Women Writing

In the tunnel where I was raped, a tunnel that was once an underground entry to an amphitheatre, a place where actors burst forth from underneath the seats of a crowd, a girl had been murdered and dismembered. I was told this story by the police. In comparison, they said, I was lucky.

But at the time, I felt I had more in common with the dead girl than I did with the large, beefy police officers or my stunned freshman-year girlfriends. The dead girl and I had been in the same low place. We had lain among the dead leaves and broken beer bottles.

During the rape my eye caught something among the leaves and glass. A pink hair tie. When I heard about the dead girl, I could imagine her pleading as I had, and wondered when her hair had been pulled loose from her hair tie. If that was something the man who killed her had done or if, to save herself the pain in the moment – thinking, hoping, no doubt, she would have the luxury to reflect on the ramifications of ‘assisting the assailant’ later on – she had, on his urging, undone her hair herself. I will not know this, just as I will never know whether the hair tie was hers or whether it, like the leaves, made its way there naturally. I will always think of her when I think of the pink hair tie. I will think of a girl in the last moments of her life

When people talk about climbing a mountain or riding rough water, they say they become one with it, their bodies so attuned to it that they often, when asked to articulate how they did it, cannot fully explain.

Inside the tunnel, where broken beer bottles, old leaves and other, as yet indiscriminate, things littered the ground, I became one with this man. He held my life in his hand. Those who say they would rather fight to the death than be raped are fools. I would rather be raped a thousand times. You do what you have to.

“Stand up,” he said.

I did.

I was shivering uncontrollably. It was cold out and the cold combined with the fear, with the exhaustion, made me shake from head to toe.

He dumped my purse and bag of books in the corner of the sealed-off tunnel.

“Take off your clothes.”

“I have eight dollars in my back pocket,” I said. “My mother has credit cards. My sister does too.”

"I don’t want your money,” he said, and laughed.

I looked at him. Into his eyes now, as if he was a human being, as if I could speak to him.

“Please don’t rape me,” I said.

“Take off your clothes.”

“I’m a virgin,” I said.

He didn’t believe me. Repeated his command. “Take off your clothes.

My hands were shaking and I couldn’t control them. He pulled me forward by my belt until my body was up against his, which was up against the tunnel’s back wall.

“Kiss me,” he said.

He drew my head forward and our lips met. My lips were pursed tightly together. He tugged harder on my belt, my body pressing up further against his. He grabbed my hair in his fist and balled it up. He drew my head back and looked at me. I began to cry, to plead.

“Please don’t,” I said. “Please.”

“Shut up.”

He kissed me again and this time he inserted his tongue in my mouth. By pleading, I had left myself open to this. Again he pulled my head back roughly. “Kiss back,” he said.

And I did.

When he was satisfied he stopped and tried to work the latch on my belt. It was a belt with a strange buckle and he couldn’t figure it out. To have him let go of me, for him to leave me alone, I said, “Let me, I’ll do it.”

He watched me.

When I was done, he unzipped the jeans I wore.

“Now take off your shirt.”

I had a cardigan sweater on. I took that off. He reached over to help unbutton my shirt. He fumbled.
“I’ll do it,” I said again.

I unbuttoned the oxford-cloth shirt and, like the cardigan, I peeled it back from my body. It was like shedding feathers. Or wings.

“Now the bra.”

I did.

Taken from ‘Lucky’, by Alice Sebold (Picador: 2002)

The Known Rapist

Rape in Marriage/by a Partner

It was only in 1989 that Rape within marriage became a crime. Before that, a woman had no legal protection if she was raped by her husband; no matter how many times this was perpetrated against her.

In that year in Glasgow, the Women’s Support Project and the Evening Times newspaper carried out a survey among their women readers. Over 1,500 women responded to that survey which showed that almost half of women who had been raped, had been raped by their husbands.

Often women find it difficult to name sexual violence they experience at the hands of their husband or partner: it can be hard to believe that this person who should be caring for you could do such a thing. There are many ways this can be perpetrated, which can make women question themselves, and often excuse the abuser...

‘It (rape within marriage) totally contaminates your body … when you’re raped you want to turn yourself inside out and scrub with disinfectant: you feel like an animal. In some ways it’s less of an invasion to be raped by a stranger. Why isn’t it less of an invasion to be raped by someone you’ve previously made love to? This is the person you should trust and is supposed to love you. You don’t forget being raped by a stranger, but you’re not forced to sit across the breakfast table from him.

(Marie Walsh: The Guardian, 1989)

Women Writing

Until recently I was unable to admit to myself that I am a rape survivor. Sure, I hadn’t been dragged off the street into a dark alley. I didn’t have a knife held to my neck. Heck, I didn’t even scream out. I did often cry myself to sleep afterwards though... very, very quietly so as not to disturb my husband’s sleeping.

My marriage twisted my brain a little. My values and my beliefs were shot. I put up with things I never should have, all because the perpetrator was my husband - the man I had promised to love for the rest of my life. The man I loved and who was supposed to love me.

What happened in the bedroom went against “the way it was supposed to be” but I guess I wasn’t able to accept the fact that I was being mistreated and that I didn’t actually have to put up with this. At the time, I didn’t have any control over my life and so I didn’t think I could take control.

I was tied to him - emotionally, financially and legally. I looked to him for my self-worth and when I didn’t find it, I just tried harder and harder, debasing myself and always trying to reach an unreachable goal.
He had power and influence over me and he took full advantage of it. This was never a relationship of love and respect, of independence and growth, of give and take. This was a marriage of power imbalance, of manipulation and degradation.

It was within those terms that I very often laid back and, with my eyes tightly shut against the world and my face held in an expression that I hoped would give away none of my pain or distaste, waited for the grunting and thrusting to be over.

Foreplay consisted of (literally) “Roll over, I wanna plug ya” or similar words, followed by the sex act itself which was to slam his penis into me until he “blew”.

My libido was pretty much non-existent and I frequently suffered from vaginismus (where the muscles of the vagina “close” ‘involuntarily’ so that penetration is almost impossible). Of course, my husband insisted on penetrating me anyhow. I subsequently had gynecological problems that went on for many years, including ‘unexplained’ abdominal pains and frequent bleeding after sex. And for me, the emotional ‘scars’ still remain.

And all this time I believed I was in love. I must have been! This was my husband! He told me that he loved me. So it must be true...

He also took away my money (while spending thousands on himself without my prior knowledge), he tried (fairly successfully) to turn me away from my family and he hated my friends, he abused and belittled everything I did from my cooking and housework (which was part of my “wifely duties”), to my body (which he deemed fat and disgusting).

Rape is about power and it’s about degradation (usually of women). It’s about objectification of people, seeing them as a tool for sexual gratification. Rape is being forced to have sex. It is being forced or coerced into receiving or performing sexual acts against your will.

Sex within a marriage or relationship should be about love and respect and caring. Not to mention wild and crazy positions (if you’re so inclined!) and a lot of fun. If a person is forced into sex against their free will then it is rape, regardless of the fact that it may be their husband who is the perpetrator.

You may believe that he loves you and he may even think he does, but the fact is that forcing someone to have sex is not an act of love.

Women Writing

I was thinking to myself, “Well, Okay.” Not in my wildest dreams would I have thought he was plotting something. Then all of his friends started leaving. I began to think, “Something is wrong, something is going on,” but I’ve been known to overreact to things, so I ignored it.

After his friends left, we’re sitting on the couch and he leans over and he kisses me and I’m thinking, “It’s a date, it’s no big deal.” So then we start kissing a little bit more and I’m thinking, “I’m starting to enjoy this, maybe this isn’t so bad.” Then the phone rang and when he came back I was standing up. He grabbed me from behind and picked me up. He had his hands over my eyes and we were walking through his house. It was really dark and I didn’t know where on earth he was taking me. I had never actually walked through his house.

He laid me down (on a bed) and kissed me … he starts taking off my clothes and I said, “Wait – time out! This is not what I want, you know.” And he said something like this is what I owed him because he made me dinner.

I said, “This is wrong, don’t do this. I didn’t go out with you with this intent.” He said, “What do you call that on the couch?” I said, “I call it a kiss, period.” And he said, “Well, I don’t.”

The two struggled until Eric rolled off her momentarily. Lori jumped up and went into the bathroom. Her plan was to come out in a few minutes and tell him to take her home.

The whole time I’m thinking, “I don’t believe this is happening to me.” I didn’t even have time to walk fully out of the bathroom door when he grabbed me and threw me on the bed and started taking my clothes off. I’m yelling and hitting and pushing on him and he just liked that. He says, “I know you must like this because a lot of women like this kind of thing.” Then he says, “This is the adult world. Maybe you ought to grow up some.”

I finally got to the point where there was nothing I could do.

Then Eric just rolled over and I started to get my clothes together. He said, “Don’t tell me you didn’t like that.” I looked at him and said, “No,” and by this time I’m crying because I don’t know what else to do. I never heard of anyone having that happen to them.

In the car he said, “Can I call you tomorrow? Can I see you next weekend?” I just looked at him and he just looked at me and started laughing.

My mom had gone out and I just laid on my bed with the covers up. Everything I could possibly put on I think I put on that night. – leg warmers, thermal underwear – everything imaginable, in the middle of summer, I put on my body. That night I dreamed it was all happening again. I dreamed I was standing there watching him do it.

For two weeks I couldn’t talk. People would talk to me and I felt nothing. I felt like a zombie. I couldn’t cry, I couldn’t smile, I couldn’t eat. My mom said, “What’s wrong with you? Is something going on?” I said, “Nothing’s wrong.”

I thought it was my fault. What did I do to make him think he could do something like that? Was I wrong in kissing him? Was I wrong to go out with him, to go over to his house?

After two weeks, she told her mother what happened and they talked about what to do. Lori decided not to report it to the police for fear Eric would blame her. Eric continued to frequent the restaurant where she worked. Several weeks after their date, he cornered her in a hallway near the kitchen.
He touched me and I said, “Get your hands off me.” At first, he thought it was funny. He said, “What’s wrong?” then he started pulling me, trying to hug me. I pushed him and said, “Leave me alone,” and I was starting to get a little loud. As I was walking away he said, “Oh, I guess you didn’t get enough.”
I walked into the kitchen and I picked up this tray full of food. I don’t know how it happened. I just dropped the whole tray and it went everywhere. My friend, another waitress, went to the manager and said, “She’s not going to be much good to you tonight,” so they sent me home.

Taken from ‘I Never Called it Rape’, Robin Warshaw: Harper 1994