She

Walk away, it isn't worth it...

Photo by Martino Pietropoli on Unsplash

She’s had bad experiences with men.

Dad drank a lot and he wasn’t really “there for her”
Her parents divorced when she was 7. She lived with Mom, who never had a good word to say about him. In fact, it was the opposite. She was taught what a monster he was.

Her first boyfriend talked her into having sex when she wasn’t really ready. She said yes but she regretted it later and wished she had “saved herself” for someone better.

Her second boyfriend once called her fat when they were fighting.

All of these events happened by the time she was 22. From that point on, her opinions and approach to the world were fixed. Everything that happened had some connection to her previous experiences.

• Her manager in her second job didn’t promote her because she was a woman

• The colleague who tried to tell her politely she was too aggressive in the way she communicated to others only did so because she was a woman.

• She only got a 6% payrise rather than an 8% payrise because she was a woman.

• Social media told her she was part of a repressed minority, a solider engaged in a never ending fight for her rights against all men, who were benefiting from her repression.

• TV shows and movies re-enforced her worst fears. The dopey, stupid dad. The horny fuck-boy friend. The toxically masculine guy making a BBQ.

• All of the boys on her dating applications on her phone were terrible. They were all emotionally immature and obsessed with sex.
  
  There were other things around that could have shown her a different perspective of course. But she seemed to filter those out?

• She ignored the news article about the man who risked his life to pull a family from a burning car, injuring his hands in the process.

• She didn’t read the news article about the kind old man who found a lost child in the shopping centre and took him to the police station.

• She ignored the interview with man who gave his kidney and his bone marrow to help his brother.

• She never really thought about her friend Jane, who’s mother and father had a great marriage that lasted over 40 years and produced three well rounded children.

• She forgot about the time a man stopped to help her change the tyre on her car when it was raining and she didn’t have the strength to move the jack.

It didn’t really occur to her that Ed Sheeran wrote “Perfect”, or that Meat Loaf would have done “anything for love.” Nor that Bryan Adams would have died for her.

Shes 39 now and shes listening to you talk.

But shes not really listening to the points you are making. Shes waiting to see what she can pick you up on. Because there’s an audience here and bringing you down a peg or two would really help?

How can she make the thing you are saying seem sexist (even though it isn’t)?

How can she make you appear out of touch, awkward, bad and wrong?

How can she “correct you” and make herself appear enlightened, woke and better in the process?

How can she make you responsible for the time Dad left her at the school gate and didn’t pick her up? For the forgotten birthday present? For the missed phone calls?

How can she make you responsible for all the times she was frightened that Mom and Dads arguing might turn violent?

How can she make you responsible for that painful nasty comment Steven made when they were fighting that one time?

Don’t fall into the trap of thinking they are all like her.

They aren’t all like her, not by a long a shot.

But gosh there are plenty of them. And when you find one, know what you are dealing with.

You can’t fix her. Love will not cure this particular brand of hatred. You can’t convince her otherwise. It’s done.

Shes made you her enemy. You are the reason for it all.

You simply have to give her what she wants. BE her enemy.