Am I a fraud?

[Grace_Olivia]

I have recently come to the realisation that I am a victim of sexual assault. That being said, I feel like a fraud for saying that as I have probably gotten off relatively unscathed in the grand scheme of things, but I still haven't been able to eat all day.

I've started writing this post a number of times now but can't seem to articulate what I'm thinking correctly. I was in a "sexual agreement" lets just call it with two different guys at two different times, one after the other. I have since come to acknowledge that I was emotionally abused by both men, and sexually coerced by both men as well.

I still can't figure out if what happened to me counts as sexual assault (as we were in a sexual relationship at the time) and am still struggling to come to terms with what that means.

2 out of the 3 people I have asked about this have minimised what happened and told me to move on. I'm just trying to figure out if that is in fact what I should do as I'm overreacting, or if in fact it's as complicated as I feel.

Thanks

Grace

[geoff]

Hello Grace_Olivia, please let me welcome you to the site and it does take courage to post a comment.

I am sorry if you have been abused by these 2 guys that should never happen at any time however there is a difference between 'being in a sexual agreement' to a 'sexual relationship'.

In a sexual relationship if you were abused physically and/or mentally then they may have been asserting power and control over you which may cause many issues, but this still shouldn't happen.

With a sexual agreement could indicate any discussion that you both agree on but even still may mean more than you have decided on.

I'm not sure whether you are thinking about taking legal action or whether you have succumbed to depression, neither of these I hope you're not going through, so maybe can you get back to us.

My best wishes.

Geoff.

[Grace_Olivia]

Hey Geoff,

I am not really sure what to call the relationship/agreement, but as we were friends, we did have a relationship in that regard and I feel that perhaps this was used against me.

I was also in a very dark place at the time of the first guy as my family friend had just died of cancer. This was again to his advantage I believe as he was a very skilled manipulator.

I, again, may be overreacting and just put myself in a bad situation that ended the way it did because of this. I'm just trying to figure out if it was as wrong as it felt.

Again, I'm new to this and I understand that any experience I had is very minimal compared to the grand scheme of things. But I guess that's why I'm here.

Thanks

Grace