Loose Women star Grace Keeling says she no longer wants to suffer in silence over what happened to her a decade ago – and hopes it helps others to know they are ‘not alone’
Grace has written a book about her life experiences so far(Image: JAMES RUDLAND)
GK Barry says her decision to speak out on the sexual assaults she experienced as a teen was partly motivated by anger.
When the TV and social media star, real name Grace Keeling, was raped as a 17-year-old during her college work experience placement, she vowed to never tell a soul.
But a decade on, she has written a book about her many and varied life experiences in which she lays out what happened in the hope it will help other young women. And she told the Mirror that it “took a lot” for her to revisit the devastating ordeal.
“He was so confident about what he did, I’m sure I wasn’t the first and won’t have been the last, and maybe I could have stopped him from doing this to another girl,” she explains in the book. “But although I wish now I’d reported it at the time, I also feel really strongly that it’s not women’s f***ing responsibility to stop men raping us.”
Her attacker was her line manager for the week, who was 10 years her senior and had offered to give her a lift to work on her second day. But instead of taking her to the office, he drove her to a deserted park and demanded a sex act. “I didn’t know what else I could do except go along with what he was telling me – resisting or fighting back felt like it might make things worse,” she said. Horribly aware that she needed to finish the work experience in order to pass her college course and get to university, she felt she had to comply. “There was never a moment in my mind where I thought I could say no to what was happening,” she says. “When you’re 17 and scared as f***, thinking logically isn’t an option.”
There was worse to come. On her last day with the company, he took her into a side room with no cameras and asked her to remove her white jeans. “And then he rapes me,” she writes, admitting it took her a many years to accept that’s what it was. Agonisingly, she confesses that one of the reasons she vowed to never speak about what happened was “in case someone confirms my biggest fear that I was to blame”.
But a year on from the assaults, Grace found the courage to tell a teacher after learning that another girl from college was about to do work experience at the same company.
When she finally spoke to the police, she was told by a female officer that, because there was no evidence, it would be her word against his and she was highly unlikely to get a conviction. “At no point did the police officer say to me that what he’d done was wrong,” she reports, saying she was offered no support or counselling at any point.
With statistics showing that 1 in 4 women over 16 experience some form of sexual assault, and six out of seven rapes against women are carried out by someone they know, Grace wishes she’d known then about support group Rape Crisis. “I think people would be more confident coming forward and reporting assaults if we knew that people were on our side and willing to believe us.”
As she lays out what happened in her new book, the podcaster and Loose Women regular, 27, told the Mirror that the secrecy around these sorts of issues needs to stop. “I think it’s something that people don’t speak about. It’s something always kept very hidden. And I don’t think we should be ashamed about it.
“I haven’t put it in just for the sake of it, it took a lot for me to even speak about it,” she says quietly. “I wish I knew that you can say no, that rape can happen whether it’s someone you’re friends with, or close to, or a boss, that it comes in many forms.” And for anyone who has suffered anything similar, she says: “I would like them to know that it wasn’t their fault, because I spent a lot of years thinking it was.”
Grace, who grew up in Newmarket, Suffolk, and is a judge this year on The Mirror’s Pride of Britain Awards, is hoping her guide to surviving and thriving will also provide plenty of laughs. “The majority of it is just hilarious stuff that has happened to me,” she says. “I think people reading it can maybe learn from everything that I’ve done wrong.”
The book shows her devotion to footballer girlfriend of two years Ella Rutherford, an attacking midfielder for Millwall. Ella, 26, was her first relationship with a woman and it’s clear she thinks they will be together forever. Calling her the “undisputed love of my life”, Grace says she plans to eventually settle with Ella and their dogs on a farm.
Grace’s mother Loretta, and step-dad Andrew, have yet to learn about the many scrapes the TikTok star has had over the years. “My mum’s read the first couple of pages, but she has no idea what’s coming, God bless her,” she says. “I think maybe I won’t be able to look my mum and dad in the eye for a couple of months.”
– GK Barry, It’s Giving Life, EBURY SPOTLIGHT | 3RD SEPTEMBER 2026 | £22.00
