Lost

I never understood why losing my virginity felt like such a traumatic experience until while looking at the definition of rape online one day, years later, I saw the term sexual coercion mentioned beside it, which I learned was within the realm of rape and I was so glad I had finally found my answer. I also felt that this was a term that is not discussed enough and I was sure that it happened to many others but they would just blame themselves instead of realizing that this is a form of abuse. When I would speak of my first time I would always make it into a joke because in the past, the way I used to get through emotional struggles was by masking trauma with humor. I would tell new college friends how I lost my virginity on a school desk as a funny fact about myself without including any other details other than that, but I didn't realize I was just in denial. I think about everything differently now but I can remember all my emotions that day very clearly and I remember the way I used to think so this is how it went: The day I lost my virginity we were in a classroom in his college, sitting on the desks, having a conversation and this was some of the dialog, he told me how he was so horny and I replied that he knew I wanted to save myself for marriage, he said if you can't do this we could just stay friends, and I told him, I didn't want to be just friends because I loved him. He replies, if you don't have sex with me there are other girls that would be willing to do this and we would just stay strictly platonic. I repeated how that would hurt me because I loved him, I brought up other things like, I don't want to do this and get pregnant, he said it's fine I've done this many times I can pull out in time but I just kept saying how there's a chance it could still happen, he continued to try and convince me that it wouldn't, that he had so much control of it, so many different situations or issues I had about this were brought up and he would have an explanation for all of it. Meanwhile, I was just getting more and more anxious and emotional. This back and forth went on for a long time, he already gave me the ultimatum, it would either happen now, even though I wasn't ready or it would never happen, it was my dad's birthday I said, I needed to get home. My thoughts were racing, I felt guilty, I didn't even want to do this, but I loved him. How else was he going to stay with me? What if he stayed and only viewed me as a friend? I felt the pressure, he tried to convince me to do this for what felt like forever, the whole conversation I believe actually went on for about three hours I said no repeatedly during this time until I finally gave in to what he wanted because I loved him more than I loved myself and didn't want to lose him. I bent over on the school desk, it was quick, he pulled out because it had been a while for him so he said he was going to finish fast, don't remember if we talked right after it happened, all I remember is the feeling of shame that washed over me, of what my family would think of me, I was afraid to disappoint my parents when there were already teen mothers in my family. I felt like I let myself down, I wanted to be different. I wanted to save myself for marriage and now I can't do that. After that, we went our separate ways and I met up with my best friend, who was doing homework while waiting for me downstairs, she noticed I looked sad and my eyes were watery and I didn't even want to tell her what happened, and I remained silent for most of the bus ride home so that it was easier to suppress my tears. When I got home I cried for a while and eventually he called and he said "I don't know what happened to me today I didn't have as much control as I normally do but you shouldn't have been wearing that low cut shirt, it's like you were asking for it" (What I now see as Rape culture/victim blaming) "I wanted to know if you regret what happened?" While in my mind I knew I wasn't happy about what happened, I also felt relieved to think that now he wouldn't leave me. So I said it was okay that it happened because I loved him and I convinced myself that I can't regret it if I lost my virginity to someone I loved. I told him it was fine and we did end up having sex again eventually but the way things started, how I lost my virginity, that first time, that was not normal and for a long time I thought it was normal and because the whole time I loved him and we continued to have sex many times after that, (although it was during times that I didn't even realize I was being emotionally abused) in my mind there was no way that first time was abuse because the physical abuse hadn't started until a later point in time but I was wrong, when you want sex it doesn't feel shameful, it doesn't feel pressured, it doesn't hurt, your muscles don't contract like that, your muscles would relax, your body doesn't say no, I'm sure that losing my virginity hurt me not only because it was my first time but because my mind said No, I didn't listen to my body or mind, I only listened to my heart and it would break if he was with someone else so it needed to be me. It was on a day years later that I googled what rape was, I had seen how the media typically portrayed it as this violent act that occurred outside usually between complete strangers but what I only slightly heard about was that it could happen to anyone, in any relationship, we normally think of it as strangers but boyfriends, friends, and husbands can rape. What was also classified under a form of rape was sexual coercion and this was something I had barely ever heard about and that was when I understood why that first time had felt so wrong and why I was in denial. I never thought what happened could be considered abuse because that day I eventually said yes, but I only accepted what happened when I read the dictionary definition under the rape category and I remembered what happened. It was not normal. He told me it was my fault. He told me it happened because my clothes. He pressured me into it. That first time I was sexually coerced and I finally accepted it. I finally realized why I would tell new friends my losing virginity tale as a funny story because the way I get through traumatic events was with humor and so how else would I be able to cope? 

Love Yourself first.
If it doesn't feel right to you,
you are always allowed to say
No.