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My 17th Birthday: My seventeenth birthday arrived and I was so excited, even though I was tired all the time and still constantly sick. I was excited because my old girlfriend, "T" was showing interest in hanging out with me again. She'd even arranged for us to double date! A real date! I sure hoped he was cute and I hoped he was sweet too. I met "T" at her house and the boys came over. Well, "T's" date was really good looking, but his friend looked, well, he looked a lot younger than I'd expected and he was chubby and shorter than me, still he seemed nice and I was looking forward to going out to the movies. Perhaps this boy would turn out to be a real gem after all, after I got to know him more! Besides, just because I looked haggard and ancient and he looked so young, that didn't mean I was chronologically older than him and he really acted like he wanted to go out with me! Then the bombshell struck. "T" and her date whispering in a corner while my date and I made small talk. Then "T" wanted to talk to me away from my date. "T's" boyfriend and "T" were grinning playfully at each other, up to something? I didn't understand. Together they told me that "T's" date's friend wanted to go out with a girl to lose his virginity. I hadn't even kissed a boy yet, I'd been fighting ALONE and without anyone's help to survive whatever was wrong with me for what felt like forever. I hadn't made it this far to sleep with a boy just because he wanted to lose his virginity. Besides, I didn't believe in sex before marriage! I was hurt and angry and I said, "No way! Not with me." I ended up leaving after telling "T's" date that he'd have to find another girl for his friend if that's what they wanted. About a week later, "T's" date called me. He and "T" weren't seeing each other anymore. They broke up that other night and he was really sorry about what happened. "T" had misled him and he'd thought I was more like "T" because I was "T's" girlfriend. But he could tell that I wasn't that kind of girl and he was really sorry. He wanted to make it up to me, take me out to a small party, just some friends, no drugs, no expectations. I verified with "T" that they were broken up, she wasn't interested in him anymore, he was boring to her. She said he was a nice guy though and that I really should accept the invitation. So I went out with him once. He took me to the party and I met his friends. Everyone had drinks, but there were no drugs that I could see. One of this guy's male friends brought me a drink and I sipped it through the evening hours. I was being careful because I knew that I was sick and that I couldn't handle drinking like other people. After awhile I started to feel really sick and exhausted. I didn't know if it was just my condition, because a lot of times that's what happened to me normally, or if I'd stayed up too late with my condition being what it was. My date and everyone else were suddenly out of the room. Everyone that is except for the guy that brought me the drink. Initially I wasn't aware that this other guy was even in the room with me. I was completely disoriented and I laid down curled up on my side to rest for a minute. The next thing I knew this guy, the one who had brought the drink, was forcing me down and over onto my back. Then he was brutally raping me. While he was raping me I felt and heard my muscles tearing and I hated him. I hated him and I struggled and I bit him as hard as I could. But my jaw was always so swollen and weak that I wasn't able to hurt him. He didn't even seem to notice that I was biting his shoulder. Then suddenly I thought, I can't hate him. Hate is a sin and God is already punishing me for some sin I must have committed long ago. I couldn't remember a sin so bad that I had to be sick like I was, but there must have been something. I thought, if I hate this man who is raping me, will God make me twice as sick? So I tried to get away from him, while he kept raping me as cruelly as he could and I kept trying not to hate him because I didn't want God to punish me more. I didn't want to get sicker and I didn't want to lose more. I didn't want more deeper wrinkles and dried skin and swollen joints and crippled ankles and over-exhaustion that never let up and everything else. I had come to the tentative conclusion that my sickness was a punishment from God awhile back because why else wouldn't anyone find out what was really wrong and help me? Why did everyone just want to hurt me more? When the rape was over, I discovered that everyone had left the apartment -- my date was gone, I didn't have any way to get home. I couldn't call my parents, what would they say? I was a whore now. I didn't chose it but I was nothing but a dirty whore now, worthless. No one decent would ever want me after this. I was tainted and it was irreversible. The 23-year old monster who had just raped me drove me home and I threw up all over his car. I couldn't stop vomiting and I didn't care. I hated him. God might punish me more, make me sicker, but I didn't care anymore. I hated him and if I hadn't been so sick and so weak I would have tried to kill him that night while he drove me home. If I hadn't been so sick then maybe whatever he put in that drink wouldn't have affected me that much. If I hadn't been that sick then maybe I could have fought him off. I remembered how strong I used to be, the way I used to run track, the way I used to be able to lift heavy things up like it was nothing. I used to be a strong girl. Not anymore, now I was helpless. If I hadn�t been so sick he would have noticed when I bit him. If I hadn't been so sick I couldn't been more alert. I was raped in part because of how sick I was, but this form of rape is becoming more common every year -- the kind of rape where the perpetrator slips something into a girls drink. These kinds of rapists are the biggest sickest cowards of them all. This monster was never jailed for raping me because I washed away all the evidence after I got home. I didn't know how a victim was supposed to not bath or change her clothes and go right into the emergency room. Going to the ER is a lot like being raped again�. Then several months later, when my older sister came to visit she couldn't wait to rip into me about how the rape was my fault because I was so stupid to go to a party at an apartment and then to accept a drink too. She said I deserved what happened to me, I was the most stupid rape victim ever. Family support is always a wonderful thing. My health continued on the decline. I kept wavering about whether or not my illness was really a punishment from God. Before I got sick I wasn't that religious, but afterwards I leaned in that direction for a long time. |
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