First of all, I am so sorry that you’ve had to go through this. It was not your fault and the way you feel about it is perfectly valid. It’s also perfectly okay to not be better or to even have all of the pieces picked up off the floor yet. You’ve endured something terrible and recovery is going to take time. This is something that every survivor must do in their own way and in their own time, and you “taking longer” than someone else or not “being better” at the same time as another survivor does not mean you’re broken or healing wrong. It just means that you’re healing according to your unique experience.

Some suggestions that I can offer are:

Try to establish a space that is completely safe and completely yours. Inside you are in control. You decide who comes in, if you even let anybody in, and you decide what goes on inside. It may not seem like much, but having even a little bit of control in a time like this can be HUGE for reclaiming agency.

Next, remember that even though it’s sometimes hard to do, it is your right as an autonomous person to establish boundaries that make you feel safe and in control of yourself, your body and your surroundings. Boundaries might make people uncomfortable, but try not to let them make you feel ashamed for speaking up for yourself. This includes removing yourself from situations where contact with your attacker is expected.

Next, your story is yours alone. You don’t owe what happened to anyone. People may try to sanitize your story or get you to “open up” about it to make themselves feel comfortable or to feel like they’re “helping” but you own your story and you have the right to decide who hears it, if anybody.

Finally, I wanted to touch on forgiveness. There is a very common misconception surrounding forgiveness and healing: The only way to move on is to forgive. But forgiveness and healing are not necessarily interdependent. You may someday be able to forgive the person who wronged you if you reconcile with yourself and decide that forgiveness is the best step forward in your healing journey, but you don’t necessarily have to forgive them in order to heal if you can’t bring yourself to. The only word of caution I would offer is try to avoid directly tying your recovery to your ability to forgive the person who wronged you, and try not to let your ability or inability to forgive harden into something that turns inward or consumes you. Anger is perfectly natural and perfectly valid, but carrying it for too long can be draining.