Coming Out as a Rape Survivor

When you're a therapist

An interesting outcrop of being a survivor and being a therapist: you feel like you have to keep it a secret – from everyone. Even people who have master’s degrees and PhD’s in psychology. It’s like you’re not allowed to share, like it’s a dirty little secret.

It’s strange to work in a field among people who help other people with their traumas, and not feel allowed to share my own.

Such has been my experience for the past almost five years.

Part of my discomfort is due to the experience I had in the immediate aftermath when I did share with colleagues and friends. I was in the acute stress phase¹ and even though I counted among them a psychologist, retired social worker and fellow classmate counselor, I realized even they couldn’t support me adequately. Yes, they had the appropriate initial reaction - “I’m sorry that happened to you” - but when it came to actual social support, checking in, messages were few and far between. Admittedly, I was so distraught during that time, I couldn’t reciprocate and be a friend to them since I was so deep in survival mode. And my expectations were perhaps too high - mostly because my pain was too high.

“In the immediate aftermath, when it came to social support, checking in, messages were few and far between.”

Friends, even therapist friends, have their limits. And I learned there are some paths we walk alone. Some relationships can survive the rockiness of the time while others cannot. These are some of the unspoken losses, the loss of friendships in the wake of trauma and needing support that others cannot or will not provide, even when they are mental health professionals themselves. It is perhaps not common knowledge although it is common to lose friends, even longtime friends, after trying to survive a profound trauma that jeopardizes the loss of self.

So there were real risks, risks in undertaking the challenge I took recently.

Invitation

Opportunity: My proposal accepted

Topic: Beyond Evidence-based: How Lived Experience Impacts Clinical Insight

In November, I attended a conference for counselors and I was one of the speakers. My plan was to share about my experience of rape and healing in the aftermath, with colleagues.

I was terrified.

The first day of the conference was good in many ways. I met a lot of people and learned from other presenters. But the overriding message is, was, and continues to be from other professionals: we have to help our clients regulate their nervous system, get back to doing hobbies, and help them find social support networks. All sounds good.

Except…

When you are a survivor of rape, sexual assault, or intimate partner violence, you are often in a double bind. You are supposed to find social support, but people can find it hard to be around you because society continues to blame its victims. It’s baked into the fabric of our culture.

“Survivors of rape and sexual assault and intimate partner violence are in a double bind: we’re told to get social support but that can be hard to find due to the heavily stigmatized nature of relational trauma.”

The double bind survivors live in can often be a blind spot for clinicians trying to help. So as a therapist who writes about surviving rape, I did the next right thing for me:

I spoke about it.

Onstage

For nine minutes, I told my story of being a survivor of rape. To my colleagues. To 700 conference attendees.

The best way I can describe it was as a “coming out.”

I describe it that way because up until I spoke at the conference, I was like everyone else at the conference - a fellow clinical counselor, but with a bit of cache since I was listed as a speaker. But once I spoke, I blurred the lines of counselor and client. I was now different. I could feel it.

Counselors can be an interesting breed. Many have a lot of compassion. But there can also be a split of experience. As in “I help people” and “clients have their issues but it doesn’t touch me” - it’s “over there.”

But I blurred the line. Suddenly I was no longer a colleague, a speaker, someone who was a peer. Now I was someone who had been harmed. And not in a normal socially acceptable way. I wasn’t in a robbery or plane crash. No. I was harmed in the (arguably) worst way a woman can be and a way that is hard for people to understand. I was showing up to talk about rape, relationships and PTSD and the lived experience of it. Instead of research and bar charts and logical conclusions (although I did present my own model of PTSD).

I was asking people to access their hearts.

It was thrilling and terrifying all at once as I walked up the steps to the podium to get the handheld mic. I spoke. I sometimes let the mic drop below level and would have to bring it back up to my mouth to make sure people could hear. I am not experienced in using a mic. But something about holding it in my hand was empowering, even if I was a bit clumsy.

I spoke. I saw the people at all the tables looking back up at me. I heard their silence when I posed the terrible question: What do you think when you hear the words “rape victim”? I heard their relieved laughter when I told them I wouldn’t put them on the spot because we were all smart enough to know we’re not supposed to have negative views of victims.

But my unspoken message was that these views are there - even in that room.

Then I listed common rape myths: what was she wearing, was she drinking, did she not see the signs and the best one when talking to a group of therapists: that wouldn’t happen to me, I’m too smart for that.

I went right for the internalized assumptions and beliefs. I made them question their biases.

Then I shared some of my story.

Because it did happen to me.

Even though I am smart and never thought it would.

After

Some attendees approached me afterwards – some told me I was courageous, others thanked me, still others told me that from what I shared they’d be approaching clients who have experienced sexual violence in a new way. Hearing how my sharing affected people in their work with clients made it all worthwhile. The shakes, the fear, the sleeplessness, all that I struggled with leading up to that moment in time.

And some people, people I’d made a connection with the day before, sat through lectures with, or even had a preexisting professional relationship with, ignored me. They walked right by me when they saw me, as if we’d never even met.

It is the reality of being a survivor. Some are inspired by the sharing of truth and some leave - even if they themselves should know better.

As hurtful as that could have been had I remained focused on it, something else happened, something that reminded me of why I chose to speak up in the first place.

Connection

Still recovering from my whirlwind nine minutes, I was approached by someone soon after who shared their own rape story. I listened with empathy. With understanding. With a sense of sister solidarity.

It was a connection that reminded me of the power of speaking, of refusing to live in silence, even if it’s uncomfortable.

Our words can help heal.

Walking the line of counselor and survivor is not an easy one. I refuse to feel that silence is my only option in the world. I refuse to be gagged and bound. It’s bad enough when during the moment of the traumatic event we lose the ability to speak in our body/mind’s quest for survival.

But now, I have choice. I am not continuing this harm against myself.

Was it a risk?

Probably.

But I went into this speaking opportunity with the words of Brené Brown ringing in my ear, What is worth doing, even if I fail?²

“What is worth doing, even if you fail?”

Speaking the truth of my rape to colleagues at an event designed to make counselors learn and grow in their skill and expertise was an opportunity to challenge myself as well as attendees. I was aware going in that I might ruffle some feathers, challenge preconceived notions about rape, those myths that abound in a culture that still blames its victims. I knew there was risk. I knew I would encounter some resistance. Still, I chose to be a part of that education, even if it was hard to do. And likely hard for many to hear.

Was it worth it?

Absolutely.

I have learned as I move forward, there is no failure.

There is only doing what’s worth doing.

1. Acute stress disorder phase. In the DSM-5, this is the immediate time (30 days) after a traumatic event: “The essential feature of acute stress disorder is the development of characteristic symptoms lasting from 3 days to 1 month following exposure to one or more traumatic events.” (page 281)

2. From Brene Brown’s book Daring Greatly: How the Courage to Be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead.