By Ruth Everhart
Ruined is a painfully beautiful memoir about a young woman who was raped more than once in her early twenties. One of these acts of violation took place at gun point during armed robbery.
Ruth is deeply vulnerable in sharing how she processed rape and gender equality in the years after the trauma. She wrestles with God about whether or not he had a part to play in these events and was she being punished for past sexual expression? Her theological framework adapts and changes and she contrasts this with family members like her mother and sister. She shares of experiencing nightmares and re-living her trauma. There is a camaraderie among the women she was living with who were also raped, but it doesn’t last forever and they sometimes walk through the stages of grief at different times. She shares feelings of shame and ruination and how some of this stemmed from religious beliefs and the exaltation of women’s virginities or supposed purity. She shares how she felt triggered when she engaged in sexual activity, but also sometimes experienced healing through love making or affection.
As Ruth’s sexual memoir, she acquaints the reader with her sexual choices as well as the times choice was taken away from her. She simultaneously paints a picture of how gender equality (or lack thereof) affects her processing of abuse, her career path, and her relationships with others and with God. I think this is powerful and important because sexual violence is so often perpetrated by men against women, and, like her first experience of rape, is sometimes treated as though the abuser couldn’t help himself: “he wouldn’t take no for an answer.” This gender disparity, where men are excused for overpowering woman, is disgraceful.
It is interesting to see how Ruth herself treats these two different acts of rape. The ladies in the household who were raped at gunpoint helped put their ‘rapists’ in jail, but the first act of rape was seemingly not dealt justice. Ruth also had to process the fact that the teenager who raped her at gunpoint was black while the man who raped her in her/their tent while trying to sleep on a hiking trail, was presumably white.
Ruth shares deeply about romantic relationships, about falling in love, marrying and having children. She and her husband find a different church which includes changing denominations for Ruth and also means she can pursue Christian ministry as a woman. I found her story powerful and very relatable! Thank you so much for bravely sharing, Ruth!