Ask Lemmy

Age 5 or 6 via the teenage boy next door who came over to my house with his little brother to play. Later at 16 via my sisters secret 30-something year old boyfriend. Then again at 19 by another 30-something man when I was sleeping in my bed in my own home while my roommates partied. My ex would always withhold affection, pout, and be downright mean if I declined sex. Suffice to say I haven’t had a good relationship with it, in general. And I’m not sure it’s worth the trouble at this point.

They say that if a young child displays sexually promiscuous behaviour, that's a warning sign that they've been raped. I know I was abused as a very young child, but I can't remember it and I don't know exactly what happened. But I can remember performing sexually promiscuous behaviour in the following years. So... Maybe?

I was 10 and I was tricked into giving and receiving a handjob from the person. They were 11, and framed it as something fun to do that parents didn't want us to do, and with extra strict parents that was more than plausible for me. I'm not sure how much I blame them, they were 11. Clearly a 3rd party I never met got to them first and that was "shared" with me.

Pretty sure this messed up my view on sex as I was developing. But then again I gained access to an early and unmoderated Internet around when I hit puberty ( I watched a lot of porn as I developed) so who knows.

Yeah. I'm a guy, I was maybe 15 at the time. I was at the library, and met my buddy's girlfriend there randomly.

I learned after the fact that she was sleeping around with a bunch of guys to prove some kind of a point, I don't know what exactly. She was kind of generally awful.

But yeah, we spoke briefly in the library and then I took off home. She followed me home. I didn't know this until she knocked on my door and let herself inside, and from there I was just so off-balance by the entire thing that I just went along with it. She pinned me on the couch and started kissing on me and things went from there. I put up some kind of token resistance, I think, but I barely knew what was going on, I had never had any kind of sex before, I had barely had a girlfriend before, I was in completely foreign territory and just let myself get led by the nose into something I didn't want to do.

It caused a big, massive fight between me, her, and the buddy in question (who I was actually really close with and I got really messed up by this whole interaction) but it eventually ended up the best way it could have, where we both cut all contact with her and basically never saw her again.

But to this day I still have consent issues, especially I find it hard to initiate sex even with someone who I absolutely know is into it and wants it. I just can't. A recent ex and I eventually broke up because I would never initiate so, we just never did it. Just the possibility of putting someone in that kind of situation just puts me completely off the mood, if I'm not the one being advanced upon, it just doesn't happen.

Raped as a kid by a family member (a woman),
Raped as a teen by a predator "boyfriend" who was well into his 30s,
Raped by my gynaecologist during an IUD insertion appointement, SAed by my boss's best friend during a work party.

I'm tired, boss.

The other aspect of not discussing it is even if it’s acceptable some people get hurt about it. Even though you know you can you don’t, because it’s upsetting.

I have been assaulted. In the early years I wanted to talk about it, some people would but I felt like a weirdo discussing it, like I could handle it more than them. And then when you are calm and cool when discussing it there’s those who accuse you of being too cold about it. The people around me who love me can’t handle it, then it stopped being discussed it and it becomes a sad dirty little secret.

I have not. That said, several of my friends have told me their stories, both recent and from years ago and I'm pretty pissed that so many garbage human beings are walking among us and hurting our friends, especially woman.

There was one guy, who hurt multiple of my friends and operates more on the coercive side (still assault). I was asked to ban him from some community events I was running because there had been a recent public incident of concerning behavior. After investigating, I did ban him and eventually made it a perma-ban after having around a dozen women, many who didn't know each other, reach out to me to let me know they had uncomfortable or worse experiences with him. Some sounded clearly like pressure/coercion for sex, some just remembered being creeped out or setting a boundary only to have him cross it. A lot of the other guys got mad at me for banning him. They said I didn't have enough evidence or that I wasn't being fair. I had heard more than enough, but I couldn't share all of it because some of the women didn't want to be on-the-record because of domestic violence concerns or because the harassment that they experienced had happened in the past and they were worried speaking up might fan the flames. Some people said it was actually entirely the woman's fault but they were speculating from the outside in. They didn't have any of the information I had, they just fell for a charismatic smile from a friendly guy with a lot of hobbies. The guy himself also gave me a lot of grief and tried to undermine me and my standing in the community for daring to rain on his SA parade. A few years later he caught some CP charges and other nasty shit. Up until that point, I only knew of victims of his that were adults. I'm guessing the only reason he didn't get tried on statutory rape was he plead to the other charges and the most recent victim didn't want to face him in court so the prosecutor took his plea. I hope everyone who was upset at me for banning him sees his mugshot on the registry and learns that just because we can't imprison someone without a conviction, doesn't mean we have to invite them to our parties. Scumbags walk among us each and every day.

There are many people here who I say this to.

Im sorry that happened. You didn’t deserve to be treated like that. It was not your fault. It was not your fault. You do what you need to heal your heart. There are many feelings that arrive over the years but be easy on yourself.

I have been coerced before, by my ex wife.

Long story made short, if she wanted sex and I didn't, and I said no, it would always pan out the same way. We'd start at "Did I do something wrong?" And end up at "everyone hates me and I should just go ahead and kill myself." So I stopped saying no even if I didn't want to, because honestly it was faster to just give her what she wanted.

As a man, it feels so minor compared to what everyone else will associate with sexual abuse, but my therapist tells me abuse is abuse and that nobody would question it if the genders were reversed.

It's had effects even 5 years after we've separated, but I'm getting better. Learning to take up space again.

As a teen by a couple young women and a young guy, as a young adult by multiple women in bars for the SA part. Coerced was ever to common in earlier relationships. Seemed common that I would get guilt tripped and told things like why don't you find me attractive and on and on continuously making full on situations where basically if I didn't just do it my life was going to be miserable around them and not around them since the invention of the cell phone. Eventually I got out of those relationships and think I kind of became not asexual because I am still sexually attracted to things, but have found I almost prefer a relationship with no sex because I have never found myself in a healthy relationship with a partner who could talk openly about sex that wasn't a casual relationship.

I've had my full dick and balls groped by an older (like 50's) lady at one of my jobs (I was maybe 20-21). Brought it up to management and was told "What!? No way! She's just a sweet old lady, she would never do anything like that!"

Meanwhile she not only grabbed my whole ass genitalia, she whispered "I'd love to see all this up close" while doing so.

No one ever believed me and it happened multiple times hence why I no longer work there..

I'm a woman.

I was SA-ed when I was 7. A teacher saved me, it would have been more than SA if he hadn't. My mother said "I know, don't mention it again" when I told her.

I've been coerced into sex by both my (ex) husband and boyfriends multiple times because I thought women had a duty to say yes when they wanted sex. I was forced to have anal sex without lube a bunch of times.

I never want to have sex with a guy again.

Yes, was SA's by a priest when I was a kid (mid 1970s), along with a lot of other people over a 30-40 year span. In the late 1980s, there was a joint lawsuit against him, with about 130 cases, many willing to testify. But he was a "pillar of the community," and had stronger support (and lawyers) on his side. It went back and forth for a few years, then he died of a heart attack. The case kind of died with him, except his widow went after some of us with ruthless cruelty and legal harassment.

Yes and every woman I know personally has either been raped or sexually assaulted. My own mother and sisters included. I have a sneaking suspicion that my dad has his own story, but I don't know the details.

My ex-husband was propositioned by his step-father when he turned 18 years old.

My best friend was routinely raped by her husband until she could finally leave him.

My own stories are varied and have happened sporadically through my life.

When I was around 20(M) my older boss regularly tried it on with me. She always tried to lean into me with her large chest. Then one day she basically exposed herself to me.

Another coworker said she did this with him too. Eventually we both explained this to upper management and she was gone within the week.

I always felt bad because Iin this case it was addressed quickly. Yet I know if my female co workes were in a similar situation.... Well, I hear enough to believe that the story would be different. For the worse.

Yeah. One time by a stranger that lured me to their car with baseball cards and candy. Legit, no joke. There is a reason those PSAs exist. Another time by a neighbor. And the last time was by my friend's grandmother. All of this happened before I was 10, I didn't tell anyone until much later in life.

Yes, I have. The others in my party who saw it happen just laughed about it.

I have known enough women to know its pretty prevalent for them. I don't think that means the intention for it to happen to men is less as much as its a bit trickier to do so happens less. It gets a bit wierd though because its kinda hard to have consensual sex without a certain amount of going for it and stopping if you meet resistance. Heck. Like it or not even resistance has wierd societal things. I can say I dated a girl who when w made out told me I was going to far so I stopped going that far until she communicated she was ready. She dumped me for a guy that im sure was not as conscientious in that way as I. I also knew one that talked about this great guy that she wished things had gone better. I asked about the physical relation and she said it never went anywhere because he did not push for it. I asked if she had with other guys who did push who she did not like as much and she said yes. Sex is complicated.

Yeah, as a child and as an adult. As a child by the ones that should have protected me and as an adult man by drunk women who mimic the behavior they experience.

Fuck in sad world. I have a good therapist and hardship built me so i got shit tons of empathy and a thick skin to deal with everything thrown at me.

Yes, sexually assaulted by an older man in my teens.

Yes, and it went beyond that. I have accepted that I’ll probably never be able to have a normal sex life.

Once in my favorite bar a long long time ago a very large guy I knew from an atheist group heard me saying I was bi and I guess mistakenly thought I was into him, he got really drunk and groped my inner thigh like right next to my crotch and put his face like 1 inch away from mine. I was frozen in place in shock and confusion.

Dude wanted an otter and thought I was down... He got shoo'd away by bar staff. I felt weirdly guilty.

Then at work an old lady with dementia kept sexually harassing me. Grabbed me multiple times tightly. Then once literally walked up to me and said "I would like to have sex with you" just full stop. I hid in my office a lot if I saw her absently wandering around the center.

Yes, many years ago an ex girlfriend and I were breaking up and she spent about an hour trying to convince me to have sex one last time. I eventually caved because then I thought, oh well you don't know when sex is coming next.

About half way through while I was on top I stopped, got up, cleaned myself off, walked out and never saw her again. That's gotta be the ultimate rejection for her.

Was molested once by a woman to whom I agreed to give a ride. She was probably just homeless and looking for somewhere to sleep.