I’ve been broken up with my ex boyfriend for about a month, so I’ve been reflecting on our relationship a lot and I notice how a lot of the sex we had made me uncomfortable. During the relationship I feel as if I was in a daze and never actually recognized it as rape and I’m not even sure if it is. A lot of times he would say things like I owed him sex because he had done something for me, but all of the things he did to me he did willingly and he would always want something in return even if I didn’t want to and often would try guilting me into it.
Anyways, there’s this one time that’s really sticking with me. I had consented to have sex and during sex I asked for him to stop and he kept going. I repeated this several times and expressed my discomfort. He finally stopped when I was crying for him to get off of me and complained about not finishing. I’m just not sure if this is rape or not because he did eventually stop and I had already given him consent previously. He apologized later and said that “men have a hard time stopping after they’ve already started” and i dont know i just really need someone to tell me I’m not crazy for thinking this is rape.
— Survivor, age 18
Dear survivor,
Only you can decide if what happened was rape, but I can tell you that by definition rape begins as soon as a person withdraws their consent and the other person continues. Consent is an active thing and it can change from one second to the next. You are not crazy. It is your experience and you get to define it in the way that is best for you. In solidarity, Alissa