I flagged every one of this waste of skin’s comments.

My own mother has not trusted a soul other than close family since she was 4. At 4 she was raped by a relative. Her mother, my grandmother, believed her instantly and reported it then moved across the country because the rest of the family came to despise them and called my mom a liar. When she was 7, she was walking…

I was raped so many times by my soon to be ex husband. The idea of someone touching me makes me sick still. I hope that goes away eventually.

The absolute hardest thing for me was not being believed; that damaged my trust far more than the actual rape ever could.

Last night my clothes dryer was making sounds that sounded like footsteps outside my door. I nearly called the police before I realised what it was, and I didn’t sleep at all. That is just one of the hundreds of ways my life is affected.

I believe you, and hope you are doing well and have all the delicious scones etc. The trolls can go to hell.

Not only does it create trust issues, but intimacy issues as well. I went from being fairly promiscuous to having very little sex drive for the past few years, both as a result of my abuse. Mentally I want to be intimate with my husband, but physically I do not. It sucks. And my abuse wasn’t violent and did not…

For me its been a weird process. I think that I trust people (for example, I’m pretty open and don’t seem to be scared by say, a man walking down the street or a guy hitting on me in a bar). But then something completely random and small will happen that will completely set me off. i.e.: a friend of mine recently…

The people who hurt me were people I loved and trusted. It happened multiple times. It sickens me. I still don’t trust men. If anyone has a kind of therapy they would recommend, I would like to know. Thanks in advance.

I’m a guy, and it took me years to have confidence in myself again. Trusting others has always been easy for me. I’ve always felt people have an amazing potential for good, but rape ripped out any sense of that in me. I thought I was diseased, so if someone was manipulating me, then I deserved it. I was a husk. It…

Years of therapy and a conglomerate of people who are there to hold you when .....you just dont want to exist anymore.

It’s hard, and I struggled with debilitation depression and self loathing for years. I finally saw a therapist who does EMDR (eye movement desentisization and reprocessing). This therapy is specifically for people with PTSD. I did it for about a year total. It was life changing. I don't struggle with the crippling…

That would make a powerful headline of the article.

As a rape survivor, here is my two cents. I’ve heard that the aftermath of rape has three stages. First, there is the acute stage - the hours and days following the assault. For me this was crying, puking, and being high out of my mind. Next is the chronic stage, which can be months or years. This is where you…

I don’t think I lost my trust in other people after I was raped. I think I just proved to myself something I had always believed. That anyone anywhere could rape me. I just go around hoping it doesn’t happen again. I also go around hoping that I don’t get hit by a car or face any life threatening situations. Life just…

For me (not raped by Cosby, of course, but twice but others plus other stuff), I’ve always sort of tried to pretend I was like anyone else and therefore could trust like anyone else does. In reality, I don’t trust anyone (not sure what it would even look like to trust people), have anxiety issues, depression issues…

It’s hard. I never told anyone. (I blamed myself, I was young, didn’t think I’d be believed) It was a long time ago now (I’m a few weeks shy of 30) I didn’t date for a long time, when I finally did, I couldn’t tell him. I knew he’d judge me. We eventually had a crappy break up. Then I didn’t date for a long time…

I choose to believe in the good of people. I’ve dated since, and those men I loved held me when I was having my nightmare flashbacks. I’m slow to trust, but those I allow into my confidence have done me well. I’ll will admit, the number of people who know about what happened to me can be counted on one hand, and I…

Have you ever lost someone close and very dear to you? Parent, grandparent etc (are the common examples), or perhaps a pet that you loved very much.
Or alternatively have you ever loved someone or been in love with someone and rejected, or perhaps broken up in a particularly harsh way?

I’m one of the ‘just because I’ve been hurt doesn’t mean this new person will hurt me too’ kind of people. Unfortunately I think that gives me blinders to some red flag kind of stuff because I have been hurt (badly) again and in hindsight I can see where there were warning signs (again). But I don’t feel that things…