She chose him over me.

The girl I asked to be my matron of honor in my wedding next year, chose to befriend the guy who raped me at the cost of our friendship.

Things have been so rough lately.

I needed closure in this area and now I've received it.

A girl who I was friends with for five years turned out not to be a friend at all.

After being drugged and raped my world has turned upside down, the rape has affected every aspect of my life.

I'm on medicine (for major depression and trauma), have gained a lot of weight, missed out on my graduation, can't sleep, have fear of being around too many people and thereforeeee have anxiety attacks, I'm not as trustful of others, I constantly feel the need to protect myself, I have nightmares, and can't function as the normal human being I once was. I lost the sincerity in my smile, I'm often sad and lacking in peace, and my memory has been affected in many ways.

And if you ever need your friends, it's in a time like this.

And it hurts, it hurts when one of the people you feel you can depend on chooses to invalidate you by siding with your rapist.

It's far from fair, but it's life, and now it's my life.

From talking to people on this website and others who know me or don't really know me.....I realized a couple of weeks ago, that this girl was not my friend.

And I want to thank you for your insight, support, and advice, because it truly prepared me for today.

She kept calling me, and I would avoid her calls. What do you say to someone who has betrayed you?

I didn't know where to begin.

When I needed her, when I needed to discuss the

nature of our friendship, she wasn't there.

And I waited, I waited.

I asked her to Please call me.

I waited all day by my phone.

She didn't call me for days.....

I had to move on. I couldn't stay stuck in that frame of mind.

I knew she wasn't going to call.

I knew in my heart, from the moment I told her that her friend raped me....I knew she didn't believe me.

And as I detailed in my post (about the night I was raped), she wasn't a friend to me then and she isn't a friend to me now.

Some people have told me they believe she was a co-conspirator...and I'm no longer doubtful of that.

She left me a message today saying that we hadn't talked in a long time and that she missed me.

I returned her call and asked if she was still friends with the rapist.

She told me yes, and that they were "cool" and still talk.

I asked her if she believed I was raped. She was quiet for a little while and said, "yes", but that she believes him also.

How can you believe that I was raped, when you believe him saying that I wanted sex?

How can you believe me, and a lying rapist at the same time????

The answer is.....you can't.

I told her that my world has changed, and the I don't know how we can be friends when she is friends with a guy who raped me.

I told her that I won't feel comfortable talking to her.

She said that she was sorry I felt that way and wished me well in life.

It's sad to say, but it's during times like this that you learn who you're true friends are.

I'm glad that I received confirmation today, it means I can begin to gain closure, for the friend that I never really had.

Has anyone else gone through similar situations?

Advice of any kind is greatly appreciated.

~Grace

You are getting help aren't you?

Are you getting married next year Grace?

I didn't realize you were with someone now! How does he feel about all this, has he been supportive of you?

Are you ready to get married with the rape haunting you this much still?

About this friend, if she chooses to side with him, there isn't much you can do about that. We cannot make choices for other people, but we can only watch out for ourselves, and clearly you are better off without her in your life if she believes him over you.

Hi Grace,

I remember she introduced you to that guy and am glad you resolved and let her go.

Note that people which are less strong than you may attach to their abusers. Seems she could be dependent of him - a victim too.

She admitted that she believed you were raped. If she is a co-conspirator, she likely is a victim too. The police may get the story out of her.

Have you made any progress going after that guy?

Do you have any legal advisor?

Why she called you now? She wanted out? Or she is checking on you for that guy? You could report the phone call with her to the police.

How is your counseling and support.

Be strong.

We always will be here for you!

Hey everyone, thanks for your support.

I am still seeking counseling.

I am getting married next year and my fiance is supportive.

I'm glad I've been able to resolve things with that girl as well.

I don't know...many times before now I've gotten the feeling that she is checking up on me, for him.

It has seemed as if she was digging for information.

When I told her that I was raped, she asked me if I would prosecute him.

She became so insensitive after I told her I had been raped.

She would call to "check up on me", but she was never sincere.

I felt as if she was calling to keep tabs on me, determine whether I was going to take action.

It's so hard to describe right now, and it's so hurtful.

I am having such a hard time.

I'm glad that I've ended my friendship with her, but I'm still so hurt.

I've known her for 4 years, I thought she was a good friend.

After telling her, I felt bad too. It hurts that she doesn't believe me.

I'm honest, and she should know that, my other friends do.

It's so hard to get to the point where you can admit to yourself you were raped, it's soooo hard to face. It's ugly and unpleasant, and also a really damaging act.

Then it's like, after a lot of work and pain, and tears, you are finally able to tell someone.

And I can't get past it.

I know it's not my fault that I was drugged and raped, and betrayed by a close friend.....but I still feel guilty, I feel guilty because I should have immediately known these people were bad. I should have known. How could I have not known? I should have picked up on something. I should have known they were this way.

Anyways, I won't have to talk to her again. But there is a strong possibility that I will see her again.

I have to have meeting with one of my teachers, and that teacher is her advisor, so she's often in the office.

I just want to thank you guys for your support.

I really need it right now.

Things have gotten pretty rough.

After I complete school this fall, I'm pretty sure we're going to take legal action (my parents and I, they know about everything now).

How am I going to face that? How will I deal with it?

What if it goes to court?

How am I going to get on a stand and say what happened to me?

I'll be so terrified.

My brain is so screwed up because of the trauma of the rape. What will I do.

I can remember the parts that I remember. That's fine.

My therapist say that I'm gradually regaining more of my memory.

What about the part that I don't remember. My therapist says I may never fully regain all of my memory back.

The rapist will lie of course....but why does that idea hurt my feelings.

It's horrible that he would rape me and lie.

I know he will, but it isn't right.

I'm afraid I'll be raped up there again on the stand. I'll have to relive everything that I remember.

I'm sure that his lawyer will probably yell at me, and call me a liar, and say that I'm a horrible person.

What will I do??? What if I have a break down?

I am sooo afraid of that possibility.

It's so hard for me to function now, what will happen to me if I have to go to court.

Right now, I'm a wreck. I can't even hold a regular job.

My mind is a mess and I get panic attacks sometimes.

What will I do?

I don't want to be raped again.

I don't want the whole world knowing that I've been raped.

I'm already on anti-depressants and sleep medicine.

What's going to happen to me if I lose all of the progress I've made?

I am getting married, ya know. I'm trying to improve myself.

I don't want a trial to rip me apart, and ruin my life. I don't want the rape to continue to ruin my life.

I've got to protect myself. I've got to stay safe. I don't want to become crazy or so depressed that I end my life.

I don't want that, I don't.

But sometimes just thinking about everything bring me so much agony.

I feel pain, extreme pain and it won't go away. Nothing makes it go away.

I can't take that kind of life. I can't live that kind of life.

I don't know how, it's too overwhelming, and I can't bare it.

I don't know what to do.

What will I do?

If she chose your rapist over you thens he's definitely not a friend. By the way have you yet reported him?? You need to if you haven't.

Hi Grace,

Good you write again.

I am happy your fiance supports you and that you get married as planned. Calling it off would add insult to your injury.

As your therapist says, most of your memories will gradually return. What you do not remember you can not tell.

I know you fear your day in court. I say your day because justice will be done for you. Good lawyers are excellent at taking whitnesses apart. Laywers can ask tough questions in the interest of justice. Lawyers can not make the truth go away.

Important on that day will be that your story is consistent and that you do not change it. Important is that you are confident.

It would be good you can find more victims too.

I and all here are saddened by your pain and that we can't make it go away.

Your life will get better, you have a bright future ahead of you together with your future husband and your own kids.

Be strong.

Hi Grace,

Here is some background info for you. It is not nice to read, but I feel it will help you in resolving that it was not your fault.

CHARACTERISTICS OF A RAPIST

Rapists who assault women lead double lives. On the outside they may appear no different from other men. They are members of every race, religion, profession, and socioeconomic group; they are of varying ages and are often members of churches. Many of them impress others as dedicated family men who are good providers.

They are not insane nor are they "sowing some wild oats." They are men who have serious psychological or personality disorders, which they discharge trough sexual violence. The consequences of this behavior (what may happen to him or to others) has no meaning to the rapist at the time of the assault. thereforeeee, he is not deterred by such logical considerations as punishment, disgrace to his family, injury to his victim, etc.

Rape is always an aggressive and/or violent act. In every act of rape, aggression is involved, but it is clear that the sexual acts are the means of expressing the aggressive needs and feelings that operate in the offender. Either anger or power is the dominant component so that rape, rather than being primarily an expression of sexual desire, is in fact the use of sexuality to express his issues of power and anger. Basically, it involves sexual behavior in the primary service of non-sexual needs.

ANGER RAPE

In some cases of sexual assault it is very apparent that sexuality becomes a means of expressing and discharging feelings of pent-up anger and rage. This type of offender attacks his victims and the assault is characterized by physical brutality. More actual force is used in the commission of the offense than would be necessary if the intent were simply to overpower the victim. He may use a blitz style of attack, a violent surprise offensive in which the victim is caught completely off guard. Or he may use a confidence-style approach to gain access to the victim and then launch a sudden, overpowering attack. In the former situation, the offender approaches the victim directly by hitting her. In the latter situation, victims often relate that at first the assailant seemed pleasant enough, but at some point he changed; suddenly and without warning he became mean and angry.

The rape experience for this type of offender is one of conscious anger and rage, and he expresses his fury both physically and verbally. His aim is to hurt and debase his victim, and he expresses his contempt for her through abusive and profane language. If his primary motive is one of anger, and if he is not sexually motivated, why doesn't this offender confine his assault to a battering of the victim? Why does he also rape her? The answer seems to be that such a man considers rape the ultimate offense he can commit against another person. Sex becomes his weapon, and rape constitutes the ultimate expression of his anger. The survivor is faceless to the anger rapist. His victim is an object for his rage.

POWER RAPE

In a power rape, power appears to be the dominant factor motivating the offender. In these assaults, it is not the offender's desire to harm his victim but to possess her sexually. Sexuality becomes a means of compensating for underlying feelings of inadequacy and serves to express issues of mastery, strength, control, authority, identity, and capability. His goal is sexual conquest, and he uses only the amount of force necessary to accomplish this objective. His aim is to capture and control his victim.

Physical aggression can be used to overpower and subdue the victim; however the intent of the offender usually is to achieve sexual intercourse with his victim as evidence of conquest. To accomplish this, he resorts to whatever force he finds necessary to overcome his victim's resistance and to render her helpless.

Such offenders entertain obsessional thoughts and masturbatory fantasies about sexual conquest and rape. In reality, the offender tends to find little sexual satisfaction in the rape. The assault is disappointing, for it never lives up to his fantasy. Whatever he may tell himself to explain the situation, at some level of experience he senses that he has not found what he is looking for in the offense. Something he cannot clearly identify or define is missing or lacking. He does not fell reassured by either his own performance or his victim's response to the assault, and, thereforeeee, he must go out an find another victim, this time, "the Right one." His offenses become repetitive and compulsive, and he may commit a whole series of rapes over a relatively short period of time.

The offenses themselves are either premeditated (the offender goes out in search of a victim with the clear intent of sexual assault) or opportunistic. The choice of a victim is predominantly determined by availability, accessibility, and vulnerability.

The sexual assaults most frequently coexist with consenting sexual relations in the life of the offender.

Frequently, the power rapist denies that the sexual encounter was forcible. He needs to believe the victim wanted and enjoyed it. Following the assault, he may insist on buying the victim a drink or dinner and express a wish to see her again. In some cases, this may be understood as a gesture of friendliness and "no hard feelings," or a way of discrediting any subsequent report of rape by her. But in other cases it reflects his fantasy expectations that sexual conquest has created a desire for him on the part of the victim.

SADISTIC RAPE

In a third pattern of rape, both sexuality and aggression become fused into a single psychological experience known as sadism. There is a sexual transformation of anger and power so that aggression itself becomes eroticized. This offender finds the intentional maltreatment of his victim intensely gratifying and takes pleasure in her torment, anguish, distress, helplessness, and suffering.

OVERVIEW

In one study examining the incidence of these three primary patterns of rape, it was found that power rapes constitute the most prominent pattern. More than half (55%) of the cases in this particular study were power rapes. Approximately 40% were anger rapes and about 5% were sadistic rapes. However, since the study examined primarily convicted offenders, this may be an inflated estimate in regard to the anger rapist and an underestimate in regard to the power rapist.

Sexuality is NOT the primary motive underlying rape. It is, however the means through which conflicts surrounding issues of anger and power become discharged.

Excerpts from: Men Who Rape: The Psychology of the Offender. A. Nicholas Groth. Plenum press, New York. 1981.

From: link removed

Grace, please keep talking to us. We always will be here for you.

How are you doing? I hope all is well with you.

Thank you so much for the information on rape.

I believe my rape is most closely related to the "Power rape".

It makes me feel bad, ya know. That he would do that to someone and then not even be satisfied.

I knew he would do it again, but I thought he would do it because it was so easy and he felt he had accomplished something.

Again, thank you for the information. I believe it will help me heal.

Understanding has been lacking for me, at least that's how I feel.

I've struggled to understand why someone would want to do that to another person.

Who could be so cruel.

The information helps me to understand a little bit better and that's very helpful.

Thanks a bunch

~Grace

Hi Grace,

I am fine, thank you. I am also happy you are posting again and that you read that material.

I hoped it will help you heal.

I was not sure if I should post it, as I was afraid that it would hurt you. But I decided in favour of the benefits.

And I am very glad it helped you heal.

Thank you for giving me good news!

I want to help you get over your depression.

My simple explanation for depression is: Depression is a mental pain caused by an imbalance between expectations and ability. To make the pain go away, one must improve ones ability or reduce ones expectations.

Some time, when you feel ready, I would like you to post about your depression, be as specific as you can. I want you to think about above explanation and write down and post your feelings about:

a) Before the rape your expectations and your ability.

b) Now your expectations and your ability.

You will see what changed. Then we talk about how to balance these feelings. I hope it will help you.

Please post again soon.