I have mentioned my previous experience in my adult life having more time consumed by being stalked than anyone should have in five lifetimes, but I want to devote one post just to this because of something strange this summer. First, I have had three stalkers in real life, but they were all people I actually met before their obsession began. This summer I had someone obsessed with me online who I had never met, and had honestly had virtually zero interaction with, and that's what makes it so bizarre. Yes, being stalked should always be freaking bizarre. However, someone who had no idea who I even was being obsessed with me to this extent is really a new level to the bizarre I had not experienced previously.
Along the way I'll include some of the unhelpful perspectives or "help" other people try to bring to the table. I mentioned already in a previous post that many women are jealous of the attention and act like you're vain that you think some guy is obsessed with you. It's really sucky behavior from women in this regard, but I already covered those reactions, so the people who try to help still don't describe things that fit the reality of the behavior patterns.
This weekend I was telling a friend or two that this strange guy resurfaced at the end of the week. The AI rendering for cyberstalker above is how we can imagine he looks. I had to tell them the context about the deal level of experience I've had in the past. The first one, again, was a manager at my first main job after my degree. He "liked a challenge" and I was a complete ice queen to him. Completely consistent in shutting down any effort from him to express interest in me. I think mentioning that another guy I knew was talking about marriage to me finally made that guy move on, but it wasn't clear to me. That was really toxic to be in the office 40 hours a week and not be able to escape him. The second was The Guy who was a major chapter in my life, the son of someone I was close to. He was emotionally abusive, isolated me, and was a destructive force in my life. I have spent the past several years looping in mutuals in our social circle to tell them about my experience and work through it. The only thing I told his father was "just don't let him stalk me," ironically. I filed several police reports about him, and the police told me it was important to create a paper trail if something major happened then they would have in writing exactly where to look. I did not like the feeling that he had to do something really bad to me before they could help me. Bouncy OG pup came into my life to help me recover from this chapter, as well as be my protector at home. One time she was not living with me, he broke into my flat, and so I immediately moved house and brought her in with me.
The third was a guy I met at my sport club while my mom was in denial about her terminal illness, and I was just trying to go there to get away and clear my head. It was my Zen space. He had a girl on the other side of the country, but spent the summer following me around. I learned my lesson to wait for him to admit it since I learned if I tried to accuse him he would deny it and blame me for being crazy and making it up. He admitted it to someone who went to school with me. I think overall it took me six months to get rid of him, which was an improvement since the others lasted for years. In the end, I think I snarled at him one day when he was doing circles around me when I was trying to get in a training session. Nothing like a good snarl, but really, you start to wonder what does it take to tell a guy to get lost? One friend asked me "what do I do to attract these weirdos?" The only guess I can make is being open. My mother predicted as an adult I would need to carry a bat to beat guys away, but I decided I was always going to hold onto the identity as the girl next door, not be a mean girl. There was a chapter where The Guy was simultaneously stalking me and creating a love triangle by dating another girl, and I wasn't my best self in that situation. I was, in fact, absolutely brutal and tore her apart. I know that part of me can exist if I chose it, but I can decide to control myself and avoid going there. After all the correct direction to take out my anger is on The Guy, not the poor victim he's dragging into his drama. I've always avoided straight girl competition for men and never been aggressively chasing after them, figuring if they were so immature to need that, they weren't the right guy for me. In general, I do not want the drama in my life or the toxicity of these kinds of situations. When I moved here I wished never to have a stalker again, and continue to do my best in being straight forward and fair in dating.
As far as I know I did absolutely nothing to open the strange chapter this summer. It was on the "Critique Partner swap" board which I've usd for two of my novels. I've chatted with several people from the board and worked with two people who were a good fit. There seems to be a normal process. Someone posts about their genre, and you get in touch if it might match yours. You exchange a chapter, and perhaps have a zoom call. The process being to determine if there's common overlaps in style and process. I have undergone this process with several people I've opted not to continue as CPs.
In May I was working on my Non-Fiction Book Proposal, and finding it required people with some niche experience. I posted on the CP swap board to see if I got any bites. One guy responded, however there was something off. He responded to my post on the board, and I sent him ONE EMAIL inquiry. That was the only contact he had from me. The first email he sent back was an information dump telling me to call him and had desparation vibes. My instinctual reaction to that was right because without any further response to me, he sent 4-5 more emails. It was awkward, and I was taking my course this summer, so I deleted several of the obsessive seeming emails and didn't think about him. Then he found my website and started sending the same messages on my website. Multiple messages on my website, when, again, he had never had more than that one first response to me.
I was busy with my summer course, trying to get all of the things moving forward with my health and doctors that I've written about. I had made progress with finishing most of my proposal, had the feedback from the newspaper editor, recommending an introduction to the Big 5 editor. I was anxious about that. I have blogged this summer about all of the things on my plate. None of them were this strange person who sent me constant messages without any response from me. One response from me in May. I only log into my website to check the analytics a few times a year, and usually when I am posting blog posts more regularly. I had been blogging about all of these things and logged in to check the visitors, when I saw the Inbox.
It had the previous messages from this person. Then there was a new, ugly, harassing message. It was from a random email address that did not identify a name. I had my suspicion though, so what I could do was check the IP address from that address, and the IP address from the strange guy's email. They were, in fact, the same. He was so obsessed with me, for some reason, he went through the trouble of creating a different email to send me an ugly harassing email, which was completely unhinged and volatile. At that time, I wrote to him telling him that if I ever heard from him again I would file a police report. Searching his original email reveals he has a PhD in psychology, and my friends observed that usually being unhinged comes with people who study those fields.
Here's where my therapist offered advice that doesn't match reality. She and I have discussed the The Guy, who was apparently pissed off about all of the police reports I filed about him. In her words, she thought that someone would be afraid of pursuing someone who had filed police reports about them. If that were the case, women would not need to have restraining orders if a mere police report would deter someone unhinged and obsessive.
The case was, apparently the same for this strange cyberstalker who had never talked to me, never met me, completely not fitting the previous patterns I have had with the 5-6 years total of being stalked in my adult life. In September, while I was in the middle of the stress of preparing for the exam for my course, he created yet a new email address to send me another harassing email on my website. Cyberharassment and stalking is illegal in Germany. I do not make threats I do not carry out. I did not respond to him after this message. I did not pass go or collect $200. I went directly to filing a police report about him.
So what happened this week to bring it all up again? I was sending out a newsletter about the new publication in Dark Horses. I use templates for my newsletters, as one does. He had apparently signed up for my newsletter on my website, and responded to the template wording in the newsletter, which no one ever does. The most creepy part about his contact at this point was trying to make it seem like there were two sides, saying "we" had anything in common about life intensity. As if I had played any role in his obsession. I called my father, since police would say I was the one who made the mistep here by being the one who contacted him. While I was on the phone with my father, the guy had still had no response to me, and went on my website and sent me ANOTHER message there.
My father always asked me if I had ever just told him I wasn't interested. My friend said telling him not to contact you and that you are filing a police report about him doesn't get any clearer. However, I did do as my father had suggested since it started to write him and say I wasn't interested. My friend thought this guy is desperate for attention, and getting any communication from me will cause him to continue. Of course I prefer not to have these kinds of situations. Men have zero right to think they are in any way to entitled to dictate the behaviour of women or to use this kind of bullying or harassment to get whatever reaction they are looking for. My father said I was clear in my message and "if he was worth his weight, he would get the message." My father tends to be optimistic about people, and I think based on the behaviour pattern, it feels like my father not reading this guy as "not worth his weight" was a misread. My father had thought when the guy started messaging me obsessively I should have sent him the message clearly to start, but to this day I still disagree that someone who sends me 8 messages with no response doesn't deserve anything other than to be ignored.