The horrific Highschool Incident

I went to a very small private high school. I have no idea if I was the cool girl, dork, or what category you would put me in during that time. All I know is that highschool was awful. I had all of these intense emotions and had no idea what to do with them! During the summer of my junior year and senior year, I was date raped by someone I considered a friend. Matter of fact, this guy was best friends with my first boyfriend. He was a popular Senior boy who all of the ladies liked. I blamed myself for this incident for about an entire decade. Maybe I wasn’t loud enough when I said NO! It all happened so fast and it’s like I couldn’t handle what was happening to me so I kind of just “checked out”. I don’t remember a lot of detials but I do remember saying NO and I do remember knowing that what was happening was wrong. That night, I told my girlfriends what had happened. They kept asking me what was wrong because I was silent and I had torn clothing, and grass in my hair. They immediately told an adult and I was on my way to the ER. I was so humiliated!! I just wanted to go home and I was afraid to tell my family but I know I had to tell them. I just wanted to go home. They wanted to preform a rape kit on me but I was already so violated that I wanted nothing to do with this. My whole family ended up showing at the ER. They were furious and really wanted me to press charges. I refused to do this because my biggest concern was people finding out at school. I didn’t want a big fuss….I didn’t want to make a big deal…I just wanted it to go away. I wanted to go away. Well, people surely found out at school. People didn’t believe me and told me I was making it up for attention. I felt that the whole school was against me, even some of my good friends. My boyfriend blamed me and called me a slut. Every day was the worst day of my life to go to school and see my rapist, who used to be my friend. I lost a lot of friends. Every day was the worst day of my life. One night, all of the senior guys (including my ex boyfriend and my rapist) came to my house and vandalized the house. Things got out of control and people were just downright mean. I became depressed…very depressed. I went to counselors, doctors, and experimented with alcohol and some drugs. I seriously just wanted to disappear from the earth. There were my friends from that horrific night that I’m still friends with to this day. I think they were the only reason why I didn’t kill myself along with my family. What got me through to survival?? COLLEGE!! I met new friends and started to study psychology to help me make sense of myself and help others going through the same thing. Now I know why I went through all of that crap…to help others and to develop a tough skin in order to help those in pain. My mother always said to me “you know that one day, people will know the truth of what happened to you and they will feel remorse. I cannot tell you how many times someone from high school has seen me out to this day and apologized for not believing me and ridiculing me. They felt guilty about it for years. They then told me the reasons for siding with my rapist….only because he was popular and to go along with the crowd. To this day, I don’t know what has become of my rapist. I just pray that he hasn’t hurt anyone else and that he got help for himself. I regret not taking the rape kit and pressing charges but I have learned to let go and help people deal with similar regrets. THANK GOD I did not kill myself because I would have never experienced the BEAUTY that awaited me past high school. For students, hang on through highschool….it gets WAAAAAYYYY better. Turn your tragedies into something beautiful. Your pain is only truly temporary. People will know the truth one day and people only are mean because they have their own insecurities.