isolated. losing my friends? help please
my best friend of over a decade drunkenly assaulted me in november. i am lost. i have avoidant personality disorder, which means i struggle debilitatingly with socializing and maintaining relationships. i am incapable of acting like myself if i am being observed and am extremely hyper vigilant regarding the way i am perceived by everyone around me, which makes social interactions feel extremely stressful and scary. am usually inebriated for any form of socializing to make it less scary. developed this disorder after hs, so i was able to make friends before becoming unable to in my adult life. ones i have been lucky enough to keep afterwards and fall back on when i feel alone. ones kind enough to understand that i am unlikely to reach out and to have the patience to continue to message me anyways because they know i want to but struggle to. very special friends that someone like me is lucky to have.
unfortunately we are a tight knit group, and my closest friend, who is a central part of this group, sexually assaulted me one night while we were alone, then forgot the next morning. and also didnt remember for the following two months afterwards. it has been really, really difficult for me. i really looked up to them, and have since we were kids. at a point all our other friends had moved out of town and for years we were the only two left, so we always hung out together. i spent so much of my life at their place hanging out with them cause there was no one else i could spend time with, and it made us really close. i dont know how to feel about that now.
the night it happened they got extremely drunk to the point of falling over constantly and toppling over a ton of my furniture each time he tried to get up and making a big fucking mess. it scared me cause there were lots of things there he could hit his head on. tried to give him food and water which he kept refusing while laughing. was crying and freaking out the whole time over how fucked up hed gotten on the booze, asking him what i should do. dragged me to the floor with him and wouldnt let me get up, groped me, kissed me, all while i was crying and freaking out. would not let me go, if i tried to get up hed cling onto me until we both violently fell to the ground. passed out on the floor in the midst of assaulting me. scream cried on the floor for 10 mins afterwards.
had to go back and forth between calling his abusive parents, an ambulance, or doing nothing cause hed prefer his folks didnt know bc theyd probably punish him. heavy drinking was normal for him but they didnt like it. called a hotline instead asking what to do cause i was worried hed hate me if i called either parents or ambulance. had to babysit his body after what he did and flinched each time he moved. cleaned up the smashed food and spilled drinks and toppled furniture in that time so i didnt have to be reminded of it in the morning. he woke up 2 hours later. continued groping and touching me, followed me into bed, which i had to coax him to do instead of continuing to drink and grope me. clung to me and would not let go. would not leave me alone, continued to grope me under clothes when finally in bed. couldnt sleep cause he took up all the fucking space. he didnt remember any of it and only found out because i msgd him asking him not to drink while a friend was visiting his place 2 months after it happened.
none of the friends in my friend group know. here is what i need advice for. do i tell them? or drop them? i see two results: i tell them and they distance themselves from him, but then he himself winds up without friends, and i feel personally responsible for anything drastic he does as a result, which is likely. and i feel guilty forever. or i tell them and they dont distance themselves from him bc hes also a vulnerable person with no other friends, and then i no longer feel like i can talk to them cause of this. i dont know. i feel like thats also likely. that it would be a "its nuanced from both sides" deal were they to know, and theyd continue to remain in contact with him in some way. right now i feel resentment seeing them all interact w him in our groupchat. it hurts to see everyone continue talking to him. but i dont want to force the group to drop him when i barely make my presence known while hes constantly interacting with everyone there. i just feel like either way, ive lost all my friends over this. i feel very isolated and unsure of what to do. any kind words or advice would be appreciated please. thank you for reading