Mariska Hargitay reveals in a powerful essay that she was raped in her thirties and talks about “reckoning”

Mariska Hargitay speaks publicly for the first time about the full extent of her own experiences with sexual assault.

The star of “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit” recalled in her own words the rape in her thirties and the “reckoning” that took place in the years that followed.

In a powerful firsthand essay in People published Wednesday, Hargitay, known for her role as a survivor advocate alongside Captain Olivia Benson in the long-running police drama, talks about being raped by a former boyfriend and her struggles to come to terms with what happened.

“A man raped me in my thirties,” 59-year-old Hargitay begins her essay. “It wasn’t sexual at all. It was dominance and control. Overwhelming control. He was a friend. Then he wasn’t.”

The actress said she left her body during the attack.

“I tried everything I could think of to get out of there. I tried making jokes, being charming, setting boundaries, being reasonable, saying no,” she wrote. “He grabbed my arms and held me tight. I was terrified.”

“I didn’t want it to escalate into violence. I know now that it was already sexual violence, but I was afraid he would become physically violent,” she continued. “I went into freeze mode, a common response to trauma when there is no way to escape. I withdrew from my body.”

Hargitay had trouble coming to terms with the attack. In cases of sexual violence, delayed reactions often occur.

“I couldn’t believe it happened. That it could happen. So I cut it out. I removed it from my narrative,” said the producer and director. “I have so much compassion now for the part of me that made that decision, because that part got me through it. It never happened. Now I honor that part: I did what I had to do to survive.”

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Hargitay has long been an advocate for victims of sexual violence. She found a voice through “SVU” by taking classes on trauma, founded her Joyful Heart Foundation to support victims of assault and abuse, and won an Emmy for news and documentary for her project “I Am Evidence,” which works to clear the backlog of rape kits.

In one instance, the Emmy Award winner recalled explicitly saying in speeches for her foundation that she was not a “survivor” and downplaying her own experience.

“I wasn’t lying; that wasn’t what I thought of myself,” she wrote. “I occasionally talked about what that person did to me, but I downplayed it. My husband Peter remembers me saying, ‘I mean, it wasn’t rape.'”

Mariska Hargitay processes the attack in “Reckoning”

Hargitay said her perspective on the incident changed because friends and family helped her call the assault “what it was.”

“I started talking about it more seriously with the people closest to me. They were the first to name it,” she said. “They were gentle and kind and careful, but their naming was important.”

She continued: “‘This is what it means when someone rapes another human being. So it might be useful in your free time to compare that to what was done to you.’ Then I realized it myself. My own reckoning.”

Hargitay points to the effects of trauma on the brain, which “damages our mind and our memory. Just like a mirror breaks.”

“Trauma impairs our memory cognitively and emotionally and changes our understanding of the world,” Emily Sachs, a clinical psychologist specializing in trauma, previously told USA TODAY.

Interpersonal traumas such as rape are the most damaging, both in terms of the chemical reaction and the way they change our ideas and expectations about the world and our relationships, Sachs said.

The Golden Globe-winning actress referred to her experience of sexual abuse as “acquaintance rape.” According to the Illinois Coalition Against Sexual Assault, “acquaintance rape,” also known as “date rape,” is a sex crime committed by someone the victim knows.

“Many people still think of rape as a man jumping out of the bushes,” Hargitay said. “This was a friend who made a unilateral decision.”

Mariska Hargitay, “SVU” and finding strength with fans and survivors

Hargitay said fans of the show have expressed how much “SVU” has helped them and said being part of fans’ lives in this way is an “immeasurable honor.”

“Survivors who have seen the show have told me that I have helped them and given them strength. But they are the ones who have been a source of strength for me,” she said. “They have experienced darkness and cruelty, a complete disregard for another human being, and they have done what they had to do to survive. We are strong and we will find a way through.”

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She also expressed her hope that survivors would not be shamed and her determination to end sexual violence.

“Sexual violence persists not because of something immutable in our human nature, but because of power structures that enable it,” she wrote. “These power structures are so pervasive that no one is immune to it.”

She continued, “They create thoughts like, ‘I must have done something to cause this.’ And our society agrees, ‘Yes, you have only yourself to blame.’ That’s wrong and that has to change.”

The actress also explains that justice for her would look like an apology from her unnamed abuser. “‘I’m sorry for what I did to you. I raped you. I have no excuse.’ That’s a start,” she wrote. “I don’t know what’s on the other side, and it won’t undo what happened, but I know it will play a role in how I process this.”

Hargitay, who turns 60 later this month, said she is “grateful” for where she is in her life, despite this “painful part of my history.”

“It doesn’t come close to defining me in the way that no other part of my story defines me,” she concludes the essay. “I am renewed and overwhelmed with compassion for all who have suffered. And I am still proud to have gone through this process.”

If you are a victim of sexual assault, RAIN offers support through the National Sexual Assault Hotline (800.656.HOPE & online.rainn.org).

Contributors: Alia E. Dastagir and Anika Reed

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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Mariska Hargitay: ‘SVU’ star recalls rape in personal essay