Dear Sasha, My boyfriend is 15 and I'm turning 15 in November. He’s my first boyfriend, but he’s had girlfriends before. We had sex for the first time not too long ago, and when he started, it hurt a lot and I told him to stop but he didn’t. I cried but he still didn’t stop. We’ve hung out at school afterwards but he’s been acting like nothing happened, and when I tried to bring it up he said he didn’t want to talk about it. We haven’t hung out just the two of us outside of school since it happened. I still want to be with him, but I feel bad about what happened. I don’t know how to deal with things right now, so do you have any advice for me? M.
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M, never ever feel bad for not wanting to do something that doesn't feel right. Your boyfriend should have stopped the second you told him to. I need you to really know that. He did not have your consent, he did not listen to your words, and he did not respect how you felt. He knows this too and that’s exactly why he’s trying to ignore you and what happened.
I know that’s a hard one to wrap your head around because you like him, he likes you, so why would he ever want to do something to hurt you? But he did, and you really need to question why you’d ever want to invest any more feelings in someone who blatantly disrespects you, your body, and how you feel.
M, listen, the last thing I want to do is to add any more pain or confusion to your situation, but by definition what he did to you was rape. There’s really not even a grey area in any of this. If you said no and he continued to have sex with you, that is rape.
Again, I know it’s hard to admit or even think someone we love could do something awful to us, but this happens all the time. So M, all I’m asking from you right now is to think about that and think about what you’d tell your best friend if this happened to her. Would you tell her he was wrong? Would you tell her to run in the opposite direction? Would you tell her that she deserved better?
My advice, M, is to for you is to step back from this relationship and spend some time apart from him and think about if you really want to be with someone who you can’t trust and who is capable of taking advantage of you. You might also want to consider seeing someone who you can talk to, like a therapist, school counsellor or even close trusted friend. I’m also here for you any time any day, so holler my way if you want to chat about this more. If you’re up to it, click here for a website with information that can help you as well.
Thanks for writing in! xo