#1 - That Time the Guy Who Raped Me Got Engaged & I Lost My Sh*t

I throw my phone across the room and scream at the top of my lungs.

“What’s wrong? What’s wrong?” Evan, my long-term partner, runs into the room out of breath.

I have no words. I curl into a fetal position on the floor, rock back and forth, and try to breathe. I had been sober two weeks and was new to being with my anger. Currently the score was, Anger – 1, Amanda – 0.

I had just been scrolling through my Instagram feed when I saw that my friends from high school were with one of the guys who raped me. They were celebrating his new engagement with a party. Everyone was drinking, dancing, and laughing.

He had three things I didn’t have – an engagement, friends to celebrate with, and the ability to drink booze.

Why was I here on the floor of my parents’ house at age 29, frozen in the past, while he gets to be happy? How is this fair? Where is the justice?

In this moment, all I wanted was a drink. But, for the first time in my life, I knew that wasn’t an option. But, I didn’t know what to do with all this rage. My therapist always told me that anger is a secondary emotion and that it’s often used to cover up a primary emotion, but in this moment the rage was front and center.  

Evan tries to place a hand on me. I hit his hand away.

“Do not touch me.” I bark.

I get up off the floor. I need space. The 5,000 square foot house begins to feel like a tiny closet that keeps getting smaller and smaller. I recognize this feeling. . I’m on the verge of a panic attack. I feel as though I am suffocating. 

“What happened? What do you need?” The more Evan worries, the more suffocated I feel.

I crawl to the front door and go outside. The temperature is below freezing and there’s snow all over the yard. I climb into the snow and stare at the stars praying that I begin to feel my body again. Images flash through my mind. Rage burns my insides like an inferno. I’m surprised the snow doesn’t melt under me.

Evan peaks his head out the window. He’s nervous. I can feel it from here. Will he just leave me alone? I can’t handle his emotions on top of my own right now.

I’m waiting for the tears to come, but I continue to only feel the rage.

Flashes of the past fly through my mind.  These are the images I used to bury with a glass or six of wine. I see myself pinned down, beaten –

Too much. I am feeling too much. I grab snow and begin building mini snow men. I then smash the tiny snow men with my hands. I see the boys who violated me. The ones who beat me into submission. In this tiny snow world, I am the queen and I demolish them. Today, this is the only power I have.

I begin to feel my body and myself again when Evan opens the door. “Amanda, why don’t you come in? It’s too cold to be outside.”

“Jesus Christ.” I mutter. 

I get up. The rage is back. I stomp past him. I begin pacing back and forth. I can’t control the images flying through my head. I debate smashing my head against a wall. I don’t know how to make this stop. My mind jumps between flashbacks, despair, and reminders that I am here as the guy who raped me is happy and getting married.

Evan stares at me with a look of concern mixed with confusion and terror. The old me would have poured a glass of wine and smiled and said “I’m fine!” This new me is unhinged. She can’t even fake a smile. It takes all of me not to scream at him.

As the rage continues to boil over, I remember a set of plates I just bought at Walmart. When I first went sober, I bought a set of dinner plates with the intention of smashing them into a garbage can. I had heard that breaking glass intentionally could be therapeutic. When I heard this I thought it sounded like a fun activity, how naïve I was just two weeks earlier. Completely unaware of the amount of rage I had pent up inside me.

“Leave. Me. Alone.” I seethe at Evan.

I grab the plates and storm down into the basement. The basement is unfinished and feels like the kind of place where a ghost would reside. I feel right at home here. The amount I’m feeling feels too much for the living, it feels like only feelings the dead would understand. Those who are angry that they have died while others still get to live. 

I put in my headphones and blast Linkin Park “in the end” on repeat. I drag a trash can into the center of room and begin smashing the plates as I scream obscenities. As each plate shatters, I feel relief course through my body. Each plate resembles how I feel on the inside – shattered and broken.

As the plates smash and my voice becomes coarse, the tears finally come. I fall to the floor and sob. My therapist was right. The rage was covering up the deepest pain I had ever felt. The heartbreak of innocence lost.