This Morning star Ashley James reveals she was raped by a male friend while she was 'unconscious' when she was 21

The TV star, now aged 38, has opened up about what happened to her when she was a student at Nottingham University.

James, who is a mum-of-two, has written about the incident in her new book, Bimbo, which is due for release later this week. The former reality star said that she was assaulted after a night out at a club with friends, and also that she'd been unconscious at the time.

She said it had been “one of the very worst moments of [her] life”, and went on to say that she lived with “the shame and silence” afterwards. But, now she hopes she will help to “change the conversation” around rape and victim blaming by speaking out.

Ashley went on to say she didn't report what happened to her because her attacker had been a friend and not “a stranger in a dark alley”, that made it harder for her to accept he was a rapist. She also then turned the blame inwards as a result.

In a chapter in her book entitled Silly Girl, which James says was chosen to highlight the way in which victims are often dismissed and blamed, she wrote: 'It’s something I’ve never spoken about and yet I’ve thought about it every day since, increasingly so since having children.

“It was one of the very worst moments of my life. It was hugely traumatic. I’m not telling the story to shock but as a mirror to show how common these experiences are – and also how broken the support system is.”

The TV star went on to candidly admit the impact the assault had on her and why she has kept it to herself until now.

“I didn’t come forward. Not because I thought the police wouldn’t believe me, or that the courts would fail me, but because the man wasn’t a stranger in a dark alley. He was a friend,” she said. “And because of that, the only person I blamed was myself. For years. Even after it happened, I was more worried about him not liking me than I was about my own trauma. I was worried he’d tell other people and everyone would think I was a s**g.

“So I didn’t tell anyone, and I even tried to stay friends with him. Even now I find it hard to think about him as a rapist. Even though that’s what he was, because I wasn’t asking for it. In fact, I was unconscious.

She said she was even worried about “ruining his life”. She added: “Yes, I was drunk. Yes, I was wearing going-out clothes, having come from a club. But I was with friends — people I trusted.'

The mum-of-two, who shares a four-year-old son named Alfie and a two-year-old daughter named Ada with her partner, Tommy Andrews, said: “We don’t teach girls that, one day, if they get the chance, their male friends might try to rape them . . . It doesn’t matter what you are wearing [or] if you had zero drinks or 1,000 drinks.”

The presenter said she decided to speak out because she no longer wanted to keep her secret. “I thought really hard about including [the rape] in the book,' she said. “But because what I write about is how the world shrinks women and strips us of our confidence, I felt like I couldn’t write the book and keep that secret.

“This shouldn’t be my shame. The focus needs to shift… I’d like to think we’ve moved on [as a society], but we haven’t. It’s a culture that is still not giving boys the tools to learn how to navigate rejection or how to really understand what consent is. We still ask questions like, ‘what was she wearing? Was she drunk?’ Most of us have stories,” she said referring to fellow women.

James also told The Mirror that changes need to be made to the current system to support sexual assault, saying that women often find themselves facing as much shame and blame as their rapists.

“Sexual assault is an area where there’s still a lot of shame and taboo,” she told the publication. “The system still doesn’t support women. It almost feels like the woman is put on trial more than the man who is accused of rape.”

Ashley James’ book Bimbo is released on Thursday (February 12). You can pre-order Bimbo via Amazon now.

* Anyone who has been victim of rape, sexual assault, or any form of sexual abuse – whether recent or non-recent – is asked to contact police. Information about sexual abuse support services can be found on the NHS website.