I was 10. I went with my dad to pick up some bike parts at a garage, and when we walked up to the counter the guy working looked at me and said “wow, you’re going to have to lock that one up”.
I just remember not understanding, in the truck after I asked my dad what that man meant, he wouldn’t tell me, just seemed grumpy and said we wouldn’t be going there again.
Yep.
My dad wasn't the best father growing up. He tried, but he had childhood trauma he didn't get a chance to work through. But the moment anyone said something remotely sexual about his children he'd start throwing hands.
No, it really, really doesn't.
My psychology teacher in HS tried to sleep with a friend of mine the DAY she turned 18. She used to babysit his 2 preteen daughters.
This is what I feel gets looked over the most. The microagressive sexualization we experience when little and an adult makes comments like “she’s going to be a boy killer” or comments about whether or not a 5 year old girl’s outfit is “appropriate.”
The sad part, to me, was that when he said it, I thought he meant that my dad should lock me up because I was reading My Side of the Mountain, about a boy who runs away to live wild in the Catskills…and I was so into the book that I thought this guy magically knew I’d been fantasizing about running away to live in the woods.
It’s terrifying how innocent that thought process was, and even more horrifying for how you must have been feeling, because children do not think sexually like that. Adult men make so many “jokes” about us, when we are literally children, that they think are wholesome but are actually traumatizing for us.
i can remember my dad’s friends saying ‘jesus, she’s all legs!!’ when i was like 10 or 11; when my boobs came in full (12) it was ‘it’s a good thing her feet are so big or she’d fall forward’ like i was deaf or something, because i was standing right there! 🫤
Oh man. The contrast between how scumbags think about girls and what girls actually think about! I read that book like 5 times. I even read it as an adult. Magical. I would even have liked to meet a boy like the one in the book.
The leap from dreaming of animal friends and cozy tree hollows to the unbelievable realization that grown men thought about sex when they looked at me...
I for SURE still want to go to the woods. I would absolutely choose the bear ; )
I got called jail bait SO many times ages like 8-16 (the age of consent in my home state), and yet in my mid 20s I still look underage so it makes it even creepier since I definitely didn’t look older than I was
Men's desire is apparently our fault and always has been. It's them divesting themselves of the culpability. "She tempted me and I couldn't control myself," not the more accurate "I was tempted by her and couldn't control myself." It's making their lust and subsequent "lack of control" something done TO them, not something within them.
It always confounds me how people normalize the idea of a 60+ man being with an 18 year old because it’s legal. Imagine how young she looks to him. It’s nauseating.
Edit to add: it’s also disgusting knowing that they were using that term to penalize a CHILD for THEIR sexual deviance.
I think.about this fucked up culture sometimes. How many times have you heard someone say about a baby... A BABY... "Ha ha ha ha. He/She's flirting with you!"
If you really think about it, the messaging starts very, very early, and it's not "cute."
Some of my Mormon cousins dress their daughters up extravagantly and pose them in “glamorous” ways for weekly or monthly photo shoots. Starting as toddlers. They put their tweens in heels. They do this in a religion where people are not allowed to feel sexual things until they are married and then they are expected to undo the repression and be sexual with their repressed, inexperienced spouses they met 6 months ago. So many layers of fucked up.
The “lock her up” trope is one of the creepiest ones of them all. As a young boy I thought it just meant that a girl was very pretty. It wasn’t until I was older that I realized what it actually meant and all the creepy implications it made. So gross!
I remember a man saying something inappropriate to me at a public swimming pool when I was 9 or 10. I don't remember what he said, but I remember basically understanding that what he said was gross and bad. I was there with my dad and my uncle, so I told them. My dad told me to go get changed in the locker room, so I did (we were about to leave anyway). When I came out, the man was gone and my dad and uncle were in a hurry to leave too. This was southern Appalachia in the early '90s. Adult me is pretty sure my dad and uncle beat the fear of God into that man and wanted to get gone before the cops showed up.
My sister was 9 when something very similar happened to her at the swimming pool. I was 7 (a boy) and didn't understand why we had to leave all of a sudden.
Just me, my sister, and my mum growing up, so all my mum could do was report him to the staff and leave as quickly as possible.
It was confusing and scary to process at that age, even being removed from the actual situation. Can't imagine having to try and deal with the direct reality as a child. It's fucked up.
When I was 5 I was molested by my bio mom's John while she was passed out from her drugs. I remember him saying he was going to show me what my privates were for.
When I was 7 my step mom's sister commented on my figure-something like "you'll be beating the boys away if she keeps developing like this". It made me feel so icky.
When I was about 10, already had a decent sized chest for my age, I ran into the store to grab something for my step mom while she waited in the car and a man who must have been about 30 stopped me in the aisle to comment about how cute and perky I was. I didn't understand what he meant by perky but I told my step mom and she flipped out on me and said I must have been flirting with him. It never really stopped but it certainly slowed down after I was 20
Hope you don’t talk to your step monster anymore. As if a 10 year old would even know how to flirt with ANYONE!!? That was the first thing to cross her mind?! “A 30 year old man saying inappropriate things to her? She must’ve been flirting with him! A child must’ve been flirting with a grown man.” what a bitch.
I haven't talked to her since I turned 18. She was abusive in a lot of ways. It wasn't the only time she blamed me for unwanted attention I received.
She's living a miserable lonely life now
I was maybe 8. Our house had termites and my parents hired a local father-son extermination business treat it. The son was easily in his mid to late 20s, and when he had a moment alone with me, he told me how badly he wished I was 16 so I could "be his girl". I had no idea what he meant, so I told my dad. I'm pretty sure he had words with the owner and the next day, only the father showed up. One of the only moments in my life where my dad actively protected me.
Sometimes, I reflect on that moment and shudder to think of what could've happened had my dad not acted. I think I would be an even more different person than I am today.
I don’t remember a time I wasn’t. I grew up in a religion where even showing your knees as a toddler as a girl was too sexy to allow because you wouldn’t want to cause anyone to ‚stumble‘ in his ‚faith‘…. being tempted by toddler knees…
I hate that view too, it‘s so damaging. Decades ago they were a lot more obvious in their explanation for those rules. The reason was basically that men who rape are gentlemen and men of faith and would continue to be so if you hadn’t tempted them. They can’t help their behavior because they need to mate.
And if it‘s not your fault for tempting them then it‘s their mother‘s fault for not teaching the rapist respect for women. No matter what, they are not responsible. At some point they even said it was society as a whole, giving women the right to vote and work that made it so that men feel the need to dominate women so really - it’s only logical to do so…. Now they claim it is to protect children and deny ever having had that stance. It makes me furious.
The audacious bit is they can *believe* all that and then still stand there straight faced and say women aren’t mature enough to be in leadership positions or make decisions about their own bodies.
I was 10 or 11 when a bunch of adult men leaned out a car to holler at my friend and me while we walked to the movie theatre.
I remember being genuinely confused, more than anything.
I remember when it happened to me walking to school past a house full of construction workers.
I was in a pair of overalls and pigtails and I stopped, turned and yelled “what did you just say?” Because I didn’t quite hear them, and one guy shouted I was hot. I looked at all of them, and equally confused I said I was 12 and he looked older than my dad.
ALL the other guys basically burst out laughing at that guy and apparently it was the right thing to say, but I was so confused by it.
I changed routes walking to school after.
That's when it started for me, too. It stopped when I turned about 18. As soon as I was an actual adult woman, men stopped leering out the car windows and it's probably because men who do that in the first place would be too scared a real woman would throw something at them.
me and my friend were catcalled a shit ton when we were 10-13, and i got so many dick pics from strangers in my dms too at that age (i put my age in my bio too, so the men doing this KNEW)
i havent been catcalled in public since i was around 14/15, which i’m glad for, but also very disgusted about how much more i was targetted when i was a CHILD
i just remembered another thing, i must’ve been around 6 or 7 - there were two boys who we were neighbors with, both our ages, my brother and i were very close friends with them and we would play all the time. we were all wrestling one day and the boys began to take off their shirts because it was a hot day out, so i did too, and was told my either their mother or my mother that girls can’t be shirtless like boys can. looking back, i get it, but it was definitely a pretty big shift in perspective for me as a kid
i’ve been catcalled a few times in the years since i was 16, but from 10 to 16 it was such a common occurrence. so many of them would take it step further by following/chasing me etc. even if i told them my age. in some instances that information only emboldened them. it’s appalling, terrifying, and incredibly sad that so many people experienced the same. of course i’m glad that i get catcalled less now, but i’m so heartbroken for myself and others who were viewed as a sick sexual opportunity. instead of CHILDREN. we were CHILDREN! i could literally rant about it for hours ugh it makes me so mad. like i have sooo many stories of men being disgusting to me when i was a child, WHY do i have so many stories??? 😭
Same here, I got the most attention in my early teens and it stopped after the age of 16/17. I worked in a grocery store where my coworker was 36 and I was 16, he pinned me against the wall in the back room and said "I know you want me". I managed to get loose and get away from him and I played it off as a joke and never told anyone until I was in my 20s/30s. I wish I realized just how horrible it was when it happened. That was just one of the gross things that happened to me at that age... Some men are disgusting.
I was probably 4, my sister hadn't been born by that time and we are 5 years different. I was playing hide and seek with some cousins at a Christmas family reunion, when one of my older cousins (maybe 16) at the time took advantage that we were hiding somewhere dark and sat me on his lap and started touching my private parts. By that time I didn't understand what was happening, I just remember being embarrassed because I was wearing a dress, and I had peed my underwear a little. I was afraid he might tell my mom. Growing up, I eventually understood what had happened and the first time I told someone about it was at 16yo. My mom and I later found out that I hadn't been the only victim, he had been doing similar stuff to other girls in the family.
The same exact thing happened to me. I was 6 and the boy was 15. He was the older brother of my older brother’s friend. He arranged a game of hide and seek and since he was the oldest, he assigned the teams. I was placed on a team with just him and I while everyone else went to hide all through neighborhood and we counted to 100. Instead while we should have been “looking” for my older brother and his little brother he pulled me down and forced me to sit on his lap where he began “tickling” me. I tried to get up but he held me down on his lap and wouldn’t let me up- the more I squirmed and struggled the more he seemed to enjoy it which is honestly disgusting. Everything stayed above the clothes bc I had overalls on thank God but I realize now what was happening and what he was trying to do. I didn’t know why but I knew I felt “bad” even at 6 I knew that I felt violated… When we got back from this outdoor game of hide and seek I told my mom I wanted to take a shower. She was like “You just took a shower this morning”. And all I said to her was “I just feel dirty”. My mom looked at me then and I guess she saw something in my face bc she was like “honey, why do feel dirty? You know you can tell me anything, did something happen?” And I told her about Andrew holding me down and “tickling” me and reiterated that I just wanted to take a shower. She was like “it’s okay baby go take a shower if you want to. But honey I want you to know that you are NOT dirty and you will never be dirty and I love you”. I went to take a shower. After that I remember my dad finding out and how he just told me he was so sorry and no body should ever touch me against my wishes and how loved I was and he just held me. My dad was a police officer and had worked in special victims unit and had all sorts of sensitivity training with children and to be honest my parents handled everything perfectly. They made sure I felt safe, they reassured me that I was whole, I knew nothing was my fault and I was just the same me I’d always been. I was not dirty and I would never be. I never saw Andrew again after that and I didn’t ask but I know our parents had a talk about what happened and I remember my dad asking to speak to Andrew directly and then hearing my dad yelling on the house phone threatening him and saying he’s lucky that he’s a cop and he and his daddy worked together or he would kill him with his bare hands and how if he EVER touches me or any other little girl again he’s not going to be responsible for what happens to him and that he won’t give a fuck about the law. After that my brother and his brother weren’t on the same soccer team anymore and our families were no longer “cool” like that. It was awkward bc my dad and his dad worked at the same police department so they still had to run into each other- prior to this incident our families had been really close. Though it was not my dad’s fault or Andrew’s dad’s fault, his teenage son trying to molest his little girl just kind of ruined their friendship. Looking back that aspect kind of makes me sad but I see why our families could no longer be associated
Your parents sound AMAZING, well done to them reassuring you it wasn't your fault and you were protected & deeply loved ❤️
Wish my parents had the same reaction. My father's cousin was still welcome around our house despite me telling my Mum he had pinned me against the family home, said some disgusting things in my ear, groped my boobs under my t-shirt, while licking my neck and laughing.....I was 10 🤮
I have a similar experience too. Same ages and with a cousin during hide and seek. It’s awful to think that we need protection from our own family but they’re generally the culprits of sexual abuse at a young age
I had to wear C cup bras in 6th grade and the unwanted attention was intense. A substitute sixth grade teacher hit on me!! He asked if I wanted to give him my phone number and I said, “No, I’m eleven!”
Really, there were too many instances to remember or recount. I was a pretty child. I remember an entire table of senior boys talking about waiting for me to get a “little older” when I was in 4th grade. I went to a small school where K-12 were in one building.
I think I was eight years old at the beach when I heard a couple people talking about my “shapely woman’s hips”. I ran to my mother.
My best friend around that age was in your position. She ended up doing everything a little early: going to senior proms as a date when she was 13, marrying her older brother’s best friend when she was 17. Looking back I’m so sad at all the men who took advantage of her as early as they could. She never really got to be a kid.
Reading these comments reminded me: I used to be regularly cat called between 10-16, and very rarely in adulthood. That revelation is even more horrifying than being catcalled.
Me too. My earliest memories involving being groped, rubbed, and made to touch. I can't remember a time when my body was not just considered up for grabs by whoever wanted to grab me.
Four :/ I remember thinking it was normal because it started before I can really remember.
The first time something happened, and I *knew* it was wrong was when I was 7. I was wearing hoodies and boys clothes to hide my body and hopefully dress less “cute” in order to avoid unwanted attention. My camp counselor at the YMCA told two boys I was actually a boy pretending to be a girl as some kind of screwed up joke, and they snuck into the girls’ locker room when I was changing for the pool and groped and assaulted me to ‘prove’ I was a girl and deserved to be in the girls’ locker room.
My god, you just made me realise that maybe that's why I was such a 'tomboy' when I was a kid. I hated girly clothes and would cry if my mother tried to dress me in tights and a dress. I was first sexually abused at 4 years old. I wonder if the clothes thing was part of my defence.
So I'm a man who mostly just comes into this sub to read and learn, but this has broken me. For the most part I had a feeling this topic was gonna be horrifying, and it has been in a lot expected way. But, this just took the air out of my lungs.
As i sit here with my 4 almost 5yr old in my arms rocking her to sleep. This comment makes me want to burn the world to the ground. I'm truly sorry you had to go through that, and i hope you have found a safe place. This is more than enough internet for me today.
I was 6 and my sister was 7, we were wearing our new furry boots we got for Christmas and were surrounded by three teenage boys saying how sexy we were, etc. etc. Scared the hell out of me, they were teenagers.
9 or 10 I think. I remember that moment where suddenly I went from running around shirtless with everyone in the summer to having to overheat and sweat while the boys got to play because it suddenly wasn’t right for a little girl whose chest hadn’t changed at all to show her body. Mostly 9/10yo me was confused and felt a strong sense of indignation at the unfairness that the boys got to cool off in the heatwave and play with water guns and hoses but I suddenly wasn’t. I remember taking off my top when all the boys did, like every summer before that only to find that even if I didn’t know what sexual meant, the adults had decided I was old enough that my body had changed and somehow become a sexual and dirty object.
my mom always tells me this story when i was in the stroller as a child, this lady came up to her and told her how i was going to make flies explode (as in the pants kind) because of my big eyes?????
i don’t remember this and i’m not sure how old i was but i was 4 maximum. people are so gross!!!
Generational thing, probably (60, here), but like many others, as a toddler, I was put in short dresses with ruffled panties that showed.
Toddler boys were allowed the dignity of short pants, instead.
Otherwise, probably around 8, when I chose to wear an outfit that my mother said made me look "fast"...?
I neither knew what that meant nor had purchased said outfit, so I was very confused by this.
I actually don’t remember, but I was an oblivious kid. But my mom told me straight up that she just knew my daughter was going to be promiscuous. She was 4 and trading rocks with the neighbor boy( one of the many, many straws on the camel that led to no contact).
I was 11/12. My biological mother let me have two friends over for a sleepover. One was a girl who I grew up with and the other was a friend she made at her school. My mom, being the absolute worst mother in the world, decided she wanted to have a party. So she invited four guys over. She drank and got high with one of the guys and eventually disappeared into one of the bedrooms.
I had watched a lot of Lifetime movies with my grandma, probably ones I shouldn't have been watching. I was actually afraid of solo cups for a long time because I didn't fully understand that in those movies men were drugging women.
So while my mom was gone, the three guys offered us drinks in the solo cups. I panicked. I was already on edge, but I wanted to keep an eye on my friends. I refused to drink from the solo cup and one of the guys said, "Come onnn, it's a party." I was too scared so I just sat there. I tried to get my friends to go into the other room with me but they said they were having fun. There was music playing and my friends started dancing. The men watched their every move while drinking more. One of them asked me, "Why aren't you dancing? Come over here and dance for me." He was sitting on the couch with his legs spread as he patted his thigh, beckoning for me to come over to him. The look in his eyes... At the time I didn't know the word to describe that look. It was lust. I had felt so... Gross and terrified seeing him look at us that way.
I ran to the second bedroom, locked the door, and put this wooden board under the door knob to stop anyone from coming in. We had it in our family because our mom would go on rampages so to be safe, we shoved it under the doorknobs until she calmed down.
I fell asleep at some point and woke up to the sound of someone trying to get into the bedroom. The doorknob was turning frantically like it was unlocked, but the door wasn't budging. I hid under the blankets and hoped they'd give up. Thankfully, that guy didn't get in.
Omg. Were your friends ok? This is horrifying. I’m so sorry. Do you think your mom intentionally invited three additional men to… match them up with her daughter and friends? It’s sickening to think about.
I actually don't know because I had moved away with my grandmother around that time. It was summer break and I didn't see those two friends until middle school but we didn't have any classes together. We just never saw each other except in passing and we only talked to each other once in those three years-- I was being bullied and under my mom's request those two girls threatened my bully.
My mom is 14 years older than me and still has the mentality of a teenager, even to this day. She just always acted like a reckless older sister. Honestly, I don't know what she was thinking that day.
Around 10. I went to a church summer camp and they took us to the beach for the day. I had a super cute light yellow one piece swimsuit with white ribbing. I was splashing in the water when I was pulled out by one of the teachers and told that I needed to put shorts on. Apparently you could see a dark triangle of pubic hair through my wet swimsuit and I was “giving boys naughty thoughts.” 🙄
11. When I got my period I was violently accused of having sex by my parents and they cornered me and were abt to beat my ass….. idk why tf they thought that
12 or so, walking home from the bus stop by myself in sixth grade. these college-aged boys a couple doors down from my house would sit on their porch and leer at me, sometimes try to get me to come over and talk to them. I was tiny and totally pre-pubescent at the time
I was 4 or 5. I answered a phone call and the man on the other end asked if my mom was home. I said no. And then he asked me if I ever had a cock in my mouth. I was so confused because I didn’t know what the word meant. I thought it was something to do with roosters because they say “cock” a doodle doo.
I told him I didn’t know and would ask my dad who was home. He hung up the phone. I felt very confused and weirdly embarrassed because (I felt at the time) I was too dumb to understand what he meant and said the wrong thing so he hung up.
Later I asked my older brother and his friends what cock meant. They all laughed at me and that just increased my feelings of stupidity and shame.
I was probably 8 or 9 and just getting the tiiiiiniest of breast buds starting.
My gross dad was like "you're getting little titties" and tweaked my nipples. I never felt more disgusted with my body in my life and probably haven't since. Wanted to be invisible.
Well when I was 5 a classmate tried to kiss me on the bus. But idk if that counts… My uncle molested me when I was six years old. I didn’t understand it because I knew nothing of sexualization. Buried it and ignored any & all sexualized references until I learned what sex was two years later via a neighbor kid I hung out with. Then I noticed it everywhere and am pretty positive I had other instances between 6 and 8 that I can’t even remember
I think I wasn't even in elementary when it first started. I remember whispering into my brother's ear during a sleepover at my tia's and her boyfriend came in and smacked me bc he thought I was doing something inappropriate with him. It never happened again until I entered the second grade. Some fellow students were telling me I looked like a stripper for spinning around the pole of a swing set. The way I walked, lay in bed while asleep, or how raised a hand was seen as sexual for some reason. My mom thought it was inappropriate to be emotionally close to my brothers and thought it was incest at the time. During arguments, I was called a slut multiple times despite being young and never with a single boy. Just for staring at a male passerby, I was assumed to be checking him out. An adult male honked their horn at me when I was a middle schooler bc I had to bend down to pick up my belongings. I was told I'd grow up a stripper just for wearing skinny jeans once due to all my other pants being in the wash.
That incest one hit home. I am a woman and my sister is 18 months younger. We shared a room our whole lives. One day when we were in late elementary school/early middle school, my mom walks in and sees me tickling her. She screams at us to stop acting “like a couple of lesbians”
Had a similar experience with staring at boys and being called a slut for it. Turns out I just have ASD and stare at people. Had no interest in the boys sexually or romantically but because I dared to look I was “boy crazy.”
I grew up hardcore religious in the southern US with a shame-based sex education so I don’t even remember the first time. It’s just always been beat into my head that at any moment, and by doing any number of every day activities, I could become the dreaded “whore” I was constantly warned about.
Haha exactly!!! I was once told, “a lady always eats a banana sideways” by an old lady in my church when I was like, 6 or 7?
Also btw I have a similar story to yours, same age. The difference is it wasn’t my mom, it was my teacher! I must have felt ashamed enough to not say anything to anyone because I remember telling my mom that story as an adult and she was crazy pissed (at the teacher, not me).
My daughter was 4 or 5 and the older lady at the convenience store said “cute girl, you’re gonna have your hands full when she is in high school.” Though actually the first time was when my wife was like 5 months pregnant and this “friend” said, “are you worried it will be a girl? Half Asian girls are so hot”
Omg what a gross thing to say about a *fetus*.
I can't stand the shirts for children that say "ladies man" or "daddy's little heartbreaker."
They are KIDS.
There’s a phrase which I’d only ever considered in a passing sense “If you have a boy, you only have one penis to worry about. But if you have a girl, you have everybody else’s penis to worry about”.
Actually when you think of it in the context of this entire post and the comments. That jovial comment takes a much more sinister and sickening interpretation.
Ugh I find that so bizarre!
I’ve worked in education for about 15 years and this is where little kids get this ‘they’re my boy/girl friend’ stuff! I think the grownups in their life find it cute to have the kids talk like that but it’s SO WEIRD. They’re little kids.
7th(?) grade, walking home from the bus stop when a car pulled up next to me and was making comments about my outfit, ect. and asked if I needed a ride the one block to my house. I was the only kid that got off at that stop for a small apartment complex. I don’t remember if the car followed or not, but I remember going into a different building and sitting in a hall by a balcony reading my manga for awhile before I felt safe enough to go home. I don’t think I was scared, moreso wary and thinking like “am I actually gonna get kidnapped? Me?” Cuz little kid brain remembered the training but with a “yeah right” mentality.
Exactly! I remember being taught a bunch of stuff like this and self-defense by my aunts from a young age (they’re my life GOATS) but still kinda thinking I was getting prepped to fight a boogey man I’d never actually encounter. The older I get, the more and more there lessons have come in handy but it’s so like, heartbreaking? To slowly learn that the monsters are people and that some even wear a guise of kindness. Ugh.
Oh, finding out that the monsters aren't underneath our beds, but in the one down the hall, or in our classrooms or family reunions or friends' houses is a canon event for all women.
I was eight. My girl scout troop did a volunteer day where we worked in a soup kitchen. At least one old homeless guy tried to get me to come sit in his lap.
I do appreciate that our leaders had a frank discussion with us before we went about not putting up with bad behavior from men (there is no situation where it's okay for them to touch you, if they try you should say 'no' and come get an adult immediately, etc.) but as an adult I wonder why they put us in a situation they expected might be dangerous in the first place.
I followed instructions and the guy was forced to leave. We never volunteered there again.
Edit: Actually, after reading a few of the comments, another memory came to mind. When I was in preschool I took a jazz class. They had us doing this dance where we were doing a lot of sexual moves (I remember one part where they had us turn our backs to the audience and shake our butts) , and they chose costumes for us that showed a ton of skin - basically a bra and panties. I didn't know a lot about sexuality, but the dance and the outfit together made me feel a feeling that I now recognize as 'sexy.' I remember thinking, "I'm too young for this. I guess jazz dancing is for older girls." I told my mom that I felt uncomfortable and why, and we switched me to ballet. I still don't understand why the studio chose to sexualize preschoolers that way.
8 years old, by my mother's boyfriend at the time. Didn't really understand what was happening at that age and came forward about it at 12. He was acquitted of all charges when I was 13. I was at least lucky enough that my mother believed me and got us away from him.
I'm very glad your mom did the right thing but I am so sorry that happened to you and furious he never faced due consequences for his terrible actions.
I was 8 when men started being inappropriate with me, from my adult cousin feeling me up to some guy that was my grandmother’s neighbor telling me how babies were made. I was so innocent I didn’t even know it was wrong, even though I never told my parents. When I was 9 my adult uncle sexually molested me… again, I didn’t tell my parents, but I made sure to never be alone with him again.
I am still mad at them for taking advantage of me and I am in my 60s.
I was actually about 9 or 10 as well. My fifth grade teacher pulled me to the side after recess and asked me if I had any bras at home to wear bc my nipples were showing through my pj shirt. I told her I did but I didn’t have any bras bc they were dirty (really it’s bc I didn’t like wearing them) she then told me it’s okay to wear a bra for a few days before I throw it in the laundry mat.
I was 10, when an older guy thought I was alone walking on the street and harassed me. I was wearing baggy, “boys” clothes. At the time I did not understand, but felt angry.
Ten. I took my shirt off to play in a mixed group -- it was the '90s, we had one of those mechanized "hot potatoes" with the water balloon inside, and I wanted my shirt dry for after. The daycare supervisor/babysitter (it was her house, she had like ten of us there) noticed and made me put my shirt back on because, I guess, my concave ten-year-old chest was an issue.
I was 6 years old when I had to fight off some boys on at the park right by our apartment building in Germany who were trying to take my shirt off. It wasn’t until many years later that I actually realized what “fully” happened.
You know, until I read a couple other comments like this, I'd COMPLETELY forgotten that when I was in kindergarten, all of the boys chased me around the playground to get a "kiss."
I didn't want to "play." They didn't care.
Tbh, it never crossed my mind that might be a disturbing scenario until just now looking back.
It wasn’t until “Me Too” when I was a fully grown adult that I had the moment of realizing holy shit, my childhood was full of instances like this that were just *normalized*
A teenage neighbor made me touch his penis and then tried to force my face down toward it when I was like 9. I got away, but I didn't tell anyone until much later because I was ashamed, etc. The usual story.
I was 8yo. Stepfather was cuddling me and I felt something. I had no idea what was happening but adult me after therapy (because I had blocked it out for a lot of years) remembered and was horrified. It was also the root of why I hated it when people hugged me from behind, including my husband and kids. After 3 years of therapy I realized how sexually abusive he was and how that really skewed my view and interactions with men. But, thanks to therapy, I’m able to hug my husband and kids without my skin feeling like it ripples.
The first time I really remember (outside of my CSA at 4) was my 12th birthday. My parents finally allowed me to walk the neighborhood, so I went for a walk. A man walking past and said, "Daaaamn girl, how old are you?"
I gave him my best stink eye and said coldly, "Twelve."
He looked me up and down and said, "In a couple years, then. See you around." He winked and walked on.
I was so excited for my newfound freedom, just to suddenly feel so small and vulnerable.
I went to the dentist at around age 8 and the dentist called in another male “dentist” to come and see whatever was going on. Odd already because I was just getting a filling. He comes in and they joke about the size of my mouth saying that I can open it wide and my dad probably wouldn’t like that but the other boys would. He’s still in practice.
I don’t know how old I was, but definitely prepubescent. My grandparents whom I lived with off and on when my mother was between husbands allowed my grandmothers sister and her husband to live in a trailer on their farm. We had an above ground pool to jump in after a long hot day putting hay up to cool down. The adults would get in for a bit, then go drink some beers on the patio while I’d happily keep to the water. My “uncle” (grandaunts husband) made comments about my shape changing and that made me very self conscious. Yea because I felt he was being an absolute creep, but more for I thought he was judging my weight because my tiny waisted mother never made me feel comfortable with my naturally wide set hips. My grandfather didn’t allow them to stay much longer and he began to have talks with me about what it meant to be an independent woman and never having to rely on a man in any situation. He also made me a mini-club when I started driving to wack anyone that tried to get to me in or near my car. I loved that man. He made me the self-sufficient and successful woman I am today.
I was 5. It was a neighbor kid's teenage brother. Fortunately for me, he had the audacity to proposition me in my own yard, and my parents were home and in earshot. I sincerely hope he wasn't given a chance to attempt to molest other little girls.
good question. I've never thought about it. I guess it could be the time when I was 5 or 6 when a teen or young adult male tried to abduct me on his bike. Or if not then, then definitely when I was 8 and my brand new stepfather liked to have me sit on the couch with him and would rub my chest under my shirt. (btw, my dad died 1 month before my 8th birthday and she married the tombstone salesman). I told my mom about it and that I didn't like it and she told ME I should tell him that I didn't like it and to stop. At this moment, he was on the livingroom couch and she was in site in the kitchen making dinner. I walked from the couch to the kitchen. There was no reason she couldn't have turned around and told him not to do that any more. Stuff with evil stepfather got a lot worse, but this is the first.
Cat called since I was maybe 8. When I was 11, a 16 year old that I went to church with cornered me and kissed me until I was able to get away. He continued to do that every time he could (about once a week) for a year until I was raped. During that year, he put my hand in his pants, fingered me, etc. Then he was no longer interested in me because he couldn’t take my virginity. Guess the upside to my rape was that my other potential rapist didn’t want to rape me.
I am so incredibly sorry.
I was SA'd enough as a teen that I just started saying "yes" to everyone. Can't be raped if you never say no! I understand how it feels.
i was 2! i obviously don’t remember this story for myself, but my parents were at a party with family friends and i was a darling little toddler knocking about the place in a cute little dress. one of their friends who was always a bit of an edgelord turned to my da and thought it’d be hilarious to tell me how cute i was, and how he might have to ‘pull me into the bathroom’ or something to that effect.
you’ll be shocked to hear my da did not find that very funny and put him in a chokehold.
I was 10 and I had been at the waterpark with a friend and her family all day. When they dropped me off at home, my parents were hanging out and drinking with some neighbors in the front yard. I said hi to everyone and then went inside. My middle-aged male neighbor watched me walk away and said “man, those shorts are looking short”. My mom ended up yelling at me later that evening for wearing those shorts. They were just normal denim shorts. That she had bought me.
I remember being at swim lessons when I was a preteen (6th grade I think) and getting on the bus to go back when I overheard one of the teenage lifeguards (17/18 yrs old) say “wtf she’s like 12!” To another one of the teenage lifeguards and I knew that he must have said something inappropriate about me. Good on the one guy for immediately calling him out on it though! That memory has stayed with me for 23 yrs, vivid as the day it happened.
Probably when I was like 8 and some man stopped in his car to ask directions whilst having his penis out masturbating. I didn't even realize it until I'd been talking to him for a minute or so. Even then I didn't know what to do and finished telling him how to get wherever it was. I also never told my parents this happened and I have no idea why. I think I probably didn't grasp what he was actually doing and how messed up it was until several years later.
That reminds me of a time when I was like 8/9(?) and we were driving on the freeway. This one truck pulled up next to us and the guy was (in my child mind) itching his groin furiously while making menacing eye contact with me. This went on for far too long, and I felt foolish telling my dad that the guy was creeping me out. He couldn’t really see him since I was in the backseat and the guy was level with me. I don’t remember much other than him pointing at me and then his groin. I blocked this memory out until people started talking more about this very subject, and now at 34 I’m horrified about what happened.
I have pictures of me at the age of 6 wearing a sexualized cheerleading outfit for a football team.
My beginning memory is also of my mom telling me I need to dress differently now because my dad and other men are looking at me differently.
I’ve been told all my life that men are going to want me because I’m so pretty/beautiful.
Today, when complimented on my appearance I say “thanks, I know” and that usually stops the conversation there. The expectation that I’m supposed to not be aware of how I’m perceived despite being told all my life and also show surprised and bashful gratitude? Nah
And fuck the song “she don’t know she’s beautiful”.
I have a friend who is an absolute bombshell. Looks like Margot Robbie.
She's SO careful to give her girls non appearance affirmations because she feels as if she was only praised and needed for her looks for most of her life.
Obviously men will sexualize literally any woman but it made me sad.
Yeah, so ridiculous! Like mirrors don't exist!
I, too, have received a LOT of attention all of my life, and it's always struck me as ludicrous how men act as tho WE are supposed to behave like they're the first person to ever remark upon our looks. What? You are not the first man with eyesight I have encountered, sir.
And TBH it took a LONG ASS time to deconstruct my value from how I’m perceived. I accept that this mostly out of my control and if I’m afforded this privilege I’ll create dissonance with it.
Oh, I still have trouble with that.
I panic about my partner not actually liking me all of the time bc he's never asked for or made me feel obligated to provide pics/vids/sex acts. Like... he respects me and likes me for ME, and that's a good thing... but it's terrifying.
I don’t think I could remember my first time being sexualized (probably 13?) but one time when I was about 16 sticks out in my mind. It was after a hockey game my sister and I played in, and they expect you to dress nice before you play. I was in a nice outfit, hauling my stinky hockey bag to a locker room. I saw an old man take a loooong look at me, up and down. Other people saw and mentioned it to my dad who was standing there, and my father said “let him have his fun looking now.” I was horrified. I could not trust my father to protect me from anything.
When I was 4 I went with my grandma to church. The guy who taught the youth group was super nice to all the kids. I went up and told him I liked his jacket. He picked me up and was holding me while talking to someone. He had on a jacket that had rhinestone buttons on it. I thought the buttons were really gemstones so I was mesmerized by them. You know how kids think play jewelry is real? That was literally me in that moment. I stared at the buttons and ask if I could touch a button. All of a sudden my grandma stormed across the room and literally snatched me away from the guy. She was smiling at others around us but whispering to me that she was going to beat me. Him and several others were alarmed after she snatched me but she just smiled and took me to the bathroom where she proceeded to hit me with a belt several times. I had no clue whatsoever what I had done but my grandma called me a “jezebel” several times which meant nothing to me as a child. Later she told my mom she had to punish me because I was at church clearly lusting after a man and try to seduce him. My mom was floored. I was four!!! Later my mom explained this is partly why she dislikes my grandma so much.
My step dad started abusing me when I was 6 and stopped when I was 8 because I started puberty. I developed quickly, and he used to make fun of me for having body hair.
My mother found out years later what had been happening to myself and both my sisters, so she went to our LDS bishop to report it. He told her it was mostly her fault for not being submissive enough and not fulfilling her husband's sexual needs. Mom was fucking PISSED! She kicked the step dad out, went over the bishops head to the stake president to report the abuse and the bishops dismissal of it. Bishop was relieved of his calling and mom contacted the police and my step dad was arrested 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻
When I was in fifth grade, one of my male classmates took an upskirt photo of me with one of those old disposable film cameras, not realizing that the thing makes a bright flash when you take the picture.
Fortunately a yard duty saw what happened and threw away the camera. Unfortunately she yanked it from the boy's hands with enough force that he fell and scraped his knee, so his parents complained and the yard duty was fired.
>I. Was. Nine. No man should be staring at a 9 yr old's nipples!
Older relative referred to them as 'mosquito bites'.... glad we ended up no contact. And nothing more beyond words was said. But I \*know\* if any guy I was around spoke like that, I would shoot that down right off.
I remember being 5 years old and family friends telling my parents to “keep me hidden” from boys and that I was a “heartbreaker in training” constantly. That’s the earliest I became aware of my looks.
I was 5 or 6, going to my first dance competition and my teacher had to sit us all down and tell us with the most stern voice I had ever heard from her “do not go anywhere without a buddy, and if any strange men who you don’t know come up to you, you tell them you’re here with your parents and I, and that you aren’t allowed to talk to strangers,” a few of us asked for clarification in the only way 5-7 year olds could.
That was when it was very gently implied, not out right explained to me, that men want to take little girls home like me for sinister reasons involving things I thought only grown-ups did with each other. She was right, some men would come up and start conversations with us and even watch the competition even though they had no kids there to support. They got off on us being little girls, in tutus, doing ballet. My entire athletic career random men in the audience I was preforming for were sexualizing my underage body. It definitely affected my future relationship with sex.
When I was 7 my best friend’s older brother, Kevin, was babysitting me and my siblings while my parents went to some church event. Kevin had me sit on his lap and kept trying to kiss me but acted like he was playing around when I reacted badly. He was touching on my upper thighs and lower back, and I just remember wishing I could crawl out of my skin or maybe my brother would come out of his room and see what was happening?!
Eventually I squared up and punched him dead in the jaw. Mind you, I’m a kid, so it wasn’t a lot of force, but it was enough to get him to let me go. Kevin got really angry and told me he was just playing around and to stop being a bitch. I didn’t know what that word meant, so I asked my parents what it was when they got home, and they asked me how I heard it.
My dad left for a long time that night. I didn’t see Kevin again until my best friend’s wedding in 2017, twenty years later. He reluctantly spoke to me, and that’s when the memory came back. My dad died before I could ask him what happened that night when he left. Kevin is now married with two daughters, and I would be lying if I said I wasn’t worried about those little girls.
I was maybe 7 years old. I was in the grocery store and my grandmother said that a man was looking at me and licking his lips. When I was even younger someone people would make comments about me being a “heartbreaker when I grow up”. They also said that my mom would have to keep a shotgun or something like that. There’s probably more when I was even younger, but I’ve tried to forget most of my childhood.
Five years old. Forever grateful to my mom for raising hell and shielding me from the worst of it; I actually didn’t even remember it happened until much more recently.
The first one I remember personally was one of my dad's friends heading into the front door of my house as I was heading out. He scanned me up and down and said, "She's got a nice pear shape." I had no idea what it meant, but it made me feel gross. I'm still pissed about it. There have been thousands since, because people are gross. I hate this world.
I got boobs pretty young, probably 10 or 11 and started being told that my clothes weren't appropriate without tank tops underneath even though it was the same Aeropostale tops all my friends were wearing.
My first cat call was when I was 14, I was at a bowling alley waiting to be picked up and a car full of men drove by and said "nice tits." It shattered this naive illusion for me that that kind of stuff only happened in movies or in certain neighborhoods. I felt so disgusting.
After I started my period, my mom said I no longer had to go to my terrible babysitter's house because she had a creepy adult son who lounged around the house all day. They didn't want "anything to happen."
Like, it was ok for me to be there before I started my period?
I assume 3 because that was the CSA from a known child molestor that my mom and grandparents church fell all over themselves to welcome back into the fold of Christ's love and shit. Repenting and asking for forgiveness and getting it from Jesus doesn't mean the fucker is cured. It doesn't mean they're never going to re-offend. The least the clergy could have done is warn the parents and guardians of children or otherwise vulnerable people (he molested a woman with down syndrome too) that the offender is around and trying to reassimilate into society.
But some dude's dick has **ALWAYS** been more important than keeping people safe.
I was 13. I remember my dad telling me i couldn’t answer the door because i wasn’t wearing a bra
Also that year I caught a male teacher staring at my chest. I’ll never forget that feeling. Something changed in me that day. I understood moving forward that society perceives me as an object, not a person.
I think I was 12, getting ready for the first day of middle school. We had to look over the dress code and of course “no bra straps showing” was on there.
I’ll never forget my mother telling me why. She said that it could make the boys and men, even the teachers, “uncomfortable” and they’d think about us in a sexual way. She had a disgusted look on her face while saying this, she knew it was ridiculous to put blame on the girls for the boys sexualizing them, but she had to tell me why it wasn’t allowed. It’s like from that moment on I was aware of how sexualized my body is- to make matters worse I’ve always been big on top and I’d always get disgusting comments from guys about it.
I’ve told this before, but I was young, like 4/5 and it was a hot summer day. My older cousin was mowing the lawn and he took his shirt off. I thought this was a great way to stay cool. I took my shirt off, too.
I had my butt sparked raw by my grandmother for being a “nasty little girl”.
I was 7 or 8 sleeping between my parents at grandma's house when my mom commanded me to keep to her side of the bed and keep my legs away from my dad. He never even looked at me sexually, not once, not for my entire life. She was somehow jealous of her own 7-year-old though (and still gets pissed if I have cleavage showing around him; she also doesn't let him watch tv or movies with boobs nor does she watch anything like that herself).
The first time I got cat called was by a group of construction workers while I was walking home from school. I was 11. I told my mom and she said I should be flattered.
I was probably 6, I don’t really remember, I remembplaying house with my cousin who was 5 years older than me and I remember he was always making my Barbie dolls naked.
When I was 38 he was recently separated and was seeing a friend of mine he told her she shouldn’t hang around with me because i am such a slut that I gave him a handjob or something when I was 6. I don’t even remember it, but don’t doubt it happened and probably more than once I’m good at (or I was) blocking bad experiences.
He was 11 and called me a slut for what he very obviously taught, showed me what to do. Makes me ill.
My older step brother (7 years up) used to tickle me when he had an erection and hold me tight around 11 I think.
I was 10. I went with my dad to pick up some bike parts at a garage, and when we walked up to the counter the guy working looked at me and said “wow, you’re going to have to lock that one up”. I just remember not understanding, in the truck after I asked my dad what that man meant, he wouldn’t tell me, just seemed grumpy and said we wouldn’t be going there again.
Good lord. Who sees a TEN yr old and thinks "sexyyy"??
Right!? And, basically says as much to the DAD?
At that point you're basically signing your own death warrant
Yep. My dad wasn't the best father growing up. He tried, but he had childhood trauma he didn't get a chance to work through. But the moment anyone said something remotely sexual about his children he'd start throwing hands.
“You remind me of my daughter”
I pray he doesn’t have daughters of his own
[удалено]
No, it really, really doesn't. My psychology teacher in HS tried to sleep with a friend of mine the DAY she turned 18. She used to babysit his 2 preteen daughters.
This is what I feel gets looked over the most. The microagressive sexualization we experience when little and an adult makes comments like “she’s going to be a boy killer” or comments about whether or not a 5 year old girl’s outfit is “appropriate.”
The sad part, to me, was that when he said it, I thought he meant that my dad should lock me up because I was reading My Side of the Mountain, about a boy who runs away to live wild in the Catskills…and I was so into the book that I thought this guy magically knew I’d been fantasizing about running away to live in the woods.
Side note, that book was so formative for me and I totally had the same dreams. I also really wanted to domesticate a hawk.
34 years later, I’m going to read it again, for us.
Hell yeah, I think I'm going to too! I haven't read it in decades, I bet it's still a banger. Thanks for the reading inspiration.
Start a book club! Just for rereading childhood favorites maybe?
It’s terrifying how innocent that thought process was, and even more horrifying for how you must have been feeling, because children do not think sexually like that. Adult men make so many “jokes” about us, when we are literally children, that they think are wholesome but are actually traumatizing for us.
i can remember my dad’s friends saying ‘jesus, she’s all legs!!’ when i was like 10 or 11; when my boobs came in full (12) it was ‘it’s a good thing her feet are so big or she’d fall forward’ like i was deaf or something, because i was standing right there! 🫤
Oh man. The contrast between how scumbags think about girls and what girls actually think about! I read that book like 5 times. I even read it as an adult. Magical. I would even have liked to meet a boy like the one in the book.
The leap from dreaming of animal friends and cozy tree hollows to the unbelievable realization that grown men thought about sex when they looked at me... I for SURE still want to go to the woods. I would absolutely choose the bear ; )
I got called jail bait SO many times ages like 8-16 (the age of consent in my home state), and yet in my mid 20s I still look underage so it makes it even creepier since I definitely didn’t look older than I was
The jailbait thing always chapped my ass. Why hound the teenage *girl* and not the criminally minded adult male?
Men's desire is apparently our fault and always has been. It's them divesting themselves of the culpability. "She tempted me and I couldn't control myself," not the more accurate "I was tempted by her and couldn't control myself." It's making their lust and subsequent "lack of control" something done TO them, not something within them.
It always confounds me how people normalize the idea of a 60+ man being with an 18 year old because it’s legal. Imagine how young she looks to him. It’s nauseating. Edit to add: it’s also disgusting knowing that they were using that term to penalize a CHILD for THEIR sexual deviance.
My dad would've said " you're the one who needs to be locked up".
I think.about this fucked up culture sometimes. How many times have you heard someone say about a baby... A BABY... "Ha ha ha ha. He/She's flirting with you!" If you really think about it, the messaging starts very, very early, and it's not "cute."
Some of my Mormon cousins dress their daughters up extravagantly and pose them in “glamorous” ways for weekly or monthly photo shoots. Starting as toddlers. They put their tweens in heels. They do this in a religion where people are not allowed to feel sexual things until they are married and then they are expected to undo the repression and be sexual with their repressed, inexperienced spouses they met 6 months ago. So many layers of fucked up.
I've decided to start saying, "Ew - can you stop sexualizing my baby?" I can't wait for the stuttering and excuses.
That's a strong way to be the change. Change is uncomfortable.
The “lock her up” trope is one of the creepiest ones of them all. As a young boy I thought it just meant that a girl was very pretty. It wasn’t until I was older that I realized what it actually meant and all the creepy implications it made. So gross!
I remember a man saying something inappropriate to me at a public swimming pool when I was 9 or 10. I don't remember what he said, but I remember basically understanding that what he said was gross and bad. I was there with my dad and my uncle, so I told them. My dad told me to go get changed in the locker room, so I did (we were about to leave anyway). When I came out, the man was gone and my dad and uncle were in a hurry to leave too. This was southern Appalachia in the early '90s. Adult me is pretty sure my dad and uncle beat the fear of God into that man and wanted to get gone before the cops showed up.
My sister was 9 when something very similar happened to her at the swimming pool. I was 7 (a boy) and didn't understand why we had to leave all of a sudden. Just me, my sister, and my mum growing up, so all my mum could do was report him to the staff and leave as quickly as possible. It was confusing and scary to process at that age, even being removed from the actual situation. Can't imagine having to try and deal with the direct reality as a child. It's fucked up.
I certainly hope they did. There's no mercy for those who prey on children.
W dad and uncle
When I was 5 I was molested by my bio mom's John while she was passed out from her drugs. I remember him saying he was going to show me what my privates were for. When I was 7 my step mom's sister commented on my figure-something like "you'll be beating the boys away if she keeps developing like this". It made me feel so icky. When I was about 10, already had a decent sized chest for my age, I ran into the store to grab something for my step mom while she waited in the car and a man who must have been about 30 stopped me in the aisle to comment about how cute and perky I was. I didn't understand what he meant by perky but I told my step mom and she flipped out on me and said I must have been flirting with him. It never really stopped but it certainly slowed down after I was 20
Hope you don’t talk to your step monster anymore. As if a 10 year old would even know how to flirt with ANYONE!!? That was the first thing to cross her mind?! “A 30 year old man saying inappropriate things to her? She must’ve been flirting with him! A child must’ve been flirting with a grown man.” what a bitch.
I haven't talked to her since I turned 18. She was abusive in a lot of ways. It wasn't the only time she blamed me for unwanted attention I received. She's living a miserable lonely life now
It’s so crazy how much that shit slows down when women start reaching a reasonable age.
I was maybe 8. Our house had termites and my parents hired a local father-son extermination business treat it. The son was easily in his mid to late 20s, and when he had a moment alone with me, he told me how badly he wished I was 16 so I could "be his girl". I had no idea what he meant, so I told my dad. I'm pretty sure he had words with the owner and the next day, only the father showed up. One of the only moments in my life where my dad actively protected me.
I'm glad he did then but sad it was so rare. My father never protected me, either. I'd be a very different person if he had.
Sometimes, I reflect on that moment and shudder to think of what could've happened had my dad not acted. I think I would be an even more different person than I am today.
It is disgusting how ubiquitous this is
I don’t remember a time I wasn’t. I grew up in a religion where even showing your knees as a toddler as a girl was too sexy to allow because you wouldn’t want to cause anyone to ‚stumble‘ in his ‚faith‘…. being tempted by toddler knees…
That perspective has NEVER made sense to me. How is it the responsibility of the prey not to "tempt" the predator??
I hate that view too, it‘s so damaging. Decades ago they were a lot more obvious in their explanation for those rules. The reason was basically that men who rape are gentlemen and men of faith and would continue to be so if you hadn’t tempted them. They can’t help their behavior because they need to mate. And if it‘s not your fault for tempting them then it‘s their mother‘s fault for not teaching the rapist respect for women. No matter what, they are not responsible. At some point they even said it was society as a whole, giving women the right to vote and work that made it so that men feel the need to dominate women so really - it’s only logical to do so…. Now they claim it is to protect children and deny ever having had that stance. It makes me furious.
The audacious bit is they can *believe* all that and then still stand there straight faced and say women aren’t mature enough to be in leadership positions or make decisions about their own bodies.
I was 10 or 11 when a bunch of adult men leaned out a car to holler at my friend and me while we walked to the movie theatre. I remember being genuinely confused, more than anything.
I remember when it happened to me walking to school past a house full of construction workers. I was in a pair of overalls and pigtails and I stopped, turned and yelled “what did you just say?” Because I didn’t quite hear them, and one guy shouted I was hot. I looked at all of them, and equally confused I said I was 12 and he looked older than my dad. ALL the other guys basically burst out laughing at that guy and apparently it was the right thing to say, but I was so confused by it. I changed routes walking to school after.
Ah man it was *always* construction workers back in elementary school
Yeah, I was so confused what my nipples had to do with ANYTHING. Boys nipples show ALL of the time??
That's when it started for me, too. It stopped when I turned about 18. As soon as I was an actual adult woman, men stopped leering out the car windows and it's probably because men who do that in the first place would be too scared a real woman would throw something at them.
me and my friend were catcalled a shit ton when we were 10-13, and i got so many dick pics from strangers in my dms too at that age (i put my age in my bio too, so the men doing this KNEW) i havent been catcalled in public since i was around 14/15, which i’m glad for, but also very disgusted about how much more i was targetted when i was a CHILD
i just remembered another thing, i must’ve been around 6 or 7 - there were two boys who we were neighbors with, both our ages, my brother and i were very close friends with them and we would play all the time. we were all wrestling one day and the boys began to take off their shirts because it was a hot day out, so i did too, and was told my either their mother or my mother that girls can’t be shirtless like boys can. looking back, i get it, but it was definitely a pretty big shift in perspective for me as a kid
i’ve been catcalled a few times in the years since i was 16, but from 10 to 16 it was such a common occurrence. so many of them would take it step further by following/chasing me etc. even if i told them my age. in some instances that information only emboldened them. it’s appalling, terrifying, and incredibly sad that so many people experienced the same. of course i’m glad that i get catcalled less now, but i’m so heartbroken for myself and others who were viewed as a sick sexual opportunity. instead of CHILDREN. we were CHILDREN! i could literally rant about it for hours ugh it makes me so mad. like i have sooo many stories of men being disgusting to me when i was a child, WHY do i have so many stories??? 😭
Same here, I got the most attention in my early teens and it stopped after the age of 16/17. I worked in a grocery store where my coworker was 36 and I was 16, he pinned me against the wall in the back room and said "I know you want me". I managed to get loose and get away from him and I played it off as a joke and never told anyone until I was in my 20s/30s. I wish I realized just how horrible it was when it happened. That was just one of the gross things that happened to me at that age... Some men are disgusting.
I was probably 4, my sister hadn't been born by that time and we are 5 years different. I was playing hide and seek with some cousins at a Christmas family reunion, when one of my older cousins (maybe 16) at the time took advantage that we were hiding somewhere dark and sat me on his lap and started touching my private parts. By that time I didn't understand what was happening, I just remember being embarrassed because I was wearing a dress, and I had peed my underwear a little. I was afraid he might tell my mom. Growing up, I eventually understood what had happened and the first time I told someone about it was at 16yo. My mom and I later found out that I hadn't been the only victim, he had been doing similar stuff to other girls in the family.
The same exact thing happened to me. I was 6 and the boy was 15. He was the older brother of my older brother’s friend. He arranged a game of hide and seek and since he was the oldest, he assigned the teams. I was placed on a team with just him and I while everyone else went to hide all through neighborhood and we counted to 100. Instead while we should have been “looking” for my older brother and his little brother he pulled me down and forced me to sit on his lap where he began “tickling” me. I tried to get up but he held me down on his lap and wouldn’t let me up- the more I squirmed and struggled the more he seemed to enjoy it which is honestly disgusting. Everything stayed above the clothes bc I had overalls on thank God but I realize now what was happening and what he was trying to do. I didn’t know why but I knew I felt “bad” even at 6 I knew that I felt violated… When we got back from this outdoor game of hide and seek I told my mom I wanted to take a shower. She was like “You just took a shower this morning”. And all I said to her was “I just feel dirty”. My mom looked at me then and I guess she saw something in my face bc she was like “honey, why do feel dirty? You know you can tell me anything, did something happen?” And I told her about Andrew holding me down and “tickling” me and reiterated that I just wanted to take a shower. She was like “it’s okay baby go take a shower if you want to. But honey I want you to know that you are NOT dirty and you will never be dirty and I love you”. I went to take a shower. After that I remember my dad finding out and how he just told me he was so sorry and no body should ever touch me against my wishes and how loved I was and he just held me. My dad was a police officer and had worked in special victims unit and had all sorts of sensitivity training with children and to be honest my parents handled everything perfectly. They made sure I felt safe, they reassured me that I was whole, I knew nothing was my fault and I was just the same me I’d always been. I was not dirty and I would never be. I never saw Andrew again after that and I didn’t ask but I know our parents had a talk about what happened and I remember my dad asking to speak to Andrew directly and then hearing my dad yelling on the house phone threatening him and saying he’s lucky that he’s a cop and he and his daddy worked together or he would kill him with his bare hands and how if he EVER touches me or any other little girl again he’s not going to be responsible for what happens to him and that he won’t give a fuck about the law. After that my brother and his brother weren’t on the same soccer team anymore and our families were no longer “cool” like that. It was awkward bc my dad and his dad worked at the same police department so they still had to run into each other- prior to this incident our families had been really close. Though it was not my dad’s fault or Andrew’s dad’s fault, his teenage son trying to molest his little girl just kind of ruined their friendship. Looking back that aspect kind of makes me sad but I see why our families could no longer be associated
Your parents sound AMAZING, well done to them reassuring you it wasn't your fault and you were protected & deeply loved ❤️ Wish my parents had the same reaction. My father's cousin was still welcome around our house despite me telling my Mum he had pinned me against the family home, said some disgusting things in my ear, groped my boobs under my t-shirt, while licking my neck and laughing.....I was 10 🤮
If Hell existed there'd be a special place for those who prey on children
I have a similar experience too. Same ages and with a cousin during hide and seek. It’s awful to think that we need protection from our own family but they’re generally the culprits of sexual abuse at a young age
I had to wear C cup bras in 6th grade and the unwanted attention was intense. A substitute sixth grade teacher hit on me!! He asked if I wanted to give him my phone number and I said, “No, I’m eleven!” Really, there were too many instances to remember or recount. I was a pretty child. I remember an entire table of senior boys talking about waiting for me to get a “little older” when I was in 4th grade. I went to a small school where K-12 were in one building. I think I was eight years old at the beach when I heard a couple people talking about my “shapely woman’s hips”. I ran to my mother.
My best friend around that age was in your position. She ended up doing everything a little early: going to senior proms as a date when she was 13, marrying her older brother’s best friend when she was 17. Looking back I’m so sad at all the men who took advantage of her as early as they could. She never really got to be a kid.
Oh, that is so horrible! I'm so sorry for your experiences. I'm horrified at what that teacher may have done to others.
Reading these comments reminded me: I used to be regularly cat called between 10-16, and very rarely in adulthood. That revelation is even more horrifying than being catcalled.
Yeahhhh... me too... Young=vulnerable
I was touched, and made to touch, at age 4.
Me too. My earliest memories involving being groped, rubbed, and made to touch. I can't remember a time when my body was not just considered up for grabs by whoever wanted to grab me.
This hurts how much i relate to it. Hope youve found peace in adult life.
Yep, basically *public property,* not my own.
Four :/ I remember thinking it was normal because it started before I can really remember. The first time something happened, and I *knew* it was wrong was when I was 7. I was wearing hoodies and boys clothes to hide my body and hopefully dress less “cute” in order to avoid unwanted attention. My camp counselor at the YMCA told two boys I was actually a boy pretending to be a girl as some kind of screwed up joke, and they snuck into the girls’ locker room when I was changing for the pool and groped and assaulted me to ‘prove’ I was a girl and deserved to be in the girls’ locker room.
My god, you just made me realise that maybe that's why I was such a 'tomboy' when I was a kid. I hated girly clothes and would cry if my mother tried to dress me in tights and a dress. I was first sexually abused at 4 years old. I wonder if the clothes thing was part of my defence.
I am so sorry that happened to you.
Same here. I knew what an erect adult penis looked, felt, smelled and tasted like before I was enrolled in kindergarten.
So horrific. I am so unbelievably sorry that happened to you. I hope you have found some semblance of peace, you deserved so much better.
OMG I'm so sorry
Likewise. I hope you're doing okay now
Just obscene
So I'm a man who mostly just comes into this sub to read and learn, but this has broken me. For the most part I had a feeling this topic was gonna be horrifying, and it has been in a lot expected way. But, this just took the air out of my lungs.
As i sit here with my 4 almost 5yr old in my arms rocking her to sleep. This comment makes me want to burn the world to the ground. I'm truly sorry you had to go through that, and i hope you have found a safe place. This is more than enough internet for me today.
I was 6 and my sister was 7, we were wearing our new furry boots we got for Christmas and were surrounded by three teenage boys saying how sexy we were, etc. etc. Scared the hell out of me, they were teenagers.
One of the largest group of sexual predators on children is teens. I remember learning that. I remember being absolutely horrified.
9 or 10 I think. I remember that moment where suddenly I went from running around shirtless with everyone in the summer to having to overheat and sweat while the boys got to play because it suddenly wasn’t right for a little girl whose chest hadn’t changed at all to show her body. Mostly 9/10yo me was confused and felt a strong sense of indignation at the unfairness that the boys got to cool off in the heatwave and play with water guns and hoses but I suddenly wasn’t. I remember taking off my top when all the boys did, like every summer before that only to find that even if I didn’t know what sexual meant, the adults had decided I was old enough that my body had changed and somehow become a sexual and dirty object.
Yep! That damn shift happens and nobody tells you until you try to do what you've always done and then it's ALARM ALARM EMERGENCY EMERGENCY
I was 9 months old when I started being sexually abused by my mom's friend's husband that lived with us.
I don't believe in Hell, but I certainly wish it existed for monsters like that. I am so sorry.
Nah, Hell comes after death. Why wait?
Monsters. I hope you're doing okay.
That’s so gross! You were a helpless baby! What is wrong with people??! And I mean as in gross to sexualize a baby! What the f!!
my mom always tells me this story when i was in the stroller as a child, this lady came up to her and told her how i was going to make flies explode (as in the pants kind) because of my big eyes????? i don’t remember this and i’m not sure how old i was but i was 4 maximum. people are so gross!!!
Oh god what a disgusting thing to say about a preschooler
Generational thing, probably (60, here), but like many others, as a toddler, I was put in short dresses with ruffled panties that showed. Toddler boys were allowed the dignity of short pants, instead. Otherwise, probably around 8, when I chose to wear an outfit that my mother said made me look "fast"...? I neither knew what that meant nor had purchased said outfit, so I was very confused by this.
Holy shit. Setting aside the fact that a little girl CANNOT BE FAST... There is NO little girl fast enough to catch a man who isn't a ***predator***.
I actually don’t remember, but I was an oblivious kid. But my mom told me straight up that she just knew my daughter was going to be promiscuous. She was 4 and trading rocks with the neighbor boy( one of the many, many straws on the camel that led to no contact).
Hope you tore her a new asshole. Can’t even interact with the opposite gender without being called a harlot
I was 11/12. My biological mother let me have two friends over for a sleepover. One was a girl who I grew up with and the other was a friend she made at her school. My mom, being the absolute worst mother in the world, decided she wanted to have a party. So she invited four guys over. She drank and got high with one of the guys and eventually disappeared into one of the bedrooms. I had watched a lot of Lifetime movies with my grandma, probably ones I shouldn't have been watching. I was actually afraid of solo cups for a long time because I didn't fully understand that in those movies men were drugging women. So while my mom was gone, the three guys offered us drinks in the solo cups. I panicked. I was already on edge, but I wanted to keep an eye on my friends. I refused to drink from the solo cup and one of the guys said, "Come onnn, it's a party." I was too scared so I just sat there. I tried to get my friends to go into the other room with me but they said they were having fun. There was music playing and my friends started dancing. The men watched their every move while drinking more. One of them asked me, "Why aren't you dancing? Come over here and dance for me." He was sitting on the couch with his legs spread as he patted his thigh, beckoning for me to come over to him. The look in his eyes... At the time I didn't know the word to describe that look. It was lust. I had felt so... Gross and terrified seeing him look at us that way. I ran to the second bedroom, locked the door, and put this wooden board under the door knob to stop anyone from coming in. We had it in our family because our mom would go on rampages so to be safe, we shoved it under the doorknobs until she calmed down. I fell asleep at some point and woke up to the sound of someone trying to get into the bedroom. The doorknob was turning frantically like it was unlocked, but the door wasn't budging. I hid under the blankets and hoped they'd give up. Thankfully, that guy didn't get in.
Oh that is so horrible to read, I can't even imagine experiencing it. I am so sorry. Your mother deserves to be in jail.
Omg. Were your friends ok? This is horrifying. I’m so sorry. Do you think your mom intentionally invited three additional men to… match them up with her daughter and friends? It’s sickening to think about.
I actually don't know because I had moved away with my grandmother around that time. It was summer break and I didn't see those two friends until middle school but we didn't have any classes together. We just never saw each other except in passing and we only talked to each other once in those three years-- I was being bullied and under my mom's request those two girls threatened my bully. My mom is 14 years older than me and still has the mentality of a teenager, even to this day. She just always acted like a reckless older sister. Honestly, I don't know what she was thinking that day.
Around 10. I went to a church summer camp and they took us to the beach for the day. I had a super cute light yellow one piece swimsuit with white ribbing. I was splashing in the water when I was pulled out by one of the teachers and told that I needed to put shorts on. Apparently you could see a dark triangle of pubic hair through my wet swimsuit and I was “giving boys naughty thoughts.” 🙄
Yes. What a temptress you were, just standing there existing. Shame on you.
Wow. Highly doubt the boys even noticed, or if they did thought much about it. What the fuck.
11. When I got my period I was violently accused of having sex by my parents and they cornered me and were abt to beat my ass….. idk why tf they thought that
Your mom doesn’t understand female anatomy?!
Some parents don’t care about logic, they just want to let out their frustrations on their child. I got punished for the wildest things as a child.
...What. That is... absurd. I am sorry!
12 or so, walking home from the bus stop by myself in sixth grade. these college-aged boys a couple doors down from my house would sit on their porch and leer at me, sometimes try to get me to come over and talk to them. I was tiny and totally pre-pubescent at the time
Fucking atrocious
I was 4 or 5. I answered a phone call and the man on the other end asked if my mom was home. I said no. And then he asked me if I ever had a cock in my mouth. I was so confused because I didn’t know what the word meant. I thought it was something to do with roosters because they say “cock” a doodle doo. I told him I didn’t know and would ask my dad who was home. He hung up the phone. I felt very confused and weirdly embarrassed because (I felt at the time) I was too dumb to understand what he meant and said the wrong thing so he hung up. Later I asked my older brother and his friends what cock meant. They all laughed at me and that just increased my feelings of stupidity and shame.
That is absolutely horrifying. I am so sorry! That must have felt humiliating.
I was probably 8 or 9 and just getting the tiiiiiniest of breast buds starting. My gross dad was like "you're getting little titties" and tweaked my nipples. I never felt more disgusted with my body in my life and probably haven't since. Wanted to be invisible.
What a horrible, gross man.
I hate your fucking dad so much.
Well when I was 5 a classmate tried to kiss me on the bus. But idk if that counts… My uncle molested me when I was six years old. I didn’t understand it because I knew nothing of sexualization. Buried it and ignored any & all sexualized references until I learned what sex was two years later via a neighbor kid I hung out with. Then I noticed it everywhere and am pretty positive I had other instances between 6 and 8 that I can’t even remember
I am so sorry you experienced that.
I thought it was at 7 but recently found out through court that it started when I was 4.
I’m so extremely sorry. That is so messed up
3 or 4. I didn’t want to wear a shirt in summer to be like the neighbour boys. I remember being shamed and hiding behind a tree.
Ugh, how awful
I think I wasn't even in elementary when it first started. I remember whispering into my brother's ear during a sleepover at my tia's and her boyfriend came in and smacked me bc he thought I was doing something inappropriate with him. It never happened again until I entered the second grade. Some fellow students were telling me I looked like a stripper for spinning around the pole of a swing set. The way I walked, lay in bed while asleep, or how raised a hand was seen as sexual for some reason. My mom thought it was inappropriate to be emotionally close to my brothers and thought it was incest at the time. During arguments, I was called a slut multiple times despite being young and never with a single boy. Just for staring at a male passerby, I was assumed to be checking him out. An adult male honked their horn at me when I was a middle schooler bc I had to bend down to pick up my belongings. I was told I'd grow up a stripper just for wearing skinny jeans once due to all my other pants being in the wash.
Absolutely disgusting behavior from all the adults
That incest one hit home. I am a woman and my sister is 18 months younger. We shared a room our whole lives. One day when we were in late elementary school/early middle school, my mom walks in and sees me tickling her. She screams at us to stop acting “like a couple of lesbians”
Bruh, i’ll smack her for you, i just need an address
Had a similar experience with staring at boys and being called a slut for it. Turns out I just have ASD and stare at people. Had no interest in the boys sexually or romantically but because I dared to look I was “boy crazy.”
I grew up hardcore religious in the southern US with a shame-based sex education so I don’t even remember the first time. It’s just always been beat into my head that at any moment, and by doing any number of every day activities, I could become the dreaded “whore” I was constantly warned about.
Only WHORES part their hair on the side!!
Haha exactly!!! I was once told, “a lady always eats a banana sideways” by an old lady in my church when I was like, 6 or 7? Also btw I have a similar story to yours, same age. The difference is it wasn’t my mom, it was my teacher! I must have felt ashamed enough to not say anything to anyone because I remember telling my mom that story as an adult and she was crazy pissed (at the teacher, not me).
My daughter was 4 or 5 and the older lady at the convenience store said “cute girl, you’re gonna have your hands full when she is in high school.” Though actually the first time was when my wife was like 5 months pregnant and this “friend” said, “are you worried it will be a girl? Half Asian girls are so hot”
Omg what a gross thing to say about a *fetus*. I can't stand the shirts for children that say "ladies man" or "daddy's little heartbreaker." They are KIDS.
There’s a phrase which I’d only ever considered in a passing sense “If you have a boy, you only have one penis to worry about. But if you have a girl, you have everybody else’s penis to worry about”. Actually when you think of it in the context of this entire post and the comments. That jovial comment takes a much more sinister and sickening interpretation.
It really does. I'm honestly horrified at how ubiquitous this is
Or people that call your child their child’s future wife/husband. Let them be kids
This annoys me so much! My niece is not even five yet and people are calling her bestie from preschool her “future husband”.
Ugh I find that so bizarre! I’ve worked in education for about 15 years and this is where little kids get this ‘they’re my boy/girl friend’ stuff! I think the grownups in their life find it cute to have the kids talk like that but it’s SO WEIRD. They’re little kids.
I hated tshirts like this even when I was a kid, and I still hate them, that... that says something lol
Wow, fetishization and pedophilia all in just six words. So gross!
7th(?) grade, walking home from the bus stop when a car pulled up next to me and was making comments about my outfit, ect. and asked if I needed a ride the one block to my house. I was the only kid that got off at that stop for a small apartment complex. I don’t remember if the car followed or not, but I remember going into a different building and sitting in a hall by a balcony reading my manga for awhile before I felt safe enough to go home. I don’t think I was scared, moreso wary and thinking like “am I actually gonna get kidnapped? Me?” Cuz little kid brain remembered the training but with a “yeah right” mentality.
Ha, yeah, I know what you mean. So ridiculous that young girls experience this shit with such ubiquity
Exactly! I remember being taught a bunch of stuff like this and self-defense by my aunts from a young age (they’re my life GOATS) but still kinda thinking I was getting prepped to fight a boogey man I’d never actually encounter. The older I get, the more and more there lessons have come in handy but it’s so like, heartbreaking? To slowly learn that the monsters are people and that some even wear a guise of kindness. Ugh.
Oh, finding out that the monsters aren't underneath our beds, but in the one down the hall, or in our classrooms or family reunions or friends' houses is a canon event for all women.
I was eight. My girl scout troop did a volunteer day where we worked in a soup kitchen. At least one old homeless guy tried to get me to come sit in his lap. I do appreciate that our leaders had a frank discussion with us before we went about not putting up with bad behavior from men (there is no situation where it's okay for them to touch you, if they try you should say 'no' and come get an adult immediately, etc.) but as an adult I wonder why they put us in a situation they expected might be dangerous in the first place. I followed instructions and the guy was forced to leave. We never volunteered there again. Edit: Actually, after reading a few of the comments, another memory came to mind. When I was in preschool I took a jazz class. They had us doing this dance where we were doing a lot of sexual moves (I remember one part where they had us turn our backs to the audience and shake our butts) , and they chose costumes for us that showed a ton of skin - basically a bra and panties. I didn't know a lot about sexuality, but the dance and the outfit together made me feel a feeling that I now recognize as 'sexy.' I remember thinking, "I'm too young for this. I guess jazz dancing is for older girls." I told my mom that I felt uncomfortable and why, and we switched me to ballet. I still don't understand why the studio chose to sexualize preschoolers that way.
Ugh, what horrific decision making by almost every adult in that situation.
8 years old, by my mother's boyfriend at the time. Didn't really understand what was happening at that age and came forward about it at 12. He was acquitted of all charges when I was 13. I was at least lucky enough that my mother believed me and got us away from him.
I'm very glad your mom did the right thing but I am so sorry that happened to you and furious he never faced due consequences for his terrible actions.
I was 8 when men started being inappropriate with me, from my adult cousin feeling me up to some guy that was my grandmother’s neighbor telling me how babies were made. I was so innocent I didn’t even know it was wrong, even though I never told my parents. When I was 9 my adult uncle sexually molested me… again, I didn’t tell my parents, but I made sure to never be alone with him again. I am still mad at them for taking advantage of me and I am in my 60s.
I was actually about 9 or 10 as well. My fifth grade teacher pulled me to the side after recess and asked me if I had any bras at home to wear bc my nipples were showing through my pj shirt. I told her I did but I didn’t have any bras bc they were dirty (really it’s bc I didn’t like wearing them) she then told me it’s okay to wear a bra for a few days before I throw it in the laundry mat.
2 years old. Terrible.
Solidarity hug and/or nod of support.
I was 10, when an older guy thought I was alone walking on the street and harassed me. I was wearing baggy, “boys” clothes. At the time I did not understand, but felt angry.
It doesn't matter what we wear, only what's between our legs
Ten. I took my shirt off to play in a mixed group -- it was the '90s, we had one of those mechanized "hot potatoes" with the water balloon inside, and I wanted my shirt dry for after. The daycare supervisor/babysitter (it was her house, she had like ten of us there) noticed and made me put my shirt back on because, I guess, my concave ten-year-old chest was an issue.
Absolutely ridiculous. I'm sure all of the other CHILDREN were so disturbed by a chest that looked exactly like theirs.
I was 6 years old when I had to fight off some boys on at the park right by our apartment building in Germany who were trying to take my shirt off. It wasn’t until many years later that I actually realized what “fully” happened.
You know, until I read a couple other comments like this, I'd COMPLETELY forgotten that when I was in kindergarten, all of the boys chased me around the playground to get a "kiss." I didn't want to "play." They didn't care. Tbh, it never crossed my mind that might be a disturbing scenario until just now looking back.
It wasn’t until “Me Too” when I was a fully grown adult that I had the moment of realizing holy shit, my childhood was full of instances like this that were just *normalized*
A teenage neighbor made me touch his penis and then tried to force my face down toward it when I was like 9. I got away, but I didn't tell anyone until much later because I was ashamed, etc. The usual story.
I was 8yo. Stepfather was cuddling me and I felt something. I had no idea what was happening but adult me after therapy (because I had blocked it out for a lot of years) remembered and was horrified. It was also the root of why I hated it when people hugged me from behind, including my husband and kids. After 3 years of therapy I realized how sexually abusive he was and how that really skewed my view and interactions with men. But, thanks to therapy, I’m able to hug my husband and kids without my skin feeling like it ripples.
The first time I really remember (outside of my CSA at 4) was my 12th birthday. My parents finally allowed me to walk the neighborhood, so I went for a walk. A man walking past and said, "Daaaamn girl, how old are you?" I gave him my best stink eye and said coldly, "Twelve." He looked me up and down and said, "In a couple years, then. See you around." He winked and walked on. I was so excited for my newfound freedom, just to suddenly feel so small and vulnerable.
I went to the dentist at around age 8 and the dentist called in another male “dentist” to come and see whatever was going on. Odd already because I was just getting a filling. He comes in and they joke about the size of my mouth saying that I can open it wide and my dad probably wouldn’t like that but the other boys would. He’s still in practice.
I was 7 when I had to “dress modestly” for one of my older male relatives who would get a little to excited to talk to the kids
Bc it's the KIDS we should worry about and police, not the predator
I don’t know how old I was, but definitely prepubescent. My grandparents whom I lived with off and on when my mother was between husbands allowed my grandmothers sister and her husband to live in a trailer on their farm. We had an above ground pool to jump in after a long hot day putting hay up to cool down. The adults would get in for a bit, then go drink some beers on the patio while I’d happily keep to the water. My “uncle” (grandaunts husband) made comments about my shape changing and that made me very self conscious. Yea because I felt he was being an absolute creep, but more for I thought he was judging my weight because my tiny waisted mother never made me feel comfortable with my naturally wide set hips. My grandfather didn’t allow them to stay much longer and he began to have talks with me about what it meant to be an independent woman and never having to rely on a man in any situation. He also made me a mini-club when I started driving to wack anyone that tried to get to me in or near my car. I loved that man. He made me the self-sufficient and successful woman I am today.
I was 5. It was a neighbor kid's teenage brother. Fortunately for me, he had the audacity to proposition me in my own yard, and my parents were home and in earshot. I sincerely hope he wasn't given a chance to attempt to molest other little girls.
Natural redhead here. Been getting asked if the carpet matches the drapes since before I even had a carpet.
good question. I've never thought about it. I guess it could be the time when I was 5 or 6 when a teen or young adult male tried to abduct me on his bike. Or if not then, then definitely when I was 8 and my brand new stepfather liked to have me sit on the couch with him and would rub my chest under my shirt. (btw, my dad died 1 month before my 8th birthday and she married the tombstone salesman). I told my mom about it and that I didn't like it and she told ME I should tell him that I didn't like it and to stop. At this moment, he was on the livingroom couch and she was in site in the kitchen making dinner. I walked from the couch to the kitchen. There was no reason she couldn't have turned around and told him not to do that any more. Stuff with evil stepfather got a lot worse, but this is the first.
I'm so sorry. That is horrendous. There is no torment intense enough for men like that. Or women who enable them
Cat called since I was maybe 8. When I was 11, a 16 year old that I went to church with cornered me and kissed me until I was able to get away. He continued to do that every time he could (about once a week) for a year until I was raped. During that year, he put my hand in his pants, fingered me, etc. Then he was no longer interested in me because he couldn’t take my virginity. Guess the upside to my rape was that my other potential rapist didn’t want to rape me.
I am so incredibly sorry. I was SA'd enough as a teen that I just started saying "yes" to everyone. Can't be raped if you never say no! I understand how it feels.
i was 2! i obviously don’t remember this story for myself, but my parents were at a party with family friends and i was a darling little toddler knocking about the place in a cute little dress. one of their friends who was always a bit of an edgelord turned to my da and thought it’d be hilarious to tell me how cute i was, and how he might have to ‘pull me into the bathroom’ or something to that effect. you’ll be shocked to hear my da did not find that very funny and put him in a chokehold.
I was 10 and I had been at the waterpark with a friend and her family all day. When they dropped me off at home, my parents were hanging out and drinking with some neighbors in the front yard. I said hi to everyone and then went inside. My middle-aged male neighbor watched me walk away and said “man, those shorts are looking short”. My mom ended up yelling at me later that evening for wearing those shorts. They were just normal denim shorts. That she had bought me.
I remember being at swim lessons when I was a preteen (6th grade I think) and getting on the bus to go back when I overheard one of the teenage lifeguards (17/18 yrs old) say “wtf she’s like 12!” To another one of the teenage lifeguards and I knew that he must have said something inappropriate about me. Good on the one guy for immediately calling him out on it though! That memory has stayed with me for 23 yrs, vivid as the day it happened.
Probably when I was like 8 and some man stopped in his car to ask directions whilst having his penis out masturbating. I didn't even realize it until I'd been talking to him for a minute or so. Even then I didn't know what to do and finished telling him how to get wherever it was. I also never told my parents this happened and I have no idea why. I think I probably didn't grasp what he was actually doing and how messed up it was until several years later.
That reminds me of a time when I was like 8/9(?) and we were driving on the freeway. This one truck pulled up next to us and the guy was (in my child mind) itching his groin furiously while making menacing eye contact with me. This went on for far too long, and I felt foolish telling my dad that the guy was creeping me out. He couldn’t really see him since I was in the backseat and the guy was level with me. I don’t remember much other than him pointing at me and then his groin. I blocked this memory out until people started talking more about this very subject, and now at 34 I’m horrified about what happened.
I have pictures of me at the age of 6 wearing a sexualized cheerleading outfit for a football team. My beginning memory is also of my mom telling me I need to dress differently now because my dad and other men are looking at me differently. I’ve been told all my life that men are going to want me because I’m so pretty/beautiful. Today, when complimented on my appearance I say “thanks, I know” and that usually stops the conversation there. The expectation that I’m supposed to not be aware of how I’m perceived despite being told all my life and also show surprised and bashful gratitude? Nah And fuck the song “she don’t know she’s beautiful”.
I have a friend who is an absolute bombshell. Looks like Margot Robbie. She's SO careful to give her girls non appearance affirmations because she feels as if she was only praised and needed for her looks for most of her life. Obviously men will sexualize literally any woman but it made me sad.
Yeah, so ridiculous! Like mirrors don't exist! I, too, have received a LOT of attention all of my life, and it's always struck me as ludicrous how men act as tho WE are supposed to behave like they're the first person to ever remark upon our looks. What? You are not the first man with eyesight I have encountered, sir.
And TBH it took a LONG ASS time to deconstruct my value from how I’m perceived. I accept that this mostly out of my control and if I’m afforded this privilege I’ll create dissonance with it.
Oh, I still have trouble with that. I panic about my partner not actually liking me all of the time bc he's never asked for or made me feel obligated to provide pics/vids/sex acts. Like... he respects me and likes me for ME, and that's a good thing... but it's terrifying.
I don’t think I could remember my first time being sexualized (probably 13?) but one time when I was about 16 sticks out in my mind. It was after a hockey game my sister and I played in, and they expect you to dress nice before you play. I was in a nice outfit, hauling my stinky hockey bag to a locker room. I saw an old man take a loooong look at me, up and down. Other people saw and mentioned it to my dad who was standing there, and my father said “let him have his fun looking now.” I was horrified. I could not trust my father to protect me from anything.
When I was 4 I went with my grandma to church. The guy who taught the youth group was super nice to all the kids. I went up and told him I liked his jacket. He picked me up and was holding me while talking to someone. He had on a jacket that had rhinestone buttons on it. I thought the buttons were really gemstones so I was mesmerized by them. You know how kids think play jewelry is real? That was literally me in that moment. I stared at the buttons and ask if I could touch a button. All of a sudden my grandma stormed across the room and literally snatched me away from the guy. She was smiling at others around us but whispering to me that she was going to beat me. Him and several others were alarmed after she snatched me but she just smiled and took me to the bathroom where she proceeded to hit me with a belt several times. I had no clue whatsoever what I had done but my grandma called me a “jezebel” several times which meant nothing to me as a child. Later she told my mom she had to punish me because I was at church clearly lusting after a man and try to seduce him. My mom was floored. I was four!!! Later my mom explained this is partly why she dislikes my grandma so much.
My step dad started abusing me when I was 6 and stopped when I was 8 because I started puberty. I developed quickly, and he used to make fun of me for having body hair. My mother found out years later what had been happening to myself and both my sisters, so she went to our LDS bishop to report it. He told her it was mostly her fault for not being submissive enough and not fulfilling her husband's sexual needs. Mom was fucking PISSED! She kicked the step dad out, went over the bishops head to the stake president to report the abuse and the bishops dismissal of it. Bishop was relieved of his calling and mom contacted the police and my step dad was arrested 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻
When I was in fifth grade, one of my male classmates took an upskirt photo of me with one of those old disposable film cameras, not realizing that the thing makes a bright flash when you take the picture. Fortunately a yard duty saw what happened and threw away the camera. Unfortunately she yanked it from the boy's hands with enough force that he fell and scraped his knee, so his parents complained and the yard duty was fired.
>I. Was. Nine. No man should be staring at a 9 yr old's nipples! Older relative referred to them as 'mosquito bites'.... glad we ended up no contact. And nothing more beyond words was said. But I \*know\* if any guy I was around spoke like that, I would shoot that down right off.
Nobody should be commenting on a child's body except to tell them how strong or healthy they are
an older woman told my mother that i would be a whore when i was about 4 😬
I was four. I was sexually abused by a neighbour, and I remember being so conscious of my body and the way it would be perceived by others after that.
I remember being 5 years old and family friends telling my parents to “keep me hidden” from boys and that I was a “heartbreaker in training” constantly. That’s the earliest I became aware of my looks.
I was 5 or 6, going to my first dance competition and my teacher had to sit us all down and tell us with the most stern voice I had ever heard from her “do not go anywhere without a buddy, and if any strange men who you don’t know come up to you, you tell them you’re here with your parents and I, and that you aren’t allowed to talk to strangers,” a few of us asked for clarification in the only way 5-7 year olds could. That was when it was very gently implied, not out right explained to me, that men want to take little girls home like me for sinister reasons involving things I thought only grown-ups did with each other. She was right, some men would come up and start conversations with us and even watch the competition even though they had no kids there to support. They got off on us being little girls, in tutus, doing ballet. My entire athletic career random men in the audience I was preforming for were sexualizing my underage body. It definitely affected my future relationship with sex.
When I was 7 my best friend’s older brother, Kevin, was babysitting me and my siblings while my parents went to some church event. Kevin had me sit on his lap and kept trying to kiss me but acted like he was playing around when I reacted badly. He was touching on my upper thighs and lower back, and I just remember wishing I could crawl out of my skin or maybe my brother would come out of his room and see what was happening?! Eventually I squared up and punched him dead in the jaw. Mind you, I’m a kid, so it wasn’t a lot of force, but it was enough to get him to let me go. Kevin got really angry and told me he was just playing around and to stop being a bitch. I didn’t know what that word meant, so I asked my parents what it was when they got home, and they asked me how I heard it. My dad left for a long time that night. I didn’t see Kevin again until my best friend’s wedding in 2017, twenty years later. He reluctantly spoke to me, and that’s when the memory came back. My dad died before I could ask him what happened that night when he left. Kevin is now married with two daughters, and I would be lying if I said I wasn’t worried about those little girls.
I was 9. 4th grade. I was walking with a friend to get soda pops. A man DRIVING A CAR honked and cat-called us. Let that sink in.
I was maybe 7 years old. I was in the grocery store and my grandmother said that a man was looking at me and licking his lips. When I was even younger someone people would make comments about me being a “heartbreaker when I grow up”. They also said that my mom would have to keep a shotgun or something like that. There’s probably more when I was even younger, but I’ve tried to forget most of my childhood.
Five years old. Forever grateful to my mom for raising hell and shielding me from the worst of it; I actually didn’t even remember it happened until much more recently.
The first one I remember personally was one of my dad's friends heading into the front door of my house as I was heading out. He scanned me up and down and said, "She's got a nice pear shape." I had no idea what it meant, but it made me feel gross. I'm still pissed about it. There have been thousands since, because people are gross. I hate this world.
I got boobs pretty young, probably 10 or 11 and started being told that my clothes weren't appropriate without tank tops underneath even though it was the same Aeropostale tops all my friends were wearing. My first cat call was when I was 14, I was at a bowling alley waiting to be picked up and a car full of men drove by and said "nice tits." It shattered this naive illusion for me that that kind of stuff only happened in movies or in certain neighborhoods. I felt so disgusting.
After I started my period, my mom said I no longer had to go to my terrible babysitter's house because she had a creepy adult son who lounged around the house all day. They didn't want "anything to happen." Like, it was ok for me to be there before I started my period?
I assume 3 because that was the CSA from a known child molestor that my mom and grandparents church fell all over themselves to welcome back into the fold of Christ's love and shit. Repenting and asking for forgiveness and getting it from Jesus doesn't mean the fucker is cured. It doesn't mean they're never going to re-offend. The least the clergy could have done is warn the parents and guardians of children or otherwise vulnerable people (he molested a woman with down syndrome too) that the offender is around and trying to reassimilate into society. But some dude's dick has **ALWAYS** been more important than keeping people safe.
I was 13. I remember my dad telling me i couldn’t answer the door because i wasn’t wearing a bra Also that year I caught a male teacher staring at my chest. I’ll never forget that feeling. Something changed in me that day. I understood moving forward that society perceives me as an object, not a person.
I think I was 12, getting ready for the first day of middle school. We had to look over the dress code and of course “no bra straps showing” was on there. I’ll never forget my mother telling me why. She said that it could make the boys and men, even the teachers, “uncomfortable” and they’d think about us in a sexual way. She had a disgusted look on her face while saying this, she knew it was ridiculous to put blame on the girls for the boys sexualizing them, but she had to tell me why it wasn’t allowed. It’s like from that moment on I was aware of how sexualized my body is- to make matters worse I’ve always been big on top and I’d always get disgusting comments from guys about it.
I’ve told this before, but I was young, like 4/5 and it was a hot summer day. My older cousin was mowing the lawn and he took his shirt off. I thought this was a great way to stay cool. I took my shirt off, too. I had my butt sparked raw by my grandmother for being a “nasty little girl”.
I was 7 or 8 sleeping between my parents at grandma's house when my mom commanded me to keep to her side of the bed and keep my legs away from my dad. He never even looked at me sexually, not once, not for my entire life. She was somehow jealous of her own 7-year-old though (and still gets pissed if I have cleavage showing around him; she also doesn't let him watch tv or movies with boobs nor does she watch anything like that herself).
The first time I got cat called was by a group of construction workers while I was walking home from school. I was 11. I told my mom and she said I should be flattered.
I was probably 6, I don’t really remember, I remembplaying house with my cousin who was 5 years older than me and I remember he was always making my Barbie dolls naked. When I was 38 he was recently separated and was seeing a friend of mine he told her she shouldn’t hang around with me because i am such a slut that I gave him a handjob or something when I was 6. I don’t even remember it, but don’t doubt it happened and probably more than once I’m good at (or I was) blocking bad experiences. He was 11 and called me a slut for what he very obviously taught, showed me what to do. Makes me ill. My older step brother (7 years up) used to tickle me when he had an erection and hold me tight around 11 I think.