I was browsing Reddit and saw an AskReddit post that was "what part of sex do you dislike?", I was curious so I clicked on it and the top comment was "mismatched libidos". I kinda chuckled to myself because that was a major problem in some past relationships so I started typing a response, and as I was typing I had this horrible realization that my ex raped me.

My response was about 2 exes, one was explicitly abusive and he attempted to rape me in my sleep but idk why he just kinda gave up and stopped before he was able to penetrate me and rolled over. I've actually processed the trauma from that event and I'm over it now.

The one that surprised me was realizing the second ex actually did just rape me in my sleep, like kinda often. He had an insanely high sex drive and would masturbate all the time. He'd make me feel bad for not wanting to have sex as often as he did, and he'd cry and ask if I didn't think he was attractive anymore. It made me feel awful. He pretty much told me that if I wasn't available to him whenever he wanted I didn't really love him, and I was holding sex as a cudgel over him.

I.... I honestly don't have words. I'm kind of in shock now realizing what that all meant. I can't remember if I ever explicitly gave him consent to do sex stuff while I was asleep, but I think I kind of agreed to it to keep the peace? I would regularly wake up to him feeling me up and playing with me, I woke up multiple times to him already inside me. I always felt so disgusted and used after those events, but somehow it never registered as rape.

I guess I'm just in shock. I feel stupid only having realized this years later. I'm in such a great relationship now that I can't really fathom how I put up with that for years. Also I'm not sure how it just hit me that was rape. I had previously given my husband consent to initiate sex while I was asleep because ngl I thought it'd be kind of fun (I was only thinking of the trauma from ex 1, I didn't realize I had trauma from ex 2 at the time) but the one time he tried I woke up and absolutely froze in terror. He stopped, we talked about it the next day and I revoked consent for that kind of play. He felt terrible for scaring me no matter how much I assured him that I didn't know it would trigger a reaction like that.

I think I'm just really lost as to how to process this right now. I'm not sure if I'm looking for sympathy or support or just someone to hear me. I have a therapist appointment on Tuesday, and my therapist knows about my unfortunate history with rape so we'll definitely be talking about this. I think I just want a sympathetic ear in the meantime.