Reading the reports of these women as well as the twitter feed of women talking about being assaulted is something I cannot even really put words to.

I knew…intellectually in any event…about giving up male privilege when I transitioned.

It is something else entirely to experience it. Being frightened…really frightened… for the first time when walking at night to get the car after a play in Raleigh in a way I never experienced when looking like “just another guy”.

Getting hit on when trying to do phone surveys. Guys would tell me my voice was soooo sexy. How the fuck are you supposed to react to that when you effectively grew up as male? I would say some sort of ‘thank you’ and try to complete the survey while thinking “Eeewwww!”

In Indianapolis, getting propositioned as a prostitute while waiting for a van ride to my hotel at a grocery store, and while wearing a professional skirt suit. Guys whistling and calling out at me if I was near a street.

Having strange men stop to offer me compliments whenever I wore a skirt. Not even really bad or offensive stuff…but just weird. Getting hit on at a bar while having a drink with my spouse( who was somewhat amused, I think, since the guy didn’t seem to read I was with a woman and we were a couple)

And I never had anyone try to actually touch me, and it still felt slimy so much of the time.

The incident at the store in Indianapolis was the one time I really felt I was in danger, and I had my hand on a knife in my purse in case he got out of the car to come at me. Thank God he didn’t.

I am just beside myself reading this stuff that so many men really have no experience with and don’t realize that women have to develop a 6th sense of danger to try and avoid the creeps, pervs and assholes at every turn.