5 Psychological Effects of Date Rape
Rape or sexual abuse of any kind leaves permanent scars on an individual on an emotional level. It is worse to recover from the trauma of a sexual assault when the perpetrator of a heinous and beastly crime is a person you trust. He can be a friend, an acquaintance or someone you grew up knowing, like a neighbor. The damage of a date rape cannot be undone but having understood its psychological effects and the impact it has on the woman can help the family and friends offer the required support. Here are 5 psychological effects of date rape.
1. Humiliation and loss of trust
The victim goes through a complex influx of emotions in her mind combined with anger, frustration, helplessness, feeling of being powerless and utterly humiliated. How do you tell your friends and family that the person you went out with drugged you and raped you? One feels rather shaken up and becomes anti-social. Everyone around her poses a threat.
2. Depression
When the trauma starts to entrench deeper in the subconscious, victims of date rape feel plunged into a state of depression, to the extent that therapy does not suffice. There is a need to take anti-depressants to drown the repeated nightmares and find the strength to find a place of peace and happiness. Depression can be very serious; it can either cause them to alienate everyone around or develop eating disorders and have bouts of breaking down.
3. Anger and rage
There are no real phases that a human being goes through when he or she has undergone deep trauma. There are repeated shifts in moods and a range of emotions that he or she experiences in no precise order. Rape is about exerting sexual prowess which a man accomplishes when he has committed the same, leaving the woman powerless and helpless. She feels angry and outraged that she could do nothing to harm the person or she didn’t realize that she made a fatal error in judgment. In certain cases, women turn rouge and revengeful, hate men or turn to drug abuse and alcoholism in a fit of rage.
