The Men Who Loved Me After The Assault (And The Reason I Won’t Give Up On Men)

I get home late one night, and my *nesting partner’s eyes are wide like saucers.

“Babe”, he declares, “you’re not going to like this. I love you, but you have no choice, I’m going to microchip you.” He’s being silly. He explains that he just finished watching The Vanishing, a movie about a man whose wife was kidnapped. He is horrified.

So it’s decided: I’m going to get microchipped.

I play along.

“Aww, you want to rescue me!”

“No. Well, yes. But once you’re safe, I’m going to tie him up in the basement.” (We don’t have a basement. We live on the 39th floor of a condo building. But I go along.) He then describes the torture he would inflict on this man, complete with the fight sounds boys seem to learn naturally. My nesting partner is a very funny man. He’s a comedian, actually. So at this point, we’re both laughing.

His revenge fantasy is incredibly violent and needed. I know we’re talking about the movie, but I also know it’s about something else. I had recently experienced a sexual assault. We had both been reeling for weeks.

It did fuck me up a lot, and it fucked him up too. As it should. I travelled through flashbacks, intrusive thoughts, hellish emotional rollercoaster-ing, feeling shame, questioning my reality, feeling enraged that at 52 years old I was going through this…again. I was hurt. I was also furious. My nesting partner suffered nightmares and burned with a fury he kept mostly to himself so as not to overwhelm me. We were experiencing post-traumatic symptoms, but gently, we were getting through the toughest moments together.

I, unlike him, have an extensive history of surviving sexual violence, and I’ve done a shit load of healing. That helped me. But this was our first time navigating something like this together. It was strange and hard.

Still, there was something about seeing his anger, his shock, his sadness that was so healing for me. It’s like the younger, 12-year-old version of me kept stealing a peek at him in wonder. “Is this what love looks like?” She asks.” Yeah, baby girl. This is what love looks like when people care about how you’ve been hurt.”

But sometimes this kind of love is hard to remember. I only have to spend about seven minutes online before it hits: the rage, the despair, the ache to be loved by men or to at least not be hurt by them. Scrolling, following some random Reddit thread or reading posts on Are We Dating the Same Guy, has led me to feel utter despair. There’s an echo chamber of far too many examples of how men hurt people. And with that, a chorus is rising of women giving up on men entirely.

“To speak our hunger for male love would demand that we name the intensity of our lack and our loss” ~ bell hooks

How did men get this way?

How could they be so violent?

How can they hurt us if it doesn’t make them monsters?

What happened to men?

It can feel utterly hopeless, but this experience taught me to live in a love story, not just the trauma story. I must pay attention to both.

So I told friends. I encouraged my nesting partner to talk to his friends. We’re not going to remain silent. We’re tapping into the love we need to heal.

My women friends and friends who have lived experience being treated as women growled with the quiet rage we each carry. Followed by: “MEN.” No other words were needed to understand one another.

But the men in my life were also angry that I was hurt. They growled too. They loved me through it. They shared their own revenge fantasies, but they also let their tears fall because they felt my pain and hated that I was hurt. I looked up and saw that I was surrounded by so many loving men. And it was one of the most healing things I’ve ever experienced. I have been sweetly and deeply loved after the assault.

It mattered.

I mattered.

Imagine if more men rose to speak up against violence? To hurt when we are hurt. To declare with us that enough is enough. I think it’s possible.

Not once did I have to convince anyone of what happened. They believed me. Not once did I have to explain or defend myself. I was met with compassion and love every single time.

The rage that bubbles up when we encounter toxic masculinity is rightful. And it also risks keeping us disconnected. Had I not trusted the men in my life with my hurt, I would have missed a chance to see what men look like when they’re doing the work to heal.

Nine weeks later, I feel like me again.

My biggest fear was that it would take me under and reopen all the doors of my past traumas.

But instead, I’m living in the love story.

I feel like myself.

I’m laughing.

I’m overworking.

I’m being creative.

I’m spending time with the people who love me.

I feel cherished.

This is what we can do for one another. Because without this community of beautiful souls, I might still be spinning in the trauma soup. I choose to live in a love story just as much as I choose to tend to and heal these wounds.

It’s also what inspires me to create shows like Heal Him!, a special edition of the Sunday Night Love Show. I’m shining a big, fat spotlight, figuratively and literally, on men’s healing because it is happening. Men are healing.

I’m not ready to give up on men. Because I see something different. I see men healing up close, especially in my practice as a therapist. I see men learning to love, being the love that’s needed and learning to finally be loved. It’s a beautiful thing, and it confirms, over and again, why I refuse to give up on men.

*Nesting partner is a term used by non-monogamous/polyamorous people to describe a partner you live with.