Apologies to the TLDR ladies.

This happened over a year ago to me and I’m still dealing with the fallout.

I’m a whitewater kayaker, which is a small and male dominated community. I had a “friend” (call him T) helping me to level up and we’d always go boating together, and often he was flirty and I’d just shut him down. It didn’t bother me much because guys are flirty and he often had a girlfriend. Anyway.....

One night around Christmas 2018 T asked if I was hungry and told me to come over, he made a huge dinner. I was already out and about and so I stopped by. We drank and had dinner and everything appeared relatively normal.

Then I don’t know how it happened- he was talking to me and invading my space so I kept backing up- he cornered me against a pool table, grabbed my wrists so I couldn’t move, pressed his pelvis against me (I could feel his hard on), tried to kiss me, etc. And bear is mind T is a super tall big guy- like over 6 ft (when I’m a normal sized woman of 5’4). I backed up over a couch, he wouldn’t let go of me so both of us flipped over the back of it. He let me go and I got to my feet and GTFO of there.

The next morning he called me, and said, “I’m sorry if you feel hungover this morning.” I yelled, “is that all you’re sorry about?!” He proceeds to play dumb and apologizes for, “misreading signals.” I yell, “what fucking signals???”

And I forgave him because I’m stupid. I told him to never pull that shit with me again. That if I changed my mind about getting involved and be more than friends I would tell him, but outside of that I was a friend he boated with and he was to treat me as such. He stated understanding.

That following summer we were planning on a trip. A mutual friend was a maybe for going and said that if he went we could sleep in his camper. Otherwise we agreed we’d come back that same night instead of camping out after paddling.

Turns out friend can’t go, and T and I leave the next AM. He then announces that he plans on camping out the whole weekend instead of coming back as we had planned if our friend couldn’t go. I ask, “but where am I gonna sleep?” And T responds, “in the back of my Subaru.”

So, on the way to the river, T also asks me about how things are going with the guy I had been seeing. I told him that I had broke it off, which he then take as license to touch and rub my leg. WTF.

When we get to the river, I get away quick and ask my friend if he’ll take me home and I explain what happened. He was kind enough to go over an hour out of his way to get me home safely so that I wouldn’t have to sleep in the back of this motherfuckers Subaru.

I am livid, and I post about it in a women’s paddling group on FB. I didn’t mention him by name, but another local woman contacted me and said, “was it T? I knew it! He’s so creepy!” She then encouraged me to let our local kayak club leaders and let them know what happened (to help prevent him from doing anything in the future). I do so.

It is now 2021 and I’m still dealing with this. One kayak buddy keeps telling me I, “have a tendency to overreact,” (he’s referring to this event), and that I should have told him to stop touching my leg when we were in the car together (Um sorry I was shocked and uncomfortable, yes I should have done that instead of being silently uncomfortable, but isn’t that victim shaming?). Another mutual friend who I actually dated kinda blamed me for it, saying, “well you are hard to read.” He also tried to get us to make up so we could all paddle together (T refused to paddle with me in any groups after I emailed to club leaders) and T said, “If she wants to paddle with me she can pay me for my time.” Once again, WTF?

Ladies, I still can’t believe the way this whole scenario unfolded. I wish I would’ve just kept my mouth shut. I know I was the victim, and I know I did nothing wrong, but I still can’t believe the way men around me act about how everything went down and still blame it on me. Men who supposedly care about me! The only men who have supported me in this are my brothers. Seriously, any advice or better outlook is appreciated.