Today, I am going to detour from my content to discuss what women go through. I want to speak to you guys about something which has been weighing incredibly heavy on me for a number of weeks now. That is the heartbreaking story of Sarah Everard. I am sure that if you are here in the UK, you will have heard all about this case throughout March. For those of you who do not know, Sarah Everard was a young woman in her early thirties. Sarah went missing during a walk home from her friend’s house. A Metropolitan Police Officer was arrested on suspicion of her abduction and murder.
This is a story that has sent shockwaves throughout the country. There was an effort to find Sarah whilst she was missing. People were at a loss for what happened. First and foremost, before I get into this blog post and explain the reason why I am writing this today. I just want to mention how deeply saddened I am that Sarah lost her life at the hands of an absolute monster. I cannot even imagine the immeasurable pain which her family is currently going through. My thoughts are with them and I pray that they get the answers that they need and have the time and space to grief for their relative.
The reason why I wanted to sit down and write this blog post today is not to speak about what happened to Sarah. I want to take this time to discuss a broader topic. This has been mentioned since the passing of Sarah and that is the safety of women. I am sure that over the past couple of weeks, you have seen the discussions on social media and the images being posted on Instagram. It just hit home a little too hard for me. The hard truth is that woman darent walk after dark. That is because of the threats that are out there. We have all been cat called. Or taken a longer route home. Had to swap shoes to trainers in case we need to run and so much more.
I feel like the big issue here is that as woman. We have been forced to believe that this is just part of our everyday life. We have to be prepared to run for our lives in case a man jumps out at us. It is normal to have to text our friends when we are home so they know we haven’t been attacked on our way home. These are not normal things to have to do. These are things that we have been conditioned to believe are normal. If people acknowledged that it was wrong, they would then have to work hard on trying to rectify the problem. So it is easier for women to have to deal with this. Then we have the men who as soon as a topic like this is brought up, come out with #NotAllMen. Which I will say is fucking bullshit.
I think it was Jameela Jamil that hit the nail perfectly on the head.
THIS. THIS. THISSSSSSSSSSS.
This dredged up my own memories of something that happened to me when I was 19 years old. I haven’t shared this story very often because I always saw it as a little bit of a sob story. I think that we need to talk about these experiences. It is things like this which happen to a woman every single day and they traumatize us for the rest of the life. The only way that change will happen is by everybody being 100% aware of the shit that us woman go through. I thought that I would bite the bullet and put my experiences. In the hope that if a man is reading this, they take something from it. If a mother is reading this they educate their son. And if somebody is reading this who has been through something similar, they know that they are strong.
For me, it all started when it was a wonderfully hot day in the middle of summer. I was sat at work and I got a text from one of the girls asking if I wanted to meet in the beer garden. After pretending that I was going to head straight home for all of 10 minutes, I let her know that I would be there at 4pm prompt and that she better have the wine on ice. I got there and we had a blast. The sun felt glorious, we had some food to share, wonderful wine and it was just so great to gossip and have a great time with my best pals.
When it was time to head home, I text me now-husband who was my boyfriend at the time to let him know that I was walking home and I would ring him when I got in (something I shouldn’t have to do, but again, conditioned to do it). He responded saying “I know you are a strong independent woman who doesn’t need a man, but just get a taxi”. My house was only a 15-minute walk away down two long roads. I just dismissed it and started my walk home. One thing that I feel I do have to say is that I always adored where I lived. It was the kind of place where everybody knew everybody, the streets were all whimsical and treelined like something out of a Bronte novel and it was wonderful.
Anyway, I was walking down one of the roads on my route home and I could feel that something was off. I looked over my shoulder and there was a man stumbling quite a distance. So, I just carried on and picked up the base a little bit. After a few minutes, I looked back over my shoulder to see where he was, and he was walking about two paces from me. I did think that he may have just wanted to overtake me and with him having longer legs he caught me up. So I slowed down and moved to the side thinking that he would just stroll past. Seconds later he had me on the floor and his body weight was on top of me. It all happened that quickly, I cannot even remember him reaching out and grabbing me.
I could smell the beer on his breath as he lay on top of me and his whole body was pressing me down and his lips grazing my cheeks. He then got up onto his knees and forced one of his legs straight through the middle of my knees which I was pressing together with all of my might. With my legs open, I felt his hand go straight up my skirt and down my underwear. I was kicking and screaming, trying to push him away, but he dwarfed me and I didn’t stand a chance. My mind flicked back to growing up with 6 burley uncles that used to wrestle me and slam me to the ground and how I would get away.
If I didn’t act I would get raped in the side of the street. Under the dark of the trees, so I fought. I wrapped my leg around one his, put one hand on his side, the other on the side of his head and I found a strength within to push him off.
Within seconds I was on my feet and running for my life. He was seconds behind me. I was in 4 inch Manolo Blahnik heels, but fuck him, I was getting away. I decided to try and throw a curveball by running a hard right and up somebody’s drive. It was a risky move because god knows what was up the driveway, but I needed to get into somebody’s home and get safe. I couldn’t run the whole way home. I ran the door of the house and tried the handle. The door was locked. That cost me a couple of seconds.
My flight mode kicked in and I was running again. This time he was behind me so I couldn’t go back the way I came. My only chance was over the fence into the neighbors garden. Luckily for me, it was only a 4ft fence.
I ran and hopped the fence, again grateful for my brutal uncles that treated me like a little boy. Sprinting, I made it to the front door and thank the lord, the door flung open. I ran into this strange house, slammed the door, and screamed for help. I pushed my body weight up against the door to barricade it and he began banging on the other side. Then, two little faced appeared around the door. I would say that the combined age of these two people was 170. The old man turned to his wife and said ‘June, go and lock the doors and windows, then call the police”. He walked up to me as quick as he could manage, he put a key in the door and turned the lock. I then fell to the floor and broke down completely.
He sat with me while I sobbed. Not only had dear old June rang the police. She also rang her two sons and daughter who all lived locally and they came to help. June had asked her daughter to bring me some pajamas. They allowed me to speak to the police in their house. They heard my sorry story and sat with me the whole time. June and Allan were positively wonderful and were my guardian angels. June stroked my hair. Allan had just arm around me. Their family stood near the front door to check that he wasn’t coming back.
I was incredibly apologetic for taking the trouble to their door. Honestly, I don’t think that I could have said sorry anymore. They were wonderful. After that, we stayed in touch and sadly both of them passed away a number of years ago. They were simply amazing and our families merged. We became this one very strange, but truly wonderful family unit. I loved them wholeheartedly.
The phycological effects that this has had on me, have taken their toll on me and my life. I do all of the things that other women do. Take longer routes, take taxis instead of walking, avoid eye contact, wear sensible shoes. Things I shouldn’t have to do, but in the world that we live in, I need to do that. Sadly, the police also didn’t want to take anything further. I had no hard proof. No CCTV footage and I couldn’t identify him. Which is the case for so many women with sexual harassment cases. Now, in a box I have the battered pair of Manolo Blahnik that I don’t want to part with because they saved my life that night, helping me getaway.
I didn’t want to share my story to get sympathy. I am past the trauma and I have to deal with that in my actions every single day. Let’s just make sure that the men in our lives are better. That things are better for us moving forward and that we feel safe and secure at all times. We should not have to change our way of life, due to the fear of what might happen. The year is 2021 and we deserve so much better.
