#whywomendontreport

So, I went out on a blind date the other night. Met the guy on Bumble, offered to meet for a drink at a craft cocktail bar in town where I know the staff.

First off, his pictures were at least 10 years old and said he was surprised I didn't recognize him from them. Second, he started asking very overtly sexual questions like "do you have any kinks" and "what do you like in bed" and "are you capable of multiple orgasms." The final nail in the coffin was asking, while slowly dragging his eyes from my face to my lap and back, "is your nose piercing the only place you have any hardware?"

I hate myself for not ending the date the second the first inappropriate question came out of his mouth, but I just waited for him to be ready to leave since he told me he had an early morning meeting. He messaged me later in the evening asking for my phone number and when I didn't answer right away, messaged "I guess you didn't have as much fun as I did LOL" I responded with "thanks for driving up here to meet me and thank you for buying my drink, but there won't be a second date. You made me uncomfortable with your inappropriate, overtly sexual questions that were creepy and in no way flirty, so please don't contact me again."

It is SO HARD in the moment to be present and think quickly enough to stop this kind of conversation as it's happening. I know for myself, I'm conditioned to be polite and try to change the subject and wait for the right opportunity to escape the situation with a minimal amount of danger when what I should have done was say "You don't get to talk to me like that, we're finished here" and pick up my purse and wrap and leave. It didn't even really occur to me consciously that I could do that until it was already over. And now I'm really angry at myself for actually saying the words "I don't put up with that kind of crap" to him in a discussion about harassment and then actually putting up with it because I was too nice/polite/anxious/scared to put my foot down and walk away in reality. 

Seriously, what is wrong with me? NOTHING. Nothing is wrong with me. Four and a half decades of social politeness took over. I'm embarrassed and disappointed that I didn't react differently in the moment and I'm going to work really hard to never do that again.