There was pain and there was blood, but the blood made the room look like a crime scene. It spilled everywhere in a gushing waterfall, staining through the bedspread and into the mattress, down the sides of the bed frame and onto the carpet.
After the bleeding started and we stopped having sex, I started using sanitary pads to try to stop the bleeding. When I got through six of them, I decided to call 111 and they asked if the sex was consensual and to describe the events that led up to it.
They told me to go to the nearest walk-in centre. At this point, I’d nearly fainted once and felt dizzy, like my entire body was experiencing pins and needles. My mouth was so dry. All I could think was that my family would kill me.
We went to the local walk-in centre – where they told me I had to go to A&E, I almost passed out, breaking my phone screen when it slipped out of my hand, as they didn’t have the equipment to find out what was wrong.
I ended up telling a nurse, in a quiet and slightly embarrassed voice, that I didn’t want my parents to find out I’d had sex because I wasn’t supposed to be having it. Even in that moment—when I was in pain, scared, and unsure of what was happening to my body—there was still this overwhelming fear of judgment, of disappointing them, of confirming everything they had warned me about growing up.
On the way to the hospital, I was completely alone. The bleeding hadn’t stopped, and I could feel my body growing weaker by the minute. At one point in the Uber, I nearly fainted again. The driver noticed something was wrong and had to pull over. I remember him looking concerned, asking if I was okay, and then stepping out to get me a packet of cereal bars and a bottle of water from a nearby shop. That small act of kindness helped stabilize me just enough to continue the journey. It’s strange how moments like that stay with you—how a stranger can show more immediate care in a crisis than you feel you can ask from your own family.
