Friend assaulted me

If this is the wrong place to post, sorry. There seem to be zero subs that will accept this post so I don’t know where else to go. I just want an outside opinion.

Throwaway account for obvious reasons.

I am 47F and have been friends with “Joe” (47M) since we were about 15 or 16 years old. Joe has always been interested in me as more than a friend. This ranges from teenage lust to adulthood with him making repeated statements that he wants to marry me. And it persists no matter how clearly I tell him that I am not interested in this whatsoever and we are only friends.

Joe has sexually assaulted me multiple times since we were 17. I never completely viewed it that way until the last several years but that is what happened. I was super grossed out and upset each time and each time I cut the friendship off for months or even years but he never really goes away and eventually I get sucked back into it. I guess I always gave him the benefit of the doubt (he was young and immature or whatever excuse I would apply to it) and would stupidly believe that he is past those behaviors only for it to be repeated.

I will describe the incidents just so the events are clear:

1. 17 years old: on an outing with some other friends and he grabbed my crotch in front of everyone out of nowhere.

2. 19 years old: I lived out of state and he came to visit. He stayed at a hotel and I decided to stay with him—on top of the covers, fully clothed, zero intentions of anything happening whatsoever. I woke up to his hand down my pants and my top up/off. No clue how long he had been doing this and I was asleep. He eventually stopped, I immediately went to the bathroom and got dressed. He ended up telling his girlfriend that we messed around and she hated me forever because she believed it was mutual. To this day she believes that.

3. 25 years old: I stupidly put myself in a situation again where we were sleeping in the same room. Once again, woke up to him with his hand in my pants and my shirt up and this time he pinned my arms down so I couldn’t stop him.

There was at least one other incident but I don’t recall the details. It was a situation where I had fallen asleep and woke up realizing he was trying to do this same stuff again and I just clutched my body so to speak and pretended to be asleep and he eventually stopped trying.

Somehow I would always blame myself because the fact is that I naively put myself in the situation repeatedly. Even if I cut the friendship off I would always go back eventually.

When we were about 31 or so, I went through a horrendous breakup with someone. I’ve never felt devastation over anyone like that. And Joe was trying to swoop in to be a knight in shining armor. I told him that any feelings I had for him were not real and merely the result of a rebound/heartbreak and that we shouldn’t do anything for that reason. He kept saying that isn’t true, he knows it’s real, etc., and would not let up. I actually did have consensual sex with him a couple of times during this event but I was horrified at myself during the acts. I knew it was wrong, stupid, not what I really wanted and I said that but I let it happen because I was so emotionally wrecked from the breakup with my boyfriend. It was a mess.

Once again I bailed on the friendship but we reconnected a few years later. As always he was constantly making comments about wanting to be with me and sexual comments about my body, etc. It just never ends. I told him that I need to be 100% clear that we are friends and nothing more and nothing more is ever going to happen between us ever again. He has repeatedly tried in that time to get me into situations where we would be sleeping in the same room or whatever and I have never done that again because I finally know better.

Ultimately he still makes sexual comments and lovey dovey type comments no matter how many times I’ve asked him not to. I’m always somewhat uncomfortable around him because I know there is perpetually a desire from him for more than friendship. He even strings along other girls and says he won’t commit to them in the hopes I will change my mind. Which I won’t ever.

Now we skip to all of the Me Too stuff that has been circulating over the last several years. For some reason he is very hung up on one particular celebrity’s actions and the accusations against them. We got in a fight over this topic because he said I am a victim blamer. I am not a victim blamer but I do tend to put a lot of the onus on the victims I guess because it’s the only way I can rationalize my own actions and friendship with Joe. I didn’t say that to him but that’s how it is.

Since that fight with him I just realized this is an unhealthy friendship and I believe it’s unhealthy for BOTH of us. He doesn’t understand why I’m barely talking to him because I haven’t explained myself. And I’m just sitting in limbo because I don’t really want to discuss it. I know how it will go. He will either not remember these events ever took place or he will deny they ever happened. He has done that before with other situations.

I feel like I just don’t want to have the conversation at all because I don’t want to deal with it. Also, as crazy as it sounds, I truly believe he is oblivious to what he has done and I don’t really wish to punish him at this point when these things happened so long ago. I just want to end the friendship and move on. That would be the easiest and best for me but I feel like I owe him an explanation.

TLDR: I have been friends with a guy who has sexually assaulted me a number of times over the past 30 years. I don’t know why I keep going back to the friendship but I do. I am finally just done with the friendship now but don’t know how to approach it with him. I would like to tell him to go away and not discuss it further but that doesn’t seem right. I don’t know what to do.