Katie’s Story: Drugged

20y/o female. About 6 months ago, I was raped. I was at a little get together with some friends and a couple friends of friends. I knew one of the “friends of friends”, named Z for anonymity. Z was always friendly towards me. He knew I was gay. He was never overly friendly or showed any interest in me. Only polite. We live in a cannabis legal state. He sold a private stash to friends that he grew out of his home. I had bought from him once or twice.
At this lowkey party, all my friends were pretty much gone, as in drunk gone. Z, however, had only been sipping lightly on a beer. I had only had about 3 shots of whiskey, not enough to get me wasted or anything, but unfortunately enough to blur my judgement. He offered me a beer, already opened, and I took it without thinking anything of it. I then proceeded to feel really, really drunk and dizzy. Ended up on the floor. When I pull myself up, his friends all try to get me to sit down on a recliner with him, putting me in his lap, but I didn’t want to. I got up and went to my friend, F, who is a non-binary male who prefers men, but has been known to be bi. I had a bit of a physical crush on him and I sat on his lap instead and he was teasing me about it and we were laighing and having a good time. It got a little heated and I turn around and kiss him, he reciprocated eagerly. We made out for a couple minutes when I fell back on the floor.
Z’s friends put me back in his lap. He pulled my hair back and said “It was supposed make you want me, not that ~bundle of sticks/gay slur~” I didn’t understand what he meant at all. For some reason, it didn’t click.
All of my friends go back into the back room (we were in the living room) to watch another friend get her hair braided with sparkly weave in it. Z’s friends look around sort of suspiciously and I go, “Haha quit looking around so much, you’re making me think something’s up!”
Of course, something was. Z’s best friend gets me by my lower half and Z himself grabs me by my shoulders and they carry me out of the house like a corpse. They put me in the back of Z’s sedan and his friend gets in the driver’s seat while Z sits in he back with me. I asked where we were going and they told me that I’ll see soon.
We get to an abandoned lot nearby, maybe 10 minutes drive tops. The whole time, Z plants kisses on my neck and is holding me down and telling me it’ll be better if I don’t fight back. He told me if I fight back, I’m just a victim, but if I give in, I’m having a good time. I plead with him to stop to no avail. He forces me to perform oral on him and then tries to do the same with me, only to find out it was that time of the month. He backhanded me in the temple hard and yelled at me for not warning him and I tried to tell him I didn’t want any of this. The driver steps out and says he’ll be back in a few. Z has his way with me, the whole time I’m disorientated from whatever he placed in my drink. I start fighting back because, according to the ER nurses, my slow metabolism disorder made it harder for the drug he put in my beer to kick in. I punch him as hard as I can, when that doesn’t faze him, I punch the window, desperately trying to find an out, and then eventually pull the door handle open and fall to the ground, stark naked in the middle of nowhere past midnight. Rocks get embedded in my knees. I broke two knuckle bones trying to punch him and the window. I try to break out in a run but he grabbed me by the hair and pulled out a gun and said I’m doing this the hard way. All I could think about was making it back home to my mother or else I would’ve made a run for it. I comply, knowing I’ll never get back home if I don’t.
After, apparently someone saw what was happening and the driver gets in and takes off fast. We returned to the house we had been at previously, but the police pull up right behind us. From this point, it’s mostly a blur. I begged the cop to not call my mom and to just take me home. She was going to be so disappointed in me. She had been raped in her youth as well and I never wanted to have the same thing happen to me. I yelled at him and showed him my ID and told him I’m 20 and if I don’t want him to take me to the ER or call my mom, he can’t. He eventually pries it out of me after around 30 minutes and we go to the house I stay in with my mom. As soon as she opened the door, she dropped to her knees and I could physically see her heart break. She thought I was dead, in that moment, but the reality wasn’t much better. She was just happy I was alive. I wasn’t.
I’ve been struggling with this ever since. I went to the ER, got tested, I’m not pregnant nor do I have any diseases. So why am I still not okay?? I don’t know what to do anymore. I’m so lost. I dropped out of this college semester and quit my job. I can’t go to certain places in the city because I know them or their family frequent the area. Both Z and his driver friend are currently in jail. I should feel happy, but I just can’t! I feel like something broke inside of me permanently. My soul feels depleted, I have no interest in doing anything at all. I’ve lost all the friends who were there that night because I began blaming them for not helping/can’t stand to talk to them because it just reminds me of what happened. I keep everyone at a distance. My mom and dad were both heartbroken and I feel like it’s my fault even though I KNOW it isn’t I still feel like it somewhere inside of me.
I don’t know what to do!! I’m hurting myself so bad and I’m screwing up my future. I know I need to go to therapy but I don’t even wanna talk about it or think about it. I’ve been blocking it out so much that it feels more like it happened in a past life or to a very close friend of mine instead of me. I can’t deal with this. I’m really sorry, I know this is a mess, but I don’t know where else to turn to.