I can tell you the exact moment my world broke apart. 2:13am, Saturday evening, mid-October, 1988. I was 14. I was drunk. I got raped.
It happens a lot, so it doesn't make me special. It seems to carry extra shame when you're a dude though. You're not supposed to allow that to happen. Suddenly you're blocked off from any hope that you will ever be able to call yourself a man. When you live in a world that demands you can blow through a 12 pack with the boys, build a fire, beat down a jerk and satisfy your woman endlessly with your 10 inch cock, what are you supposed to do when you've had another dude's dick in your ass.
What I did was die. My hopes were gone. My options gone. Any thought of self-esteem or being able to be of any worth to any human ever, especially a woman, effectively scorched from the Earth. So I turned to a string of cliches to try and keep going forward. Eventually I discovered a unique ability. Since I hated myself, I discovered I could step in and take the heat, almost regardless of the situation. Because no amount of disapproval or disgust could outpace what I felt inside. I might not be able to fix myself, but I could give others the chance to grow and move on from their mistakes, simply by taking on their blame.
It's made for a difficult and often lonely life, but it was the training I needed to handle the day the Vapors came.
