I spent a lot of my younger years eluding my every conflict, internal or otherwise, to the “daddy issues”, which I had so kindly, and so loosely, been diagnosed with in my earlier years of life. It was easier for friends, family, countless therapists, and even myself at some points, to blame something I had no control over for the things I couldn’t explain. It felt like everyone wanted to talk about my abandonment, as if that was all my mind and heart consisted of.

As the years went by, most of the problems I created were a result of my own rebellious tendencies. For once, I wanted my demons to be something that I could control, not just what everyone else chose to interpret them as. I didn’t want to give my childhood, or lack thereof, any credit for the person I was becoming, good or bad. I wanted people to see me for who I was, not what I was trying so hard not to be.

I didn’t want to be another girl whose entire existence was ruled by the fault of someone she was supposed to be able to trust. This is the exact reason why I never told anyone I was raped.

It was the summer before my senior year, and I knew it was only a matter of time before I was expected to have my entire life planned out before me. I was born victim to a natural inclination for rebellion. I wanted to try things, to experience life for better or for worse, and if someone tried to stop me? Even better. For some reason, the imminency of the future, constantly weighing down on my shoulders, was only a catalyst for the trouble I planned to cause.

My friends would tell me to slow down, that I wasn’t being myself, that maybe there was something I wasn’t dealing with. I was offended that they thought my wild nature was a cover for something much deeper, until I realized how right they were in the hardest way possible.

I went out every possible night, usually searching for parties or whatever event sounded like my mom would hate the most. (Seventeen was a spiteful, spiteful year—sorry, mom). I surrounded myself with people I didn’t know in places I had never been before. Alcohol sometimes clouded my brain, complicating the situation even more at times. I never liked the stinging taste of alcohol or the way it robbed me of any control I had. It stripped me of my inhibitions, and at the time, I thought that was just the thing I needed.

I met a lot of boys in those days, but there was one in particular who had the strangest kind of charm. I had seen him before, and I knew it wouldn’t be the last time. I wondered if he was enjoying himself, or trying to escape something the way I was. Eventually, I couldn’t help myself. We talked for hours about simple nothings, until he handed me my sixth drink. I started to have a hard time saying things, and the conversation began to falter. I was embarrassed, and not usually a big drinker, so it all happened faster than I was able to stop it. He started to laugh, as if he had watched many girls like myself make a smooth but rapid decline into borderline unconsciousness. I started to wonder why he found my absent state of mind so amusing, but it almost felt like he liked it, and that was good enough for me.

Sometimes, it’s easy to mistake the way people feel about your vulnerability for liking you, for caring about you, for being the type of person to never want to hurt you. I “fell asleep” thinking that everything was fine, that I had a great conversation with a great boy, until I woke up to a sharp thrashing pain in my abdomen. I opened my eyes slowly and then all at once. I made eye contact with him just long enough to watch him walk away. I put on my clothes as I hurried to follow him. I wanted to chase him. I wanted to scream. I wanted to ask him why he couldn’t even stay to give me an explanation. I wanted to call the police, to tell my best friend. But I didn’t. I walked to my friend's house down the street, told her that I drank too much and was exhausted, and she drove me home. I laid in my bedroom and stared at the ceiling for what felt like hours before the word “rape” finally echoed in my mind.

I was disgusted. I hated that word, and I never wanted to hear anyone say it to me. Ever. At the time, there was only one way that I knew how to make that happen. I got undressed, I got in the shower, and I washed away the second skin that made me feel so dirty. I let the water run down my spine as I promised myself I would never have to look my mother in the eye and tell her what had happened to me. That I would never have another therapist elude my problems to some trauma that I would never be able to make go away.

I felt ashamed, like I was the only person responsible for what had just happened to me. I had the same feeling in the pit of my stomach after you know you’ve done something really wrong. I felt guilty. I felt like I wanted to step outside of my body and never have to wear that skin again. I was convinced that in one way or another this was my fault.

Time passed and my shame turned into anger. It was anger that I put on other people. That I let build up inside of myself until I found someone who I felt was deserving of all my fury. I felt myself changing. I wasn’t the free spirit that I had always been proud of being. I was being victimized by my anger, my pain, and my shame. Throughout the following months, my biggest fear was becoming a statistic. A victim. I woke up one day and realized that I was the one making myself a victim more than anyone else. I had been trying so hard not to be a result of what had happened to me, that I inevitably became one. I couldn’t pretend that what happened to me never actually happened, and I hope that other women like myself won’t either.

I will never be able to get justice for what was done to me, because I tried so hard to pretend it wasn’t real. I will never be able to take back the year I spent dealing with it on my own. The way my silence impacted my relationship with my family, my friends, and myself. I will never be able to go back to that day and deal with it the way my stronger self would now.

I will never let the permanence of the past and what happened to me keep me from reminding other people to never feel ashamed for being raped. To not prioritize “being a victim” over getting the help you need.

So here is what I say to anyone forced to understand:

You can’t punish yourself for the things that happen to you. You have to accept them. You have to promise to be fearless in the face of your problems, for yourself, and for the people that care about you. You deserve to be the person you were before you were raped, and you deserve the potential to become a better person because of it. Vow to tell your story, to never be ashamed of it, and to always be willing to understand when someone else has a story much like yours.

I'm in college now, and I'm doing far better than anyone in my life expected, including myself. I'm establishing healthy relationships, learning to love unconditionally, to use my own experiences to support the people around me, and to find peace with my past. I hope that my story will encourage fellow survivors, not victims, to do the same.