I know I don’t post on here very often but this is going to be a rather dark one today folks, this isn’t going to be a happy read but its something I’d like to get off my chest. this is something I want to talk about from my own personal experiences that I feel isn’t talked about enough and today I’m going to tell you my story. if you have triggers regarding sexual abuse, knives or self harm id possibly recommend not reading, the knives and self harm aren’t as massively present in the story but there is still mention of them, so read on if you wish.

It all began last year in an abusive relationship, I wont go into the ins and outs of it all as there would be way too much to go into and a lot of it isn’t related to my story today, just know it wasn’t a good relationship but I believe you should get the basic gist of it from this story. It all took place during a week beginning in August and ending in September. It was hell.

On the Tuesday of that week, I expressed that I was too tired to do anything that night, which I thought was reasonable. Apparently it was not. I was berated, called pointless, useless, worthless, weak and weird, told that no one is ever too tired for sex and so on and so forth, just a lot of shouting and insults aimed at me trying to make me feel bad for not wanting to do anything. I never thought in my life that I would have to argue that I am in fact allowed to say no.

It only got worse from here on out, she grabbed a knife. which is terrifying enough as it is, but this knife wasn’t aimed at me, she was planning on cutting herself. she had a history of mental illness and self harm and oh boy she sure did let me know it. whenever she got really bad on video call shed show herself putting the knife up to her wrist, knowing full well that I cannot handle self harm. She’d find it funny whenever I threw my phone at the sight of it. whenever she got bad she’d also send me a lot of depressing/suicide based nightcore songs and so now my fight or flight response kicks in at the sound of anything nightcore, fun huh? But yes, she had a knife and was standing at the door staring at me, i could tell just from the empty look in her eye what she wanted to do and I don’t know quite how to explain it but having to stare into the empty eyes of someone you once loved, crying and begging them to drop a knife, all while she asks “why are you crying” with words that lacked any expression whatsoever, is… an experience to say the least.

She eventually dropped the knife but the night didn’t exactly get better. She continued to verbally attack me until I had a panic attack. She just left me to it and went to bed, no attempt at comfort. I should have called my parents that night and asked them to pick me up, but it was gone past 2am and I was a good hour or 2 away from home and I didn’t want to bother them, so I stupidly stayed. I stayed until the end of the week. You may wonder why I stayed, and I did too as I stayed up crying every night wanting to go home, but I felt trapped, she had a very strong control over me, and with my crippling fear of upsetting people, it was very easy for her to convince me to stay. This may sound stupid to some of you, but leaving is honestly a lot harder than you’d think, its really not easy.

But, as we all know, the week doesn’t end on a Tuesday, but a Sunday instead, we still had 4 days to go and nothing got better. I didn’t want to be around her, or touch her, or feel her touch me but I had to reluctantly pretend so I didn’t upset her again because we all know what happened last time. I had to do a lot of things that I did not want to that week, i had to force myself and put myself through things I didn’t want to do, I gave consent out of pure fear because I felt like I had no other option, because only I know what would happen if I said no again. I felt so gross and violated, I had to stop myself from crying out of frustration and fear every single time because I did not want any of it, I hated touching her, I hated her touching me, the idea of it still makes my skin crawl.

And on top of that i felt like I had no one else to blame but myself. Because I couldn’t be strong enough to say no. Because I was weak. Until Saturday night. The last night before I left for good.

In some ways the night went better than Tuesday, in others it was worse. I said no that night and things went differently, but not in a good way, sure there was no shouting or insults, instead there was a lot of guilt tripping and pushing. I clearly said that I did not want to do anything and just wanted to sleep, only because I had to get up early, obviously. That was definitely the only reason. The only reason she knew of anyway. She would make comments about how it was our last night together, that we wouldn’t get to see each other for a while, all while she tried to touch me, which i asked her not to. But she kept pushing me, she kept touching me more, and more. Telling me how sad she’d be. How it’s not fair on her. she kept going and going until I broke down and gave in. I still hate myself for it. I still feel weak for it. I still have times where the the idea of anyone at all touching me makes me feel extremely uncomfortable and gross. I was stronger than that. Or so I thought anyway. I’m well aware that none of it is my fault, but those feeling do creep in every so often, but that’s neither here nor there.

I left the next morning, very quickly broke up with her on the train and I was safe, I done with it. well, sort of anyway. i blocked her on everything but she still found new ways to try and contact me and torment me, she continued to try guilt tripping me, telling me she’d kill herself if I left, she refused to accept that I didn’t want anything to do with her anymore. She eventually gave up, but it still took a month, she could not take no for an answer. I still fear, though, that one day she’ll try to contact me again, it really does scare me, but I’ve been free of her for months now so I’m doing good so far.

I’m now going to tell a follow up story, just to help back up my point a little further, this story doesn’t include her but someone else and its nowhere near as bad. At the beginning of January I decided to try make some more friends, because why not, I was feeling a lot better about myself and thought, hey, more friends would be nice, and so I met someone, she was okay at first, we played a lot of Minecraft together etc and became fairly decent friends. I had told her of my experience etc, and she replied with how you’d expect someone to, sympathy, understanding and so on and so forth. Then, at one point the conversation turned a bit frisky, and she made a comment that I did not like in the slightest. it was something along the lines of if I were to ever disappoint her (sexually) she would stop being friend with me. Yeah i got pissed. I asked her why she thought it was at all a good idea to say something like that to me after knowing the sort of things I went through. This time she didn’t reply how you’d expect someone to. Instead of apologising, she told me that she found my new anger sexy. She saw my frustration with her borderline sexually abusive comment and found it sexy. So yeah, we are no longer friends, blocked her very quickly. I’m still proud of myself for sticking up for myself and no just accepting it this time. Sounds dumb, I know, but that pride was important to me.

Now you may be wondering to yourself “where are you going with this Edan?” and I’ll tell you. Society puts a heavy burden and expectation on men to just accept and put up with sexual abuse and objectification and it’s not okay. It isn’t talked about enough. Sure, we hear about people spreading the word that men can in fact be sexually abused too, which is great, men need to be more aware of it, but more importantly there needs to be a larger emphasis on informing men on how to handle sexual abuse. we aren’t told about it like women are, we aren’t taught about noticing and reacting to being sexually abused like women are, a lot of men are sexually abused and will think nothing of it because of how society tells us that it is fine, that this is how we are supposed to be, that we are supposed to like it, that we are weird if we don’t want to have sex, that we are supposed to be strong and just put up with it all. and I’ve had enough of it. I’ll give a first hand example of the sorts of comments we have to deal with if we even try to open up about our experiences, I personally have been told by multiple colleagues at work that “you should have just had sex with her” and “I would have done it” and “do you still have her number” and “oh boo hoo, Edan didn’t want to have sex, poor him” and “you should feel lucky”. Yup I feel so lucky. And if I were to try argue and explain anything about it, i would be met with more comments, and laughter. It’s easier for us to just not say anything and repress our feelings because if we ever try to open up and express ourselves, we’re met with laughter and invalidation. This is why most men don’t speak up about rape or sexual abuse, because they believe no one will listen or understand, because a lot of the time they don’t. We’re expected to put ourselves through it all because we have no other option. we will let ourselves be violated and degraded because we are told that if we don’t, we’re weak.

The expectation to be “strong” and “manly” is too high.

I’m going to leave this on a slightly higher note and say that if you have ever been through anything like this, ever, you are not weak. And anyone that’s been able to speak up and talk about their experiences despite the comments of those around them, you are so strong. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.

So thank you, whoever you may be, for listening to me today and letting me open up about my experiences, and I hope that you never have to experience something similar. Thank you again.