I was raped and I gave a baby up for adoption. Guess which was worse.

Lorraine

Okay, I was raped by someone I knew. We had been dating for a few weeks, but nothing serious. I didn't want to see him anymore. He came to my apartment, which was a six-floor walk-up in a tenement; the lock on the door to the outside was broken and so he could get all the way up to my apartment. At one a.m. when he began banging on my door, waking up the neighbors on my floor. Doors were opening, people were looking. He was shouting: I know you are in there!

I was embarrassed. I let him in, thinking we would talk about this sanely. But no. He had been drinking, he was furious I was the one who called it quits, he threatened me and forced himself sexually on me before he left. It was clear his whole reason for raping me was to show me that he was in charge, that HE, not me, go to decide when whatever relationship we had was going to be over. In the malarkey-filled brains of some Republicans (see chart), my rape would not qualify as "legitimate."

Sympathy for the Other Woman

Lorraine

Why do I feel sympathy for the women caught up in sex scandals? Because they never get over it. It will be a long time for the woman to have a second act. Arnold Schwarzenegger will have a movie career apparently. Patty Baena will always be "that woman." I hope the boy can have some kind of meaningful relationship with his father.