Anonymous Story: I Was A Virgin

My story starts in 2012. It was the summer before my last year of high school and I was at a house party. Everyone was in the backyard, there was a bonfire, and beer pong. Everyone was drinking, and I was sitting by the fire. I had come with a group of girls and had been with a friend but she got up and left to talk to someone at the party and I was sitting there alone.

I dont remember how I started talking to him but, I remember being on the bench by the fire and the older brother of a guy from our friend group was sitting beside me. I’ll call him D. He kept pulling me onto his lap, I remember repeatedly trying to get off him but I was drunk and he was able to easily pull me back onto his lap. I very clearly remember getting up and knocking my drink over and watching it spill onto the grass as I tried to pull away one last time. I picked up my drink and tried to get away. I kept saying no. Repeatedly. He was trying to sweet talk me. I was drunk at this point but not entirely wasted. My memory of the early portion of the night is perfectly intact. However, he started making out with me and I only remember pieces from there.

After that I remember being in the forest just behind the party and the fire I had been sitting near. I remember laying on the ground in the forest and the sticks and leaves scraping my skin through my shirt. I remember stumbling through the forest later in the night looking for my hair brush that had fallen out of my purse. I had blood on my face and I didn’t know where it had come from. Then I remember being on the driveway at the front of the house (the party was around back) with a guy friend hugging me and telling me it was going to be okay. My friends parents picked us up and we stayed the night at her house (still don’t know why they didn’t question my less than stellar appearance).

I woke up in the morning sore and covered in scrapes. My friends were all discussing the night before and my best friend said she couldn’t find me for like an hour and then she saw me coming out of the forest wearing pants that were way too big on me. She said I couldn’t even speak properly and I had stripes of blood on my cheeks. She immediately took me to take a morning after pill. I didn’t even know what that was, and I didn’t fully understand what had happened. I mean I had had sex ed in school as my parents were always very open and progressive people but something like this no one had ever discussed.

Everyone in our social circle at school just knew that we had had “sex” and I felt disgusting and embarrassed. I didn’t know what to do with myself after that. I didn’t remember it happening, but the weird thing is that no one really talked it about it after that party. Life went on as normal.

D even began texting me afterwards (don’t know how he got my number) and asking me to go on a date, I ignored him. I didn’t know what I was feeling but I knew that I didn’t want to be around him ever again. He got mad at my lack of response to his texts and eventually stopped texting me. That was the last communication we ever had with each other. He still lives in that town as far as I know.

I wish I had spoken out at the time. But it took me years to realize that it had even been rape. I was a virgin when it happened. I didn’t even have a single healthy sexual encounter to compare it to.

I never told my parents or anyone else because I felt ashamed. In 2014 I disclosed it to my current boyfriend when we started dating because I felt like “damaged goods”. He told me it wasn’t my fault and has been fully supportive of me ever since.

Now I’m in a good place and I’m happy in my life but I’m also feeling very empowered to share my story. There’s nothing I can do now to prosecute this guy, and I haven’t decided if I ever want to contact him to tell him what he did (I’m sure he doesn’t think of it as rape) and how he made me feel – but I know that I’m strong. I wanted to share this story as so many other girls have gone through similar experiences and I want them to know they’re strong too.