What followed were the longest three weeks of my life.
Prior to this happening, I had started to write John a letter everyday that he was at basic, and following the incident I was unsure if he would ever want to talk to me again or if he would forgive me and we could move on with our relationship. I’m not sure what came over me, but I decided to keep writing him, everyday, until I got a letter or call saying to stop contacting him. A little stalker-like, maybe, but I was 18 and knew this guy could be my everything and wanted to know that I had done everything in my power to save the relationship.
Over the next few weeks we did exchange letters where John did forgive me. Once he was able to get his phone for a few minutes we discussed it as best we could and decided to try and move forward with our relationship. I won’t lie and say that it was easy and we went back to be a perfect, great relationship. I knew I had broken his trust and truly the worst part was the rumors that were going on about that night, simply because I truly had NO idea what had happened.
I felt so overwhelmed and violated that other people may know more about the night than I did. After that evening I stopped going out, not at John’s request, but I was so scared that I would lose John if I went out and something happened again.
It was a weird feeling that I didn’t trust myself.
It wasn’t that I didn’t have control of myself, but it was just odd feeling. I had gone out so many times with friends and was fine and have never had a blackout or any rough moment when I was drinking, and the first time was my worst nightmare. After the incident, I went out maybe once or twice again in college, and I maybe told the incident to one or two of my friends so I lost a lot of friends. A lot of friends didn’t want a friend that only felt comfortable drinking in the confines of her room with a small group of close friends only.
I learned a lot about myself and how I move through life after this incident. I learned a lot about my relationship with John and the trust that he had for me. We got through the incident together. We burned the letter that I had first sent him about the incident and it was the first time I felt that I could breathe. It is now over six years since the incident and we are celebrating our one-year anniversary of marriage and discussing having a child. To this day I wonder what happened and question myself and my actions. I still reduce the time I go out to drink unless I am with people I know I can trust. John has the utmost respect and trust in me and our relationship following everything that happened.
If you’ve faced something similar in your life, just know you are not alone. And there is a light at the end of the tunnel. Take just one step toward healing and find your people to open up to.
*names changed for privacy
