#YesALLWomen
Sunday night, I had an experience that I want to share.
I had missed my bus, and decided to walk the few blocks to another option for getting home. It was after 11, and very dark, but I wasn't going to let my fear stop me from getting home earlier. So off I went, walking down the street.
When I came up on a bus stop, there was a sketchy guy standing there. So, in my "I can do this but he's sketchy" way, I stepped off the sidewalk to walk around him, thinking nothing of it. Just minding my own business, walking down the dark street. I'm a powerful woman, I don't walk like a victim, no one's going to bother me.
The route I had to take went up onto a dark, shadowed path. Okay, little bit scary, turn down the music in my headphones and keep walking. 50 yards down the path, I realize that there's someone yelling "hey" at me. I pull one side of my headphones down to hear better, and he asks me the time. I'm a polite girl, so I half turn to look at him.
It's the guy from the bus stop. Following me. Yelling at me and trying to get me to stop. On a dark path with many shadows, and no one else around. FUCK.
I keep walking, turning again as I pull my phone from my pocket. Politeness being ingrained in me, I yell the time back to him as I walk a little faster. And he keeps following me. So I call my sister. I wake her up when she has to work in the morning, but I didn't know that before I called and she's good enough as I tell her, loud enough to be heard, what is happening and where I am. My exact location on the path.
The guy finally stops following me. I make it to the lit street, let my sister go back to sleep, and spend the $8 to catch a Lyft home. I'm safe, I'm home, and the people who are posting to my anxiety attack coping mechanism facebook post are supportive. I can finally start to recover myself.
But I didn't post this whole story to facebook when it happened. And so there were holes found, and people leaping to defend the guy who yelled at me, a lone woman on a dark path. Because he asked me the time.
Today, I'm back in anxiety mode. I'm shaking with reaction, and I don't really know how to respond to people. Some have been so super supportive, even people who are still strangers to me and found the post because a mutual friend commented. But those few who even just seem to be coming down on me for my actions are in my head, and I can't get them out.
I had missed my bus, and decided to walk the few blocks to another option for getting home. It was after 11, and very dark, but I wasn't going to let my fear stop me from getting home earlier. So off I went, walking down the street.
When I came up on a bus stop, there was a sketchy guy standing there. So, in my "I can do this but he's sketchy" way, I stepped off the sidewalk to walk around him, thinking nothing of it. Just minding my own business, walking down the dark street. I'm a powerful woman, I don't walk like a victim, no one's going to bother me.
The route I had to take went up onto a dark, shadowed path. Okay, little bit scary, turn down the music in my headphones and keep walking. 50 yards down the path, I realize that there's someone yelling "hey" at me. I pull one side of my headphones down to hear better, and he asks me the time. I'm a polite girl, so I half turn to look at him.
It's the guy from the bus stop. Following me. Yelling at me and trying to get me to stop. On a dark path with many shadows, and no one else around. FUCK.
I keep walking, turning again as I pull my phone from my pocket. Politeness being ingrained in me, I yell the time back to him as I walk a little faster. And he keeps following me. So I call my sister. I wake her up when she has to work in the morning, but I didn't know that before I called and she's good enough as I tell her, loud enough to be heard, what is happening and where I am. My exact location on the path.
The guy finally stops following me. I make it to the lit street, let my sister go back to sleep, and spend the $8 to catch a Lyft home. I'm safe, I'm home, and the people who are posting to my anxiety attack coping mechanism facebook post are supportive. I can finally start to recover myself.
But I didn't post this whole story to facebook when it happened. And so there were holes found, and people leaping to defend the guy who yelled at me, a lone woman on a dark path. Because he asked me the time.
Today, I'm back in anxiety mode. I'm shaking with reaction, and I don't really know how to respond to people. Some have been so super supportive, even people who are still strangers to me and found the post because a mutual friend commented. But those few who even just seem to be coming down on me for my actions are in my head, and I can't get them out.