Sexual violence in an intimate relationship: when “no” counts at home too

“It wasn’t rape. We’re a couple. I just … didn’t want to, and it happened anyway.”

The sentence often stops right there, at that “happened anyway”, with nothing after it. People who say it usually say it quietly, looking at the floor, and almost always add something straight away to soften it: that he was tired, that she had been too distant, that this sort of thing just happens in long relationships, that it wasn’t violent because nobody was hit. The hardest part is not saying what happened. The hardest part is naming it.

Sexual violence in an intimate relationship is talked about less than almost any other form of violence. It seems to be separated by a thin wall from “ordinary” sexual difficulties in a relationship — and that is exactly why it stays hidden, sometimes even from the person living through it. In this post I will try to explain what this violence includes, why it is so hard to recognise, why the body so often responds differently from how we would wish in those moments, and where help can be found. But first, one thing needs to be clear: this post is not a test and not a tool for assessing danger. If you do not feel safe, safety comes first — call 113 (police) or 112 in Slovenia if you are in immediate danger, and the SOS helpline for women and children who are victims of violence on 080 11 55 in Slovenia.

Why it is so hard to name

When people hear the words “sexual violence”, they usually picture a stranger, a dark street, a physical attack. That image is powerful, and it is precisely because of it that so many people do not recognise what is happening to them at home as violence. A partner is not a stranger. You love him, or you once did. You share a bed with him, the bills, perhaps children. Sex was once something you both wanted. And when the line shifts, it does not shift all at once, but little by little, at night, with no witnesses.

Old beliefs we carry without knowing it play their part too: that sex in marriage is a “duty”, that men are “just like that”, that turning a partner down is cruel, that you do not refuse love. Such beliefs do not excuse violence, but they help to hide it. When someone feels they ought to want it, they are often more ashamed of their own unwillingness than of what was done to them. So shame comes first, and only much later — if at all — the word violence.

Sexual violence in a relationship rarely comes on its own. The researcher Evan Stark describes it as part of a wider pattern of coercive control: control over money, contacts, movement, the phone — and the body too. Sex becomes one more area in which one partner decides for both. That is why it often makes sense to look more widely: do you feel free around this partner elsewhere too, not only in bed? The entry violence in a relationship in the knowledge base describes these forms briefly.

How often it happens

The World Health Organization and colleagues brought together data from 161 countries. The estimate, published in 2022, is that around 27 per cent of women who have ever had a partner have experienced physical or sexual violence from a partner, or both, during their lifetime. The figure combines the two forms, so it does not tell us how much of it was sexual violence alone — but it does tell us that violence in intimate relationships is not a fringe phenomenon. Older studies, such as Diana Russell’s work on rape in marriage, already showed that sexual violence by a partner is more common than violence by a stranger, only people speak about it far less often.

Men and people in same-sex relationships experience sexual violence too. It is talked about even less, but it is no less real for that. Everything in this post applies regardless of gender.

In Slovenia, since 2021 the Criminal Code has built its sexual offences on the “yes means yes” model: a sexual act without consent is a criminal offence even if there was no force or threat. This applies within marriage and cohabitation just as it does between strangers. Being a couple does not mean consent is given in advance and for ever.

Forms people rarely call violence

Sexual violence in a relationship is not always force. It often looks like something that can be explained away by “circumstances”. Some of the forms people describe most often:

• Physical force — holding down, pushing, carrying on despite resistance.
• Pressure and coercion — hours of persuading, sulking, threats to leave or to cheat, punishing silence until you “give in”.
• Sex when consent is not possible — during sleep, under the influence of alcohol or medication, during illness or straight after giving birth.
• Being pushed into acts you do not want — including watching pornography, being filmed, involving other people.
• Reproductive coercion — secretly removing a condom, sabotaging contraception, pressure to become pregnant or to end a pregnancy. Research by Elizabeth Miller and colleagues has shown that this form of control is often linked with other forms of partner violence.
• A degrading attitude to your body — insults, comparisons, orders about what to wear and how to look for your partner.

What all these forms share is that consent was not free. Consent is not something given once and for all. It is ongoing, it can be withdrawn at any moment, and it is only possible when “no” is a real option — when refusing carries no consequences you are afraid of.

Why you didn’t say “no” — or did, and it made no difference

One of the most painful questions people ask themselves after such experiences is: why didn’t I resist? Why did I lie still, why did I stay silent, why did I even go along so it would be over sooner? That question quickly turns into an accusation: if I didn’t resist, perhaps I wanted it.

The body does not work like that. Under threat, the nervous system responds faster than thought can catch up with what is happening. Besides the familiar responses of fight and flight there is also freeze — a stillness in which the muscles do not respond, no voice comes out of the throat, and all that is left is waiting. A Swedish study by Anna Möller and colleagues, published in 2017, included women who sought help at an emergency clinic after a sexual assault. Around 70 per cent of them had experienced marked immobility during the assault. That response was not a choice and did not mean consent.

With a partner, another response is common, sometimes called fawning in the professional literature: the person goes along, smiles, does what is expected because they have learned it is the quickest way to peace. That is not consent; it is survival. It often took shape much earlier, in childhood, around adults whose anger was dangerous.

If you recognise yourself in this, it may not feel easier straight away. But you can begin to let go of the question “why didn’t I resist?” and replace it with another: “what did my body know at that moment that I didn’t?”

What remains — in the body and in the relationship

Sexual violence by a partner carries a particular weight because it happens where a person ought to be safest. In Trauma and Recovery, Judith Herman described how trauma caused by someone close wounds not only the body and memory but also the capacity to trust. When the source of danger is the same person as the source of closeness, a split is written into you: you are drawn to them and afraid of them at the same time.

Common consequences include sleeplessness, tension at being touched, a sense of being “somewhere else” during sex — dissociation —, loss of desire, physical pain, anxiety and depression. The body also remembers what the mind would rather not; I wrote more about this in How trauma stays written in the body. Guilt is also very common: the feeling that you did something wrong, that you should have said it more clearly, that you provoked it. How that guilt becomes built into your self-image is the subject of Self-image after abuse: when you believe it was your fault.

Some people stay in the relationship and learn to live alongside what is happening. That is not weakness. Leaving a violent relationship is hard for reasons that have little to do with willpower: fear, financial dependence, children, the hope that the partner will change, and often a danger that increases at the point of leaving.

A conversation that happens more often than you might think

This is how a conversation in the therapy room might sound (composed, not a real person):

“I don’t know why I even mentioned it. Nothing really happened.”
“You said you told him you didn’t want to, and he carried on.”
“Yes. But then I just waited. I didn’t push him away.”
“What was going on inside you while you waited?”
“Nothing. I looked at the ceiling and counted the cracks. As if I wasn’t there.”
“What you’re describing is a body protecting itself. That isn’t the same as wanting it.”
“If I say that out loud, then it really was …”
“You don’t have to say anything out loud until you’re ready. But we could start with what you noticed: that you weren’t there.”

This conversation is not a solution. It is a beginning — the moment someone hears for the first time that what happened to them can be told differently from the way they have been telling it to themselves.

When disagreement about sex is not violence

Because this subject is so sensitive, I want to be careful in the other direction too. Not every sexual difficulty in a relationship is violence, and not every unpleasant sexual experience is abuse.

Different levels of desire are common and normal. In most long relationships one partner wants sex more often than the other. That brings tension, disappointment, sometimes a sense of rejection — but as long as both are free to say “no” without being punished, it is not violence; it is something to talk about. I wrote about this in When your desires don’t match: sex in a long relationship.

Occasionally going along is not always abuse either. People sometimes agree to sex when they do not feel much desire — out of tenderness towards their partner, out of curiosity, or because they know desire often wakes only once touch has begun. The key question is not whether you wanted it at that moment, but whether you could have said no — and whether your no would have been heard and respected.

“Violence” is not a label anyone should put on your experience for you. Some people need time before they name an experience. For others the word violence does not fit, yet they still need help. What matters is not what the experience is called, but that the person has a place where they can speak about it.

And one more limit: this post cannot judge how dangerous your situation is. No post can. Assessing danger and planning for safety are best done together with people who deal with this every day — on the SOS helpline, at a counselling service for victims of violence, or with the police.

Why couples therapy is not the right place

As a therapist in training under supervision in marriage and family therapy, I think a great deal about relationships as a whole — about the patterns both partners create together. That is exactly why it matters to say this clearly: when there is violence in a relationship, couples therapy is not an appropriate form of help. In a joint session the person being harmed cannot speak safely about what is happening, and whatever they do say may be turned against them at home. On top of that, working together on “communication” quickly creates the impression that both are responsible for the violence. They are not. The person who uses violence is responsible for it.

I have written more about why in Why couples therapy is not the right help when there is violence. For someone who has experienced violence, individual support is more suitable, and when the violence is ongoing, specialised organisations come first — they know how to assess danger and help with safety. I am not a specialist in violence myself. In individual therapy we can work on the consequences — shame, the body, trust, boundaries — once a person is safe.

An exercise: a first step towards naming it

This exercise is not meant to decide whether it was violence. It is meant to give what you have been carrying alone a shape for the first time. Do it only if you have a safe time and place for it. If you live with a partner who checks your phone or your notes, do not write anything where they could find it.

1. Find a moment when you are alone and safe. Sit so that you can feel support behind your back and the floor under your feet. Breathe out slowly a few times.
2. In your head, or on a sheet of paper you destroy afterwards, describe one event in three sentences. Facts only: what was said, what happened, what you did.
3. Add one sentence about your body. What did your body do then? What does it feel now, as you remember?
4. Write down what you wish you could have done then, and what stopped you. Not as an accusation but as a description: “I wanted to leave, but I was afraid he would get angry.”
5. Choose one person or one number you could tell. A friend, your doctor, the SOS helpline on 080 11 55 in Slovenia. Not necessarily now — just choose who you could tell.

If the exercise overwhelms you, stop. Look around and name five things you can see. That is not failure; it is a sign that the memory is still alive and needs more support than you can give yourself alone.

Where to find help

If you are in immediate danger, call 112 or the police on 113 in Slovenia. You can also report sexual violence to the police later. If the violence was recent, it is important to be seen by a doctor as soon as possible — for your health, and because any evidence is preserved that way, even if you have not yet decided whether to report.

• SOS helpline for women and children who are victims of violence: 080 11 55 in Slovenia — free and anonymous.
• Klic v duševni stiski (crisis line): 01 520 99 00 in Slovenia — every day from 7 pm to 7 am.
• Samarijan confidential helpline: 116 123 in Slovenia — 24 hours a day.
• In Slovenia there are non-governmental organisations offering counselling, accompaniment to the police and court, as well as safe houses and mothers’ homes. The SOS helpline or a social work centre can direct you to them.

An overview of the options, step by step, is in Where to get help with abuse in Slovenia: a map for the first step. If you are worried about yourself or someone you love, seeking a conversation early is always better than waiting for it to “sort itself out”. It is also a good idea to see your GP or gynaecologist if you have physical symptoms or pain — a doctor can also help you find further support.

What to remember

• Being a couple does not mean consent in advance. Consent is free, ongoing and revocable — within marriage just as anywhere else.
• Sexual violence by a partner is not always force: it also includes pressure, coercion, sex without the possibility of consent, and reproductive coercion.
• Freezing and fawning are the body’s responses to threat, not a sign that you wanted it.
• When there is violence in a relationship, couples therapy is not appropriate; safety comes first.
• Help in Slovenia: SOS helpline 080 11 55, emergency 112, police 113, crisis line 01 520 99 00.