I raped 2 people and regret it more than anything

Hello. This may be an odd story, but I hope you bear with me.

I've had a problem with lying for awhile now, namely in a way to get attention or affection from others. Whenever I was at risk of being pushed out of a friend group or wanted to get closer to another group, this was my method. This usually consisted of me lying about my sexuality and later on my gender.

Twice in high school I lied about being bisexual. One was for the purpose of getting my other two friends who had started dating one another to pay attention to me. Nothing really happened, though and thats the end of that story. The second time I lied about it was to a group of gay people who seemed really friendly and I wanted to befriend. This lead to me dating one of the members, a trans man who I tried to support, but in retrospect was not very good with. I cared for them, but was ultimately attracted to them because I saw them as a woman. Luckily this relationship didn't really go anywhere, and we unceremoniously broke up a few weeks later.

In college, I found myself in a similar scenario. I was on the periphery of my friend group and feared being forgotten. I started to lie about questioning my gender and being nonbinary. This worked a bit. At the time I was seeing this girl, kinda sorta. We would mess around together sometimes, but she would make comments about men that made me feel bad. In an effort to make her like me more, and to feel less bad as a man, I started acting more feminine and wearing dresses. I had also told her I was aromantic, since we were initially just friends while she had a boyfriend and the boyfriend was wary of me. I was not being honest with who I was and was lying for the purpose of getting close to her. Definitionally this is rape. Eventually she told me she wanted to stop having sex or messing around and I said okay. A few weeks later I told her to let me know if she ever decided she wanted to have sex again. I had forgotten that earlier she had told me that she used sex in a self destructive way, and that I was essentially offering a recovering smoker a cigarette
We didn't talk after that, and I felt horrible.

I had moved into a new place and had cut ties with my old friend group over the above events. I eventually started pretending to be trans again for the purposes of fitting in in my new environment and making friends. It worked. I feel that my mind here was somewhat delusional. I would take random bits of info and such from reddit in order to justify my actions. I desperately wanted to be trans, since I found that so much better than being myself, as well as enjoying the community being trans gave me and a sense of feeling special. I knew I wasn't trans, but I really wanted to be. I went on hormones and lived the next 9 or so months like that, just hanging out and living a lie.

Then I decided to start dating. This was my big mistake. Only one of my dates went anywhere and it was with the person who would become my partner. I replicated many of the same mistakes from my relationship with the trans man from earlier, while they are nonbinary, they were afab and I saw them and was attracted to them as such. I rationalized this by saying I knew they were nonbinary and I respected that, but truthfully I was attracted to them because I saw them as a woman. I was very scared about sex, I did not want to recreate the mistakes I had made the first time, and let them decide if we would have sex or not. Eventually we did. Later on they'd ask my sexuality and I told them bi since I didn't want them to think I saw them as a woman. Definitionally this is rape.

A few months into the relationship I confessed that I was a cishet man and surprisingly they were okay with that. They did not feel malice in my intentions and we stayed together for another year and a half. We broke up recently and thinking back to the early days of the relationship, I did rape them. Not in the way people usually think of rape, but all the same. We still chat from time to time and I've considered coming clean with how I feel, since it may offer some peace, but I don't know if that wouldn't just hurt them more.

I've talked to my parents and my therapist and neither of them believes this to be rape, which I'd frustrating since I know that it is. I'm unsure of how to move forward. I'm strongly considering castration and moving to Florida to live in Miracle Village. Thank you for reading my story. Any throughts, even those just telling me to kill myself are appreciated.

Hello, and welcome.

someguy11235 wrote:Any throughts, even those just telling me to kill myself are appreciated.

Not if they don't want to get on the fast track to the business end of my banhammer... so I think we can set aside demands for your untimely demise.

Well yours is a very interesting story. Since you've mentioned a therapist, may I ask if they have laid any kind of diagnosis on you? It might be enlightening...

I won't use kid gloves here. You know you done wrong, pretending to be things you weren't. But again, depending on what your therapist thinks, there might be reasons for it. Not that it's an excuse, just an explanation (and something to overcome). Certainly there seems to be something serious going on- either that or some real dedication, going on hormones for a time.

I'm not a therapist, I'm just a moderator. I'm afraid I'm liable to disappoint you by agreeing with your therapist and parents. Were you deceiving? Looks like it. Not exactly a shining moment or two, no. Rape? that's sort of pushing it. At what point does deceitfulness become 'rape'? A lot of men have lied their asses off to get laid over the history of the human race. I think whatever negative comments can be applied to deceptions, 'rape is a bit strong. I'm not willing to agree with you on that, and think Miracle Village is a bit overkill.

I think the best way to atone- since you're wearing the hair shirt, here- is to work with that therapist to become a person who doesn't feel they have to make up stuff in order to fit in with others, or have a partner. Simply beating yourself up isn't the thing to do.

someguy11235 wrote:I was not being honest with who I was and was lying for the purpose of getting close to her. Definitionally this is rape.

Nope. Not even close. This is the definition of rape: "Rape is a type of sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse or other forms of sexual penetration carried out against a person without their consent."

If those people consented to having sex with you, and you didn't force yourself on them in any way, at the time, then it was not rape. You were being dishonest, but that is NOT the same as rape. You don't get to change the actual definition of words just to punish yourself.

I agree with Snaga's suggestion to work with your therapist on why you feel you need to lie in order to get attention or make friends. It sounds like it interferes in relationships more than anything rather than helping you form long-lasting and healthy friendships or romantic relationships.

I agree with everyone else that this is not rape. Perhaps this misrepresenting of what rape is, is of a similar thing to what made you misrepresent yourself in the first place. I think you should be focusing on what made you feel you needed to misrepresent yourself, and not on punishing yourself. I'm sorry you felt this way, but I think you're being very brave in admitting why you did it. Now I just think you would benefit from self healing and understanding yourself better.