance/recognition to yourself that it was rape/abuse/etc. While we are -inside- of those situations still, it's kind of a survival mechanism to not emotionally connect to the rape and abuse.

For me, it was as if it was happening to someone else, it was as if it wasn't -real-. I was numb. It's hard to describe, but, it's only later, after I had removed myself from the situation, that I was able to start connecting the dots, and emotionally connecting to what happened to me, and realizing it was really abuse, and it all really happened, and it all really happened to me.

Not feeling like your emotions and symptoms are valid is very common for us - during the abuse, our brains protected us by -not- letting us realize how bad things -really- were. That is why your PTSD can begin later, well after the trauma has ended. It's just one of the brain's survival mechanisms. Perfectly normal, to have things happen the way they happened for you.

Also I wonder if it’s weird that I feel like I am not able to remember much?

It's not weird at all - it's very common. All the time, I will have memories come back to me. Much of the years of abuse, just feel like a fog - the memories are all jumbled, and there are holes in them, some are foggy, and I know there is so much that I have yet to remember.

Not remembering things is another defense mechanism of the brain, to try to help us deal with really bad things. I don't remember the physical assault that injured my knee - but my LCL got messed up, and my kneecap no longer sits in the right place. I don't remember it at all. I remember before, and things starting to get heated and him starting to get really wound up. And then I am on my bed crying a bunch. and then i start trying to get up, and my abuser said "woah! what about your knee??" and I am like "what??" and I move it and it hurt a lot :(

I was limping for months, and months. It still bothers me often, but it's gotten a lot better now that I've had physical therapy for it and all that. Yet, I -still- can't remember the incident.

There are many other things I can't remember. The sexual abuse that took place in my childhood is similar - there is stuff I don't remember, and I don't -want- to remember it, but I know there is more than what I have delved into, because I have forced myself to stop delving for now.

I remember that at some point in our relationship I lost the ability to cry and I am still experiencing issues with this.

Yeah, the same thing happened to me. For a long time after I freed myself, I couldn't cry either. Sometimes I still can't cry - but, it's come back with time, and I've had some days where I just cry all day long.

The not-being-able-to-cry stuff is emotional numbing - it's also very common for people with PTSD. I've read so many posts on this site, about not being able to cry. It's totally normal for us.

All your reactions are totally normal for someone with PTSD - for someone who was traumatized. We know what it's like, you're not alone in feeling all of these things :hug:
 
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