Woman went to sleep after party - what she woke up to will 'always haunt me'
A brave young woman has waived her right to anonymity to speak about the terrifying ordeal she went through at a party which left her mentally scarred for years to come.
Chelsea Hern, from Wigan, was out celebrating a new job offer when she was invited back to a friend’s house in the summer of 2021, when she was 21. The “really good” evening was full of “drinking and partying” and it was decided she would spend the night in a spare room after the sizeable gathering at the house.
However things took a turn for the worse when she headed to bed at around 3am, and woke up to find someone else in the same bed kissing her neck and shoulders. Chelsea shrugged him off and shuffled closer to the wall, hoping he would stop. But the man – Frank Manase – moved closer and put his hands up her top to grope her breasts.
Despite Chelsea asking him to stop numerous times, he then attempted to put his hands down her trousers. Chelsea rolled onto her stomach to prevent this, hoping he would “get the message and go away”. But when she realised that wasn’t going to happen, she shouted for her friend and ran from the bedroom.
She said “I didn’t know what to do" (Chelsea Hern)
Despite Chelsea asking him to stop numerous times, he then attempted to put his hands down her trousers (Chelsea Hern)She told the Manchester Evening News : “I’m quite a loud and prompt person, but at that moment I was frozen. It was fight or flight. You never know how you’re going to react. I ended up freezing for a good while. I didn’t know what to do. I heard my friend in the next bedroom and I shouted at her. As soon as I got a response, I darted from the bedroom and ran downstairs. She followed me and I told her what had happened.”
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She added: “To be honest, I was numb. I wasn’t crying about it or hysterical; I didn’t get upset initially. I think it was anger for a couple of weeks. Then it started to grate on me. I was having nightmares and I was scared to go to sleep.” Now in a relationship, Chelsea still flinches if someone touches her from behind unexpectedly, and said the horrifying experience affected her trust.
She said: “I don’t feel like I’m as naïve. It shouldn’t have happened anyway, but I won’t go out and get as drunk anymore. I don’t like being around people I don’t know.” Chelsea says she had never met Manase prior to the party but had spoken to him throughout the evening. She claims he contacted her after the assault to apologise. “He tried to approach me after to say he was sorry,” Chelsea added. “I was like, just stay away from me. He was ringing me and sending me messages. He didn’t understand he did anything wrong.”
Manase was arrested and charged following the incident on May 16 and was later sentenced at Liverpool Crown Court. He was given an 11-month prison sentence, suspended for 12 months, 150 hours of unpaid work and 45 days rehabilitation.
Chelsea added: “Following the assault I was scared to be alone. I find it so hard to put into words the impact that this has had on me but it will always haunt me. Going to the police and having to talk about the incident for the first time and re-live the incident multiple times after brings back the horrible memories and the fears of what happened.
“I felt so embarrassed and powerless having to speak about what happened and its been hard to build relationships afterwards because of the trauma and flashbacks. I felt like I had to start my life all over again just to give myself a chance of being happy. I would frequently wake up panicking in the fear of someone else being in the room with me. I had a really hard time feeling safe and it’s something that still happens when I am reminded of what happened by speaking about it or attending interviews.”
Chelsea says the incident left her hating the skin she was in and felt “sick” whenever she remembered the attack, and would spend nights crying herself to sleep at the “thought of another man touching” her body without consent. She said: “It made me hate the skin that I was in. It’s hard to explain but it took me a long time to make my body feel like my own again and not to feel powerless. It will always make me feel sick thinking about what he did.
“Now, I don’t feel ashamed of what happened, nor embarrassed. I have accepted that this was not my fault and I can’t change it but I can hopefully stop this from happening to at least another person. I will never be okay with what happened to me and it will stay with me forever, but I am willing to use my voice and speak about it to try and end the stigma of the shame me and many other people carry with things like this.”
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