My first memory in life is being molested at age 5. It wasn’t the last. At age six I started having nightmares every single night of a monster coming to get me. These nightmares escalated and have been consistent throughout my entire life. At age 16, I was raped. For the longest time I couldn’t even call it that. I blamed myself. I tried to push him off me, I said no. I went through high school pretending it didn’t happen. But it happened again, age 20, age 21, age 22. I’m 24 years old now, and am haunted every single night with remembering. Thank you for sharing my story because I am still too afraid to speak up.

I think I was 5 when it started. I don’t remember the exact time but I was in primary school. It was my uncle. He used to touch me and get me to touch him. I didn’t think there was anything wrong with it, so I did what he asked me to do. Over the years he forced me to perform oral sex on him and it led to rape. From around the age of 5 - 18 he repeatedly beat, mentally abused and raped me. He told me I was his property and that if I ever wanted anything, I have to go to him. I kept it a secret because I was so scared of him. The exact year, month, time etc is hard because everything is so scrambled in my mind but my body remembers the encounters, almost as if my senses had memorised every single rape. I spoke out at the beginning of this year. My parents supported me but I lost the rest of my family. I’m 19. I thought it would get better but it hasn’t yet, I’m still hoping that it will.

When I was 16, I was sexually assaulted. My friend and I went to a older man's apartment to drink alcohol. Being 16 years old, we thought it would be a fun time and nothing would happen. We drank enough that my friend passed out on the couch. I remember sitting on that same couch seeing this man start putting his hand down her pants. She was 15 years old. I decided to say something to get him to stop. He stopped, but came after me. He told me I had to pay my dues. He grabbed the back of my head and forced me down so that my mouth went over his penis. He forced me to give him head over and over again. I remember silver shorts and throwing up on him. I remember feeling like I was done only to find that he simply cleaned himself off and made me continue. It was endless. During this time, my other friend could not find us. She ended up calling 911. My parents showed up and took me home. It could have been so much worse had she not called for help in locating us.

I am now 32 years old. It was been 16 years since this has happened. Tonight, my father was upset with me over something stupid and decided to use my past against me. He wanted to use my story and embarrass me. I am not embarrassed. I am proud. I am the survivor of a sexual assault. It has made me who I am today and it is part of my story. That is just it. It is MY STORY. Not his. I am not embarrassed that I was sexually assaulted. I am not embarrassed to tell the whole world what happened to me. The man that did this should be embarrassed. My father should be embarrassed. But me, no embarrassment to be had.

At the age of 13, I have started lessons with this math teacher one of my friend's mom suggested to my mom. Every Saturday starting from 9 a.m. we will begin our lessons. From explaining the topic to me understanding everything was just fine. However, it started to get weird. He would touch me. He would caress my arms, my legs. He would make these circular motions with his thumb while he teaches me the lesson. He would compliment how I dress and anytime I have my hair down. It's like he was always checking me out like he wanted more. I knew things got really bad after the neck incident since he massaged it for me I have never felt so afraid in my life i just wanted to run out of his house but i sat there motionless. I couldn't do anything. I'm 15 now and i still think about it, it affected me in way in which anyone comes up to me but touching my back or my arm all i think about is him.

I'm not the only one who is affected. He does it to my friends also. All of them told their parents but why can't I? I mean I told my friends but they seem to not care and the worst part is I still go by his lessons. At the age of 15 I never really thought this would happen to me. I thought my life would be normal by just graduating school and going to college in majoring in some subject but I guess i can't have that life.

 I was 16 years old, and fresh out of a relationship with someone who was my first everything. I was in no way ready to do anything with anyone. I started talking to this guy who told me he had the same intentions. He just got out of a relationship too and wasn't ready for anything either. One day, during the summer, he asked me to pick him up after practice and he gave me a random address. I drove 20 minutes away to him, picked him up, and he started giving me directions to somewhere I didn't know where we were going. We ended up in a Catholic School parking lot. Remind you this is the middle of the summer, no one to be found around us. I parked the car under the assumption we were going to listen to music and talk. Instead he lures me into the backseat. He told me he had a cramp in his leg and needed room. Not even a minute into us being back there we start kissing. I was uncomfortable but not enough to stop, it was okay. A minute later he forcefully pins me to my backseat and proceeds to touch me. I say no over and over. I wasn't ready. He doesn't listen and holds me down harder. He undresses me and forces himself inside of me, still pinning me down. I scream no, no, no, over and over again. He's bigger than me, stronger than me, I couldn't do anything about it. He raped me. Time froze. I froze. I couldn't move I couldn't scream anymore. He kept going and when he was done after what felt like an eternity, there was blood everywhere. I was still frozen, I couldn't even cry or talk nothing would come out. He saw the blood and immediately asked for me to bring him home. Nothing was said on the ride back. I should have just left him there but I was scared for me life. I dropped him off and immediately called my best friend. Now I was crying. I couldn't even put together words as to what just happened to me. She didn't believe me and is one of the reasons why I blamed myself for the longest time. I know I screamed the word no a million times, I know I didn't consent, and I know I didn't want it. But something inside me after that conversation with her just said it was my fault. To this day I still have flashbacks. My sexual assault has made it so hard to love and trust a new lover. It's gotten better, but this will always be a part of me. A year after being raped, I finally spoke out. After a year of blaming myself, I finally told someone. I'm not afraid anymore and I'm starting to overcome it. After reading dozens of stories from other survivors, realizing I'm not alone, I figured it was my turn to speak out.