Rape Survivor: My experience, and journey of healing

            One of the hardest things for me to overcome is trusting men. Sometimes I still struggle with it. For example, the other day, I was at Wal-Mart by myself with my little boy, and there was this man that I kept seeing around the store. There was something about him that gave me the creeps. There was one point where he stood in front of my cart and wouldn’t move and was just staring at me. Usually I try to be nice to people, but this guy I was pretty short with and told him to get out of my way. I was afraid that if I was nice to him, he would follow me out to my car. I started to get scared, and I didn’t even finish my shopping because I was so freaked out by this guy. So I bought what I had in my cart, and I left the store… Sometimes I just hate my anxiety.             There are times too where a guy isn’t even creepy and I still get freaked out. I have gotten significantly better, but there have been many times where I run away from a man in the parking lot of a store,

            When I read back through my journal entries of that time when I began my healing process, it’s amazing to me how much I have changed, and how much happier I am now than I was then. My therapist had me write a little bit everyday about how I felt, and would have me put a number between 1-10 at the end of my entry for how my day was overall; 10 being the happiest and 1 being the worst. Most of my days were between a 2 and a 6. In my journal entries, I talked about how all I did the entire day was sleep until 6 pm, or how I cried all day when I thought about something minor that to me was huge. Some days I said how I didn’t want to wake up that morning, so I lied in bed for hours on end and didn’t eat anything or talk to anyone. I would write about how the only reason I got up to get ready was to see my boyfriend so he wouldn’t know that anything was wrong with me. Most days I cried all day. Most days I called my mom and would cry to her about my daily anxieties and hurt. Mos

            It’s no secret that I have anxiety because of what happened to me. What most people do not know is that I deal with this every day, all day. It never goes away. I constantly feel unsettled and anxious. People with anxiety are always in fight-or-flight mode, they have a hard time differentiating problems that are small and problems that are a big deal. Every problem to a person with anxiety is a big deal to them.             I have gotten a lot better with controlling my anxiety. I can talk to people and not have a nervous breakdown, I can go in public and not feel like I am going to be attacked every 5 seconds. I can pretty much deal with every day things now. But there are still a lot of times that I cannot control my anxiety, and it comes about like I am angry.             My worst anxiety I get is when I feel out of control in a situation that is really important to me… for obvious reasons. Since I was out of control with the rape, being in control is something

            Since I have been writing about my story, it’s been taking a toll on me, more than I thought it would be. I knew it would make me emotional, but I am thankful for my family and husband for supporting me through writing this. It has made all the difference in the world.             Once I began the path to recovery by regularly seeing my therapist and talking to my church leader, I also started to date my future husband. We dated for a few weeks before I decided that I needed to tell him what was going on. I was nervous about this, because I knew that by telling him I was raped and the hard times I had for a couple years after, that he might not want to date me anymore. I really liked him, but he had to know, because for the first couple months that I was seeing my therapist, I would have a mental breakdown after every session.             Not only was I having breakdowns after every session, most days I wouldn’t even get out of bed, unless I absolutely had to; or u

               I just found out recently that after I was raped I experienced Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). It is a mental health condition that is triggered after a terrifying event. The sooner you get help for PTSD once you realize that you are experiencing symptoms, will help prevent long term PTSD. The symptoms can last for months or years and can completely turn your life inside out. Symptoms usually start within 3 months after the traumatic event. There are three types of PTSD:     Intrusive memories- symptoms include: Flashbacks, or reliving the traumatic event for minutes or even days at a time Upsetting dreams about the traumatic event     Avoidance and emotional numbing- symptoms include:         Trying to avoid thinking or talking about the traumatic event Feeling emotionally numb Avoiding activities you once enjoyed Hopelessness about the future Memory problems Trouble concentrating Difficulty maintaining close relationships      A nxiety and i

               I apologize for not posting an entry today. The next subject I want to talk about is extremely difficult for me to talk about, and is a delicate situation. I am planning on posting it tomorrow once I feel I have expressed the situation appropriately. Thank you for your patience every one!

          I know that saying he would soon be serving a mission for my church may be confusing. I am proud to say that I am LDS, or Mormon. I love my religion, and I love God. I know he is there for me, and my religion is a big reason why I feel I was able to overcome what had happened to me.             In my religion, many people serve missions, which means they go out for about 2 years to places all over the world, serving God, people, and sharing our beliefs without pay. It is a huge sacrifice, and is an amazing experience for those who have chosen to do this. But to be able to do this, the person who chooses to serve needs to be worthy, meaning they need to be keeping the commandments of God, they need to not be using substances like alcohol and drugs, and they need to be morally clean, basically meaning not going around and having sex. If someone has made mistakes, they can repent and eventually serve. We believe God does forgive our sins. But if a person has sexually abused

            About a day or two after my ex tried to kidnap me, I met with my therapist. Conveniently enough, I already had an appointment set up. I was seeing my therapist as needed for depression that I was dealing with off and on for a few years, and I had set up this appointment with him weeks before I was raped. I was debating if I still wanted to talk to him, but I went anyways. I thought that if there was anyone who would know for sure what had happened to me, it would be my therapist.             The session started as usual, him asking me how I was doing, how I was handling my stress, etc. I told him short answers and said I was fine and doing better, and I told him I had a question for him. I told him “I think I may have been raped, but I’m not sure”. I explained to him the situation. I started from the beginning to meeting my ex at the restaurant to talk, and ended with what had happened in the parking lot across the street. To my surprise, my therapist looked extremely

            The more I think and write about what happened, the more I remember. It’s insane to me that I can remember so many specific details and word for word conversations. And it’s pretty hard to believe that after all that, I still saw him for another two weeks. I admit, I was afraid of leaving him. I felt trapped with him, like a hostage. There was no way out of the relationship any more. I continued giving him what he wanted, even intimately; because I was afraid he would hurt me. And for two weeks, I was planning the rest of my life with him. I saw him almost every day. He even showed up at my house in the middle of the night; standing outside of my window, continuing to instill the fear that he put on me that I could never leave him.             As the days passed, I thought about what happened constantly, trying to wrap my mind around what had actually happened. Of course, the event pointed to rape. No matter how many different ways I tried to look at it, I knew deep do

            About 5 years ago, I was raped by my ex-boyfriend at the time. For me, this changed my life for the worse, then for the better. I was able to overcome being a victim to abuse, to becoming a survivor. I know that if I share my story of what happened and how I overcame, that I will be able to help a lot of people that have experienced the same terrifying event. This is something that happens far too often, and is not talked about nearly enough. There is no easy way to put this, so I think I will start from the beginning.             I broke up with my boyfriend about a month prior to the event. He tried to control every aspect of my life, to the point that he did not want me going to church so other boys could not talk to me. He did not want me to have any other friends other than him, and he was trying to turn me against my own family by telling me that they were the ones ruining my life, not him. As I finally started to realize how unhealthy this relationship was, I en