One in four women will be raped in their life-time
One in four women will be raped in their life-time. What a shocking statistic. 84% of women who are raped know their attacker. They are raped by their current for former husbands, boyfriends, family members or acquaintances.
Many of the women I work with have been raped by husbands or boyfriends. Many more have been coerced or manipulated into sexual intercourse or sexual acts that they did not want to perform.
It is not uncommon that a man will rape his partner early in the relationship or marriage. The woman is not likely to think of the rape as rape because the man is her “boyfriend” or “husband” but the damage is done, the trust is gone – it has been replaced with terror.
Hi I work with abusive men and I have an ok knowledge of the stats about abuse and I have not come across this shocking figure. Could you tell me the research this figure comes from please?
Thanks for your comment. I have been doing a lot of research lately on this issue and am posting a series of blogs over the next week. Here is one site that I found helpful:www.ptsd.va.gov/public/pages/sexual-assault-females.asp. Also, the two academics who have done a lot of research in this field are Dr. Diana Russell and Dr. Mary Koss. If you google either of them, you will find lots of stuff. As I wrote this series of posts, I wondered if I should be referencing where I am getting the statistics from. In then end, I mostly didn’t because it makes the posts hard to read but you have made me think that maybe I need to put that info at the bottom. Again, thanks for comment. I wish you all the best in your important work. Karen.