Rape Survivor Had to Educate Her 63-Year-Old Dad About Sex

So in 2009, when I was 23 years old and on a trip out of state, I was raped. For the purposes of what is relevant to this story, what is revelant is the rapist was a stranger who offered to help me when I got lost in this unfamiliar place, and then he attacked me, there was physical force involved, and I reported all this to the police. For those who wish to know, he was identified a year after the attack. But well before that happened, only like a week after the attack, I had an extremely awkward conversation with my father.

We were discussing the crime and I said I was sure that if and when he was arrested, the man would claim I had consented. My father pointed out that I had visible injuries (still visible, only several days after what happened), injuries the police had taken photos of when documenting everything, and said how could anyone think I had consented when I had this injury and that one?

“Well, Dad,” I said, “some people like it rough.”

My father looked at me blankly. There was a long pause and finally he was like, “Excuse me?”

At first I thought he hadn’t heard so repeated myself slightly louder but that got the same blank expression. He said, “I don’t understand.”

I tried re-phrasing what I had said: “Some people, they like to hit each other when they have sex.” I am not one of those people, incidentally, I had only heard of them.

He looked absolutely shocked. He said he had never heard of such a thing, and why would anyone want to do that?

I really had not expected this. Dad was about 63 years old, had been married to my mom for decades (since 35 or a little younger, after he got his assistant professorship in biology) and was the biological father of my mother’s three younger children as well as the stepfather of her four older ones. I had not expected that he would not know anything about this.

To answer his question I explained that this was not all that uncommon and about BDSM and how there was a whole subculture based around it. My dad was absolutely astonished, and it was just extremely awkward for me to have to educate him on this matter. We both forgot entirely, for a few minutes anyway, about the rape as I explained what little I knew about this topic.

\[edited for typo\]