The Stigma
Things They'll Hold Against You
Before you start reading this list of reasons why my case was rejected by the DDA, please understand that sexual assault and abuse not your fault. Your sexuality should be celebrated and respected and trauma responses can often seem irrational and counterintuitive. Your experience is valid, no matter what your brain compelled you to do for self preservation.
Although the DDA expressed that he believed my account, he decided that my case was not able to move forward due lack of evidence and behavior on my part that a jury would not likely understand. Due to the ignorance of the general populace about common trauma responses, he felt that he would be unable to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt with my case alone. I do not consider this his, my or anyone's fault.
It simply is, and that is all.
The Perfect Victim Fallacy
The perfect victim doesn't have a relationship with her attacker. She isn't attracted to her attacker and doesn't want sex with them. She is small, weak, bloody and she fought her attacker tooth and nail. She has a rape kit, seeks medical attention and documents all her injuries immediately. Perfect Victim obtains a record of admission from her attacker. She reports to police promptly. She has never encountered police before and does not have any diagnosis. Perfect Victim has no self-doubt about what happened and doesn't make excuses for her attacker.
If you, like myself, are not the perfect victim, it doesn't negate your experience of heinous abuse or your worthiness of justice. Society is not yet fully equipped to understand.
He-Said-She-Said
Who anticipates and records their abuse? Who is able to force an admission of guilt out of a manipulative partner? Probably not many of us, but good on you if you have or can.
My abuser spent our entire pretext call using, "I'm sorry you feel that way," verbiage, thinly veiled blame, performative remorse and flattery. His immediate retaining of an attorney and outright denial to police holds more weight in the eyes of the law than my report and total lack of motive to tell untruths about him years later.
Sexual Needs and Wants
The Cake Analogy:
Let's say you tell a good friend you like cake. They happen to have some cake and want you to try some. You ask for a fork to taste it and your friend agrees to get you a fork. Your excitement turns to dismay when they start force-feeding cake to you with their hands! Oh, you're resisting? It doesn't seem to matter to them! The cake still tastes good to you, but does that justify the action or ignoring your wishes? After all, you said you wanted cake!
Regardless of your disapproval, this becomes a repeating pattern of surprise cake-attacks from your friend.
So now you have two choices:
Leave and risk ending an otherwise good friendship or
accept it and try to preserve your now-strained relationship.
Because you like the flavor of cake and really don't want to lose your friend, you try framing their actions as an overall positive. Maybe this is your friend's way of showing love. You feel embarrassed and invent a narrative that your friend is doing something special for you, and that you're an ungrateful person for feeling uncomfortable.
This is your life now.
After a failed relationship of several years, I was ready for someone who could take care of themselves. Someone assertive that didn't wait for me to initiate more than half of anything, whether it was intimacy or cooking breakfast. I was perfectly open about my sexuality on my dating profile. If a couple bruises, bumps and hickeys happened during sex, I was fine with it - it was all par for the course in sharing a joyful and rambunctious encounter with someone I felt committed to.
This is in no way consent, implied consent or an invitation to use the of force, practicing a kink without discussion or abusive behavior. It also is not an excuse to ignore words and signs of protest and discomfort.
Before this relationship, I never had reason to pay attention to the analogy that the famous Tea Consent video covered, because I simply expected relationships to function with consent and respect by default. However, some people can and will weaponize your sexuality against you.
Lack of Physical Evidence
Because of my sense of denial, I wasn't about to take photos of my bruises or save chat logs after the fact. I felt like documenting these things is what victims did and I wasn't prepared to confront that possibility. It would have been an admission of a dangerous dynamic and I was not ready to face that truth about either of us. My self-blame gave me a comforting sense of control. The fact that I had initially proudly worn bruises I assumed were an accident like signals of affection was the perfect landscape for a snowball effect of abuse on his part and overwhelming confusion on mine.
For the sake shielding my partner and my sanity, I purposefully put off the idea of researching, saving or obtaining any article of physical proof against him. I still felt bonded to him, and the idea of getting him into any sort of trouble and causing him to hate me made me feel utterly sick.
I was certainly not prepared for anyone to hear my standards were so low.
By the time I needed substantial evidence, remaining chat and text logs were sometimes disjointed or even missing altogether.
Refusal to Leave Your Abusive Partner
There is no doubt in my mind now. I loved my rapist. Whether it was a survival technique or not, the cycle of being abused, comforted, nitpicked and then abused again made me focus on the positive. I was desperate to feel loved. He was familiar, so I kept running back. That didn't make me deserving of or responsible for his choices.
After the first incident, I invested a huge amount of my self-worth into his approval of me. If the relationship ended, so did my tiny illusion of control over what was happening. I wasn't sure I had the ability to reinstate boundaries without ruining good feelings between us, so I did all I could within (and without) reason to fix the relationship by giving him support, praise and affection.
If my abuser had not ejected me from his life, I'm not sure if I would have felt able to leave of my own accord. I was so convinced I could make things right.
Delayed Reporting
Physically and romantically, I moved on quickly. However, I spent nearly three busy years self-blaming and struggling with why I couldn't get past my experience. This filled me with extreme guilt and even a sense that I somehow needed to apologize to my abuser for having made his life harder than it had to be, simply by existing in it.
Even after the fact, even during the pretext call while I confronted him with his actions, he was full of praise for me. His accolades filled me with self-doubt. Was he actually a good man at heart? Was he just confused when he did those things to me? What sort of monster was I to report him?
To be blunt, it's not my business point what his problems are. What's done is done and I am wholly responsible for my recovery.
Lying to Friends
I found every reason under the sun to rationalize my rapist's abuse to myself, which included lying to my friends about what was really going on. Telling them the whole truth meant acknowledging that my relationship and partner were not only imperfect, but that they were inappropriate and harmful. The possibility of hearing anything negative about my abusive partner made my friend's compassion and worry seem threatening to me.
While I was with my abuser, and for some time after, I emphasized the good and only told my friends the truth by omission.
Possibly the worst I said against him during the course of the relationship was that he was bratty and noncommittal. I not only shielded him, but I used my friends as a platform to convince my ego that all was well, and if it wasn't, then it was either my fault or I wanted it that way. I really think I convinced myself!
By the end, I had already had to admit that he didn't love me. How could I admit to anyone, including myself, that he was also a criminal? It's humiliating.
Distortion
There's often a temptation for me to look at my experience as very black and white. I want to believe that most of my behavior was right and all my rapist's behavior was wrong.
This is something I hold against myself. I haven't often gotten support for my feelings when I've experienced hard times, so I'll frequently cling to validation when it comes to this particular trauma. I believe he will never tell the truth of his story and perspective, which leaves our account incomplete.
I'm painfully aware that I idealized my rapist and saw a sort of perfection in him during good times that didn't truly exist anywhere except in my imagination. Whether this was brought on by my own issues or because he paid me a sort of attention I had never experienced before, or both combined, I don't know.
I was a very lonely person with unaddressed anxiety, low self esteem and deep-seated human needs. I'll frequently blame myself for others' actions toward me. I have my own issues.
I don't believe I distorted his actions toward me or his intent.
That never kept me from second-guessing myself, with or without him.