I don't think anyone ever expects to be the cautionary tale among their friends and family. No one expects these kinds of things to happen to them, but they do. They did to me. Before you assume the worst, let me make a few things clear; I am very lucky. I was not assaulted or raped. Physically, I wasn't harmed at all. However, I wouldn't wish what happened to me on my worst enemy
Flash back to a few months ago.
Like a lot of people my age, I had Tinder, a popular online dating app, downloaded on my phone. It wasn't ever something I was super invested in; just a way to meet people and get a confidence boost every now and again. Seems harmless enough, right?
One night, I was chatting with this guy - let's call him Chad. We had matched earlier that day and been messaging back and forth for a few hours. Nothing of real relevance or interest was said, just a lot of "get to know you" chat with the occasional splash of politics. I wasn't exactly enamored with him, but a conversation is a conversation. As the night went on, he decided that talking wasn't enough and that he wanted to meet. When I hesitated, he made a rather rude comment regarding my looks, my weight and that due to those attributes of mine, he was the best I could possibly do. Offended, I told him that I was not interested and where he could stick that opinion of his.
Chad didn't like that.
Once it became clear that I had no interest in being with him, he lashed out. He began threatening to post our messages onto my college Facebook page (not that they were that exciting to begin with) and that he'd call my work to show the world my "true colors" if I continued to refuse him. F***ing blackmail, people!
Naturally, I was terrified and did my best to talk him down and made up an excuse to leave the conversation without him going crazy on me again. Once the constant stream of messages stopped, I blocked and reported him to Tinder, along with getting rid of my account entirely.
Scary night, lesson learned. Time to move on, right?
Well, that's what I thought before a notification popped up on my Facebook page, a friend request from none other than Chad. I was shaking at this point, I hadn't given him any personal information about me, let alone my last name. How the hell had he found me? The first message came a few minutes later, only one sentence long.
"Well, this is really unfortunate."
He then sent several more messages saying that he truly was a nice guy just trying to meet a good girl and how I'd ruined everything. How I now had to pay. He sent more of the same threats before I'd finally figured out how to block him. The next friend request came 10 minutes later. The picture had changed and the last name was different, but it was him. This kind of behavior went on for most of the night. By the next day, after the incessant friend requests had finally stopped, it seemed that he was done. He'd had his fun and now it was over.
It wasn't.
Harassing and attempting to blackmail me wasn't enough for him. The messages started coming in again, only this time they weren't to me. No, these went to nearly every single person on my Facebook friends list. In them, he called me a whore. He called me a slut. He called me a pathetic, arrogant, ridiculous, pale, entitled fat girl.
He sent that message to my parents.
He sent that message to my friends.
He sent that message to my former teachers, current professors, grandparents, relatives...
He posted that very same, degrading message onto my college Facebook page.
At first, I wanted nothing more than to hide, to crawl under my covers and never leave. I was so incredibly embarrassed and ashamed. How could I face anyone after being publicly humiliated like that? How could I leave my house again knowing that there was this psychopath out to get me?
If I'm being completely honest, those questions haunted me for a while. But you know what? It began to dawn on me that I was not in the wrong here. I have nothing to apologize for. I have nothing to be ashamed of. The only thing I did was say no. I said no and somehow that made it okay for this little worm of a boy to use me as his poetic punching bag. Eleanor Roosevelt once said, "nobody can make you feel inferior without your consent" and it's d*mn time that I learned that. It's about d*mn time everyone else learned that too. Because this is not just my story, this is my voice along with so many others who've been kicked down and made to feel small.
I am not broken.
We are not broken.
The fact of the matter is that "Chad" may see himself as a knight in shining armor, defender of wormy, insecure guys just like him. But here's the thing, he may be a man but I'm a mother f*****g dragon!
So, "Chad" and anyone else who may try and take me down, this is my message to you:
This is not my cautionary tale.
This is not me feeling sorry for myself.
This is my fighting stance, this is my battle cry.
My name is Katie Madigan, and I am not afraid of you.
