friends

when nobody helps

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my boyfriend loved me, or i thought he did. we were together for a year and a half. my first relationship. he raped me more times than i can count. i told myself it wasn’t rape, that it was an accident, that he loved me – so it was fine. i sat on the feeling for months. things didn’t feel quite right anymore. he made a group of friends, and told them private sexual information about me without my permission, then asked to send explicit photos of me to the group. i told him no but the more i said no, the more upset he got. he kept trying to pressure me into a foursome with two of his friends – i didn’t know what to do or say, i tried to refuse but he’d cry and argue if i did. i didn’t know what to do. he invited me out for a meal with friends, i thought it would be a normal night – once we’d finished eating, some of his friends left, leaving him and myself alongside the two friends that he wanted me to ‘fuck.’ i was freezing cold, walking around in a jumper at 9pm in september. we walked around the town for a bit, my boyfriend kept grabbing me to the point where i felt claustrophobic, trying to be sexual but actually just frightening me. i agreed to go back to one of their houses just to hang out, i assumed we’d be talking or using our phones. when we got there, my boyfriend blocked off the area with chairs and cornered me on a sofa. he assaulted me, grabbing me and putting his hands under my clothes, not pulling his arm out from my underwear even when i was tugging on it. his friends watched, they did nothing to help me. he dragged me off to his friend’s bedroom and got me down on the bed. i was on my phone, repeatedly turning away and trying to make it clear that i didn’t want to do anything sexual. he tried to take off my jeans. it felt like a year until his friends came back in. they were trying to have sex on the bed next to us. i felt shaken and physically sick. we walked home, he grabbed my arm so hard that fingerprint shaped bruises appeared the following day, and kept asking me ‘why wouldn’t you let me touch you?’ i felt sick to my stomach from that night. the feeling of nausea, losing my appetite and vomiting didn’t stop until over a month after the attack. my boyfriend went out the following day to fuck another girl behind my back – the same girl who sat next to me and watched him assault me, doing nothing. i reached out to her and asked for help, not knowing what went on with her and him – she told me to fuck off. she wasn’t interested in what i had to say. my boyfriend broke up with me the following day so he could date her. and that was it. i have lost all my friends, respect, i can no longer leave the house and had to quit my job. i have been diagnosed with ptsd and can’t function normally. i’ve attempted suicide four times since the attack. i reported the assault to the police, but because of legal issues, they won’t allow me to access therapy. i see a therapist once every fortnight but am not allowed to discuss the assault. i want nothing more than to die. if you see something suspicious, please step in. i wish more than anything that someone would have helped me.

Anonymous

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Best friends boyfriend grabbed my tit repeatedly while I was laying next to the pair of them the morning after a party. Claimed I led him on the night before but I was so drunk I can’t remember (which I had explicitly told him) and in the morning he was sober and kept trying to make me drink more. At the time I didn’t think much of it but now I have days where it pops into my head and it makes me hate myself because I feel like it’s my fault and it’s put a wedge between me and my best friend.

louise

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I was telling a man whom I know quite well, but who is not my sexual partner, about femoral nerve compression in my hip and leg that I’d been experiencing lately and how uncomfortable and worrisome it was, and that I was booked for an MRI, and his only acknowledgement of this unpleasant health issue was to say “Yes, but can you still spread your legs?”

C

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Fiancé’s groomsman said he didn’t want to be in the same group chat as my eight bridesmaids because he wouldn’t be able to deal with eight girls screaming over each other. He’s only ever met three of them and no screaming was had at that meeting. He’s just stereotyping and belittling them according to the “naggy hysterical girl” archetype sigh. Casual sexism.

Clare

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My conversation Me: i dont want marriage or children, i never have Them: youll change your mind/youre too young to think that/you havent met the right man yet/tell me in 10years when youre married with kids etc My boyfriends conversation Him: i dont want marriage or children. I never have Them: what about your partner? Him: she doesnt want that either Them: sweet/lucky/highfives all round Why cant i get that reaction for knowing what i want with my life? Why is he lucky but im deluded?

Lucia

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I was going with my friend down a street after we went to Starbucks and then this car started following us, it was in broad daylight. We found it weird cause there was no one there and the car was going at our speed and there were like 5 men inside and we were 2 and then we started running and running but the car would just speed up so me and my friend started running back and forth and the car would just hit reverse. We then ran out full speed until we reached home and the car was outside the house but after 2 minutes they left. KEEP IN MIND THIS WAS IN AN ARABIC COUNTRY QATAR, IN BROAD DAYLIGHT, I AM 11, AND I WASNT SHOWING MUCH

Kathy

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First, I have to tell, that most of my friends are Boys. I don’t know why, but they are. We have been friends for more then ten years now and I really love my friends. But sometimes I just want to Punch them. It all atarted about nine years ago when we were all about 17/18. We watched Eurotrip and there is this Girl who is always refered to as “A cool dude with long hair” and “Not a real girl”.Since then, they projected that on me, telling me constantly that I am “not a real girl” and that I am “more like a guy” to them. When I was Young and stupid, I took it as a compliment (They certainly mean it as a compliment), but now that I am older and more educated, I see it as the Sexist behavior that it is. Yesterday, one of my friends said: “Women are so annoying. I just don’t get them.”. I said: “Hey, we aren’t that bad”. He looked at me puzzeled and told me: “Not you, I mean real Girls.”. So I asked him, what he meant by “Real Girls”. “You know, this whiny, entiteled bitches. They don’t get anything, they only care about Looks and they are so emotional and irrational. You are more like a dude, you know? We can talk to each other without you having a breakdown or wanting to have a relationship with me. We can drink beer together and joke around. A girl would never be like that. I wish I could find a rational woman to be with. But they just don’t exist”. I pointed out to him that he would never find a “rational woman” to be with if he just doesn’t view them as women and that the Point is that he is afraid his girlfriend could be smarter then him or more educated and so he wouldn’t be able to talk down on her. We had a very Long discussion about gender don’t being a “biological” issue to him but more an issue about prejudices and gender roles. He, who sees himself as the most rational being on earth, was a Little upset but promised to think about his views towards women. We’ll see… I like to Point out that not only he engages in this behaviour. A lot of my male equaintences do that. It affects not only me, but my husband as well. Because they don’t see me as A “real woman”, they don’t see him as a “real man”. There are a lot of gay jokes (Bad, no matter what the circumstances- come on guys!) (Wich they say are not about man having sex with man- they say they don’t care and that love is love, but about “gay behaviour”- whatever that means)and jokes about him “being the girl in the relationship”. You know- all the emasculating bullshit, because obviously there is nothing worse then being a woman on this earth and “girl” is the biggest Insult… I am glad, that my husband isn’t stressed out by that stupid bullshit at all, but calls it out with me. I feel really bad that for some years now, I have contributed to Misogynie by actually feeling flatered for beeing seen as “not like other Girls” and “a cool dude with Long hair”. I will no longer keep up with that crap. Listen guys: Woman are not hysterical, whiney, irrational beings and you are not the ones deciding who is or isn’t a girl. Humanity is divers. You don’t get to Label someone who doesn’t fit inside your worldview. Shut up!

mad, overprotective, younger sister

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Men, even the self proclaimed ‘woke’ ones, who don’t understand that when someone has told you they’re not interested, you should stop with all the advances. My family’s been friends with this guy through my brother for like 4 years now. We’re increasingly becoming done with him. Major reason why? His inability to keep it platonic with my sister. They already talked about his one-sided feelings and agreed to remain friends. And yet he keeps doing really awkward stuff that irritates and embarrasses my sister. Worst of all he’s frequently stated how emotionally dependent he is on my sister, and that their ‘friendship’ has helped him through his mental illness. From that alone you might think, all he’s done is thank her. Well no. He’s said ‘he’d be depressed without her’ with puts responsiblity on my sister for his health, and holds her accountable if she wants to end the friendship that he has made so stressful and infuriating. He’s had the gall in a club to grab my sister’s hand, and said her leaving his sight triggers his anxiety. She justly left him alone in the corner of the club while she danced with her friends. He comes over every family event and then proceeds to stay the whole weekend even once everyone else has left. My sister hates this, because he doesn’t deserve all her time. Not even a husband should be attached to the hip of his partner. He’s just being a creep now, not respecting boundaries. And this is a dude who acts all woke about social injustice, and yet he’s been very sexist to my sister with his behaviour. Leave women alone, if you can’t keep your dick in your pants, do her a favour and remove yourself from her life

Lili

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Just met up with someone who is a friend – not a long-time friend, more of an acquaintance. I consider him a decent guy, but he just spent the whole hour and a half talking about himself. There was not one question about how things were going with me, it was all about him. He wasn’t stressed about anything, so it wasn’t a situation where sometimes you just need a listening ear to talk things over, he was just talking about his life, his ideas, his plans. I mean really, what was in that for me? I’m just exhausted and annoyed, I won’t bother with him again. It seems like the only time men (pretend) to listen to women is when they think it might help them to get you into bed, and even then they can barely manage to keep up the artifice. Men never assume that a woman is more intelligent than them either, so they sit there rattling off their opinions with confidence on something they know next to nothing about, even if the woman they’re talking to has a degree in the subject – at least I’ve met few men who do otherwise.

LM

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A new friend asked me about my day, so I told her that I’d been researching different topics and gave her some basic details. She said to me “you’re a serious little girl, aren’t you?” I’m a woman in my forties and she’s 50.