I feel creeped out

[moonlight]

Last week, I was texting back and forth with a friend of my parents who I am doing some work for about that work and then he said something to the effect of "I really like you. But can I really say that since I know so much more than you. Thinking that is not immoral." (I don't remember exactly what he said and I don't want to look back at it because I am so bothered by what he said.)

This man is perhaps 30 years older than me and his text made me feel incredibly uncomfortable and I haven't been able to get it out of my head.

I still have some work to complete for him, but I've been putting it off for two weeks because I am so disturbed by what he has said.

I'm afraid when I'm in places where he might be that I will see him there and that he will say something else. I hide me phone from my parents lest he should text me and say something else and they might see. I don't want to have to talk to them about it, as much as I would like their support.

I don't know if I should be less bothered by this, if I am making something out of nothing, but I know that this really bothers me.

I feel ashamed and afraid and I can't get what he said out of my head.

I know I don't have to feel ashamed but I do.

How do I handle this and prevent it from escalating?

(And Heather I know we had a difference of opinion about some things in the past, but I would really welcome your input if you have the time, I really value what you have to say)

[Sam W]

Hi Moonlight,

If the gist of his text was that he's attracted to you, then that is inappropriate from someone who is both older than you and your employer. So it's understandable that would make you feel creeped out. Is this something he's done before?

You mention you don't want to bring this up with your parents. Can you tell me why that is?

[Heather]

Moonlight: happy to pitch in here (and always okay to ask me to: you don't have to want to talk with me every time!).

I am so, so sorry you're dealing with sexual harassment -- and this is textbook sexual harassment -- with an employer. All too many of us have had to in our lives and it's absolutely inexcusable.

You say you still need to finish some work with them: is this about honoring a contract? About needing the income from that work? In a word, I'm trying to see if you even have to do that, since, obviously, if you can just get the heck away from this person and not have to deal with them at all, that'd be safest for you and probably be what you'd prefer.

[moonlight]

Thank you both for your replies.

No, he hasn't done this before.

I don't know why I don't want to tell my parents. Part of it is that I don't want them to be sad that this person has sexually harassed me (thank you Heather for giving this a title). Part of it is that I am uncomfortable about what happened. Part of it is that talking about it out loud makes it more than words on a screen. Because even though I'm talking about it here, it's still words on a screen. And everything just becomes so much more real if I talk about it out loud.

As per this work, there's no contract, but there is a verbal agreement. I don't really need the money. But the thing is that if I didn't do the work, I'm afraid that it would get back to my parents and they would ask me why I didn't do it. Plus I'm doing the same sort of work for someone else, and I don't really want to stop doing that work for the other person and they are friends, so I wouldn't know how to explain why I stopped doing the work without telling him.

I will be moving soon, but the problem is the work can be done remotely and he might even ask me to do more work. Plus he has my cellphone number, so he can reach me wherever I go.

I don't know how to get away from someone who can reach me via my phone.

[Heather]

Okay.

So, my personal best advice would be to go ahead and tell your parents, and figure you are just out with any work with this guy.

I get your concerns with that, and I think you not wanting them to be sad a friend of theirs has turned out to be, to put it nicely, an asshole, is a loving thing. But the fact is that that is who their friend is, as he's so clearly demonstrated, and sometimes our friends do turn out to be assholes. I actually bet few of us who have gotten to be my age (I'm in my late 40s) have not only had a friend who turned out to be a jerk, but one who turned out to be this kind. I know I sure have had more than a few myself. This kind of behaviour is still surprisingly common, and it was only more so 10, 20, 30 and more years back.

And I don't know about your folks, but I really want to know when and if my friends are jerks. I REALLY want to know when the kind of jerk they are is an abusive jerk. I don't want to be friends with someone awful and dangerous without knowing. Yuck. The biggest of yuck. I also want to know if someone in my circle is harming someone else I care about, so that a) I can get that person outta my circles and b) care for that person I care about they hurt.

If the hurt person was my child...all of that, especially that last bit, would be exponentially bigger.

I think -- and loving parents generally think this way, too -- your folks would probably be more sad you didn't tell them than if you did, and would be really unhappy if you were trying to protect them when really, as your parents, the person they want to protect most is probably you. See where I'm going with this?

If you are going to tell them, you can ask for their support in figuring out your next steps. You can report for sexual harassment (as it is a crime) if that's an option you want to explore (or not). You can craft a letter, perhaps with their help, to this man explaining why you are terminating your employment and contact with him, or do that without explaining, if you prefer. And you can also ask them for emotional support, or help finding that elsewhere, or help with things like getting a new phone number, or getting a no-contact order, if you want, and so on.

If you want to talk other ways to do this, we can do that, too, but if the only thing keeping you from ditching this gig and this man with it, and telling your parents is worry you will make them sad, I'd let that go and tell them. Like I said, they probably will be sad, in a bunch of ways, but they will likely be fine, and probably between them have already been through life experiences like this before, at least to some degree.

[moonlight]

So I told my parents and I feel a bit better about things because of it.

I am done working for this guy. I tied up the loose ends that I couldn't avoid (took me about 20 minutes) and sent him an email stating simply that I could no longer do the work for him and providing him with the details he didn't have that were needed to get someone else to finish the work. (And I wouldn't have even done that if it weren't for the fact that it would have been worse because, due to the nature of the work, he would have stayed linked to me.)

I wish my parents had seen this as a bigger deal than they seemed to. I know that things could be so much worse, but to me this is a big enough deal. It's certainly bothering me enough. But they seemed to treat it like it was smaller than I see it.

I don't want to report him and I'm not really sure why. I think it's mostly that I just want to wash my hands of this whole business. I will consider changing my phone number, but that is a major headache (plus I really don't want to explain this whole business to everyone who has my phone number now). I wish that where I am moving to had a different area code, but it doesn't, so that isn't an excuse I can use. But if he contacts me again, I will maybe block him on my phone (I'm pretty sure that I can do that with my phone provider) because that would make me feel better and not be so much of a headache.

I'm expecting an email asking why I won't be completing the work I agreed to and I'm pretty worried about what he might say in that email, but I don't see what I can do about that.

Thank you for your support so far, I really appreciate it.

[Kaizen]

Note if you decide to change your phone number: You definitely don't have to explain why to everyone. Or anyone. Just announce that you've got a new phone number. If anyone asks why, you can just casually say, "Something came up and I changed it." If they keep asking, then they are making it weird, and you can feel free to hand the weird right back with something like, "Why does it matter to you?" or "Why are you making this a big deal?"

Kudos on how you've handled everything so far!

[Sam W]

Hi Moonlight,

Glad to hear you ended the work you were doing with this guy. That can't have felt easy, but hopefully it will make things better in the long run. I agree with Kaizen's advice about what to do should you decide to change your number. I would actually recommend preemptively blocking his number, just to limit the number of platforms he can contact you on.

You mention being concerned about what his email response might be like. Can you tell me a little more about what you think he might say?

[moonlight]

Hi Sam,

I did end up getting a message back from him and it didn't say anything creepy, so I am relieved. (Said some stupid things about how the work I had completed was sub par and incomplete and less than he had expected. All of which tells me he has no inkling that he has done anything wrong, or else he'd know why I'm not working for him. What a creep.)

I've blocked his phone number from texting and calling me. I've also blocked his email. Unfortunately that does just send him to my spam inbox (if anyone knows a way to block him completely, I'd love to know it) which I do check occasionally to make sure that important messages haven't gotten lost, so there is the risk he might send me an email.

But honestly, I don't think this creep knows he did anything wrong/completely forgets he said anything at all so maybe he won't even try to contact me. Either way I won't know.

But now I need to deal with the fact that one of my favourite places is also a place that he goes to sometimes. I REALLY don't want to run into him. But I live in a small town and stopping going to this one place would mean stopping going to that kind of place all together (it's the only one). It would mean stopping my regular routine. It's really the only place to go in town.

I'm going to stop going there. So what do I do if I run into him?

[Sam W]

Long-distance high five for setting up more boundaries around him

In terms of running into him, I don't think you necessarily have to stop going to the place you like (especially if he only is there every so often). If you're anxious about seeing him, you could come up with a plan for what you're going to do if he's there at the same time you are (e.g. would you leave, occupy yourself to look busy, etc). Even if you don't end up needing them, having plans for what to do can help you feel calmer.

[Kaizen]

About email blocking: If you use Gmail, you can set up a rule to automatically delete any email coming from his address.

Or (putting this here for anyone who might read this and find this part useful:) set it to "Skip the inbox", mark it as read, and put a particular label on it, so it's saved somewhere without you having to see or know about it, which I could see as being useful for someone who needs to gather evidence of someone's creepy behavior but doesn't want to unpreparedly be exposed to it.

[Heather]

Just a few thoughts:

1) His response, to me, actually sounds like someone STILL harassing you. I actually think he's probably trying to cover his own butt by saying what he did to you. If you did a crummy job, after all, and that's his story, then he gets cover for this really being about his earlier harassment. People who abuse others typically do things like this.

2) I am very sorry you felt your parents didn't take this seriously or, if they did, that they didn't respond to you in a way that expressed that. Personally, if I had connected someone with someone who would up abusing them in any way at all, I'd be apologizing for making that connection. It stinks that you didn't get that, and I'm sorry you didn't.

3) You get to make whatever choices feel best to you when it comes to reporting. If you don't want to, you don't need a reason, because that doesn't need to be validated. Whatever you want here is already valid.

4) I'm glad to hear you're not going to let this stop you from living your life as you want to, including going to places you enjoy. How you respond to him if he shows up there will be up to you, based on what you feel is right for you. But I'd suggest you consider that you have power here, and that if you just keep going to that place and holding it as yours, he may very well be the one who decides not to go there anymore.

5) In the event he emails or calls you again and you see he has, I'd suggest you get good at quick deletes without looking at content. In other words, you see his name, you don't open what it is, and if you have to to delete, you open it and hit trash without even looking at the content. I know it can be hard not to, but IME, it's better self-care to learn the art of the look-away-and-just-delete.

Hang in there, moonlight. Rooting for you.

[Redskies]

I very much agree with Heather that this guy knows why you're leaving and knows what he did. They nearly-nearly-always do, no matter what they then say and do. His later unpleasant email demonstrates that he knows.

This kind of harrassment functions as a power play from them. Your detaching yourself from him, getting away from him - effectively refusing to submit to it, in short - was you exerting your own power around your own self (as we all have the full right to do, of course). They don't like that, and it scares them, so they say some nonsense to try to belittle you in a different way, and - like Heather said - to cover their own arse. I'm very sure your work was fine, and I'm sure he had no problem with your work.

The ick and the ooginess in this situation was 100% on him, not you. Someone who wants to pull a sexist power-play like that will simply do it to anyone around them they can possibly conceive they might get away with it - which is why young women (and woman-presenting people) are so often on the receiving end of this kind of thing, because people like this think that young women are both less than them and aren't powerful. This was all him and his crappy attitudes, and nothing about you at all. You did great.

[Heather]

Biggest of cosigns with Redskies' last paragraph. I hope you can take that in.

[moonlight]

...you could come up with a plan for what you're going to do if he's there at the same time you are (e.g. would you leave, occupy yourself to look busy, etc). Even if you don't end up needing them, having plans for what to do can help you feel calmer.

This is a good idea. I like the idea about occupying myself to look busy. I'm actually usually quite busy when I'm there anyways so this is easy enough to accomplish. And I'll make leaving be my plan B.

About email blocking: If you use Gmail, you can set up a rule to automatically delete any email coming from his address.

Or (putting this here for anyone who might read this and find this part useful:) set it to "Skip the inbox", mark it as read, and put a particular label on it, so it's saved somewhere without you having to see or know about it, which I could see as being useful for someone who needs to gather evidence of someone's creepy behavior but doesn't want to unpreparedly be exposed to it.

Thanks, this was really helpful. I've done your second suggestion since I may later want a record of this in case I do decide to report him.

1) His response, to me, actually sounds like someone STILL harassing you. I actually think he's probably trying to cover his own butt by saying what he did to you. If you did a crummy job, after all, and that's his story, then he gets cover for this really being about his earlier harassment. People who abuse others typically do things like this.

I hadn't really considered this. I guess in part because it's a whole lot easier to think that he is someone who thoughtlessly said something inappropriate this one time, instead thinking of him as being a manipulative person who repeatedly harasses me, and possibly others.

But it's validating, in a way, to hear that too. Because I felt pretty crummy when he said that. I worked hard up until this harassment started, so hearing that my work was disappointing was, well, disappointing. So it's validating to know that I shouldn't feel crummy because the quality of my work has nothing to do with what I did and everything to do with this guy being a harassing creep.

2) I am very sorry you felt your parents didn't take this seriously or, if they did, that they didn't respond to you in a way that expressed that. Personally, if I had connected someone with someone who would up abusing them in any way at all, I'd be apologizing for making that connection. It stinks that you didn't get that, and I'm sorry you didn't.

Thanks for this. I was really disappointed today to hear my dad casually mentioning the guy's name in conversation, like he had done nothing wrong and was an average regular person.

I very much agree with Heather that this guy knows why you're leaving and knows what he did. They nearly-nearly-always do, no matter what they then say and do. His later unpleasant email demonstrates that he knows.

not really sure how to feel about this. Like I said above it's so much easier to think that he's less of a creep than he is. But I am a person who values the truth, so thank you for giving me your assessment of the truth, I think you're probably right that he knows.

This kind of harrassment functions as a power play from them. Your detaching yourself from him, getting away from him - effectively refusing to submit to it, in short - was you exerting your own power around your own self (as we all have the full right to do, of course). They don't like that, and it scares them, so they say some nonsense to try to belittle you in a different way, and - like Heather said - to cover their own arse. I'm very sure your work was fine, and I'm sure he had no problem with your work.

Looking back on this, he previously said that my work "looks great" so what you're both saying about him covering his arse seems more and more accurate. (And makes this all the more scary since it means I am dealing with a truly horrible and dangerous individual.)

The ick and the ooginess in this situation was 100% on him, not you. Someone who wants to pull a sexist power-play like that will simply do it to anyone around them they can possibly conceive they might get away with it - which is why young women (and woman-presenting people) are so often on the receiving end of this kind of thing, because people like this think that young women are both less than them and aren't powerful. This was all him and his crappy attitudes, and nothing about you at all. You did great.

Thank you so much for this. I feel like crap still but I recognize that the longer I feel this way, the longer I am still thinking about him, the more he wins. So I'm letting myself feel what I feel but I'm not making myself feel any worse.

I know this is not my fault and that he is 100% at fault, but it's so hard to marry what I know to what I feel. And it's so hard to not feel like this doesn't count because it was "so small" because others have had it so much worse. Which is total bunk. In this situation I would say to any other person that it is real and valid, yet I go on feeling this way. Makes me really hate the culture that socialized these feelings and thoughts into my head and told this guy that he can act like this towards women.

I think I've really done everything that I can (aside from reporting which I really appreciate the validation that it is not obligatory) to deal with this. How do I start moving on?

Edited to change a misworded segment.

[Heather]

It depends on what you feel like you need to do that. What do you think?

One thing I did want to ask about from up there was this:

Thanks for this. I was really disappointed today to hear my dad casually mentioning the guy's name in conversation, like he had done nothing wrong and was an average regular person.

It's pretty ooky, at best, to have to listen to someone talk about someone who harassed you like that was no big deal or didn't happen, and like that person is just-whatever when to you they SO are not.

And it's always okay -- or at least it sure should be -- to set limits and boundaries, to make fair asks, with others when it comes to that. So, you could absolutely say to your Dad something to the tune of, "Hey. <Person's name> sexually harassed me, as you know, and then was a jerk to me even after that. Hearing them talked about like that's no big deal is really upsetting to me. Can I ask that you please just not talk about that person around me for now unless you are giving me support or having a discussion of what they did to me I have asked you for?"

How would you feel about doing that?

P.S. I am glad to see your last paragraph there where you unpack the -- agreed, bunk -- idea that trauma can be quantified like that or that somehow, one person naming their abuse as an abuse takes something away from someone else naming theirs when it's a different kind of abuse or trauma. That's really hard for some people to do, and even when you do, it still leaks in sometimes. Keep tossing it.

P.P.S. If it helps, I am someone who has had numerous and multiple experiences of a wide range of kinds of harassment and abuse, probably some kinds you'd think were "worse" than this harassment that has happened to you. I don't think you're taking jack away from me here. Too, I also have experienced sexual harassment at work, and way more than once. Thinking about it, I can name at least six different workplaces/gigs where that's happened to me off the top of my head, and it really is awful. It also often impacts people's economic circumstances in a big way, which really adds an extra component of yuck to this kind of, at best, unprofessional maltreatment, and at worst, outright abuse. You feel bad because this feels bad. This feels gross because it is. You're entitled to all those expected feelings and reactions.

[moonlight]

One thing I did want to ask about from up there was this:

Thanks for this. I was really disappointed today to hear my dad casually mentioning the guy's name in conversation, like he had done nothing wrong and was an average regular person.

It's pretty ooky, at best, to have to listen to someone talk about someone who harassed you like that was no big deal or didn't happen, and like that person is just-whatever when to you they SO are not.

And it's always okay -- or at least it sure should be -- to set limits and boundaries, to make fair asks, with others when it comes to that. So, you could absolutely say to your Dad something to the tune of, "Hey. <Person's name> sexually harassed me, as you know, and then was a jerk to me even after that. Hearing them talked about like that's no big deal is really upsetting to me. Can I ask that you please just not talk about that person around me for now unless you are giving me support or having a discussion of what they did to me I have asked you for?"

How would you feel about doing that?

I almost did this, but we were in a public place when it happened and I didn't want to be overheard, so I just kept reading my book and pretending like I hadn't even heard (he was talking to my mom, but right next to me).

But if he does this again, I will do what you suggest.

It depends on what you feel like you need to do that. What do you think?

Well, I think part of what I need to do is get back to my daily life. Fortunately, my employment with this guy was just a thing I was doing on the side and the major thing I'm doing until I go back to school is volunteering.

But my volunteering hasn't gone into full swing yet (I'm at one place part time and waiting to hear back from another), so I have a lot of time to focus on the ickiness of this situation.

So, number 1 is get busy.

Number 2 is stop talking, and as much as possible, thinking about this creep, unless something new comes up. I've gone over all of my feelings thanks to you lovely people and any more thinking about this, I think, would just do more harm than good.

Number 3 is do some serious self care. That includes taking care of all those little things on my mental to do list that have been dragging me down and taking another look at Self Care A La Carte (http://www.scarleteen.com/article/abuse ... a_la_carte).

[Heather]

Sounds like you've got yourself a pretty great plan, there, and one that's totally doable. That's fantastic, and I wish all the best for you with this.