522 - Mailbox: The "Good" Samaritan / Women's Self Defence
A local woman shares an experience of being followed home
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This recent experience by a 50-60 year old woman who has a partial disability was recounted to me at last Sunday’s women’s group training. My comments and other views will lie in the relative safety of the paywall section so as to side step local displeasure where I coach. Jeth
“Jeth - I used your training last night…
I’d accompanied some friends who had tickets to a musical at the top of town - they had a spare one and I joined them. It was not my cup of tea at all, everyone else seemed to be having a great time but I was finding it all a bit relentless with he singing and dancing.
A traditional favourite of the British about a love affair across social positions - an unimaginable plot to resolve that is indeed resolved with the last minute discovery that one of the main characters is not of a higher class at all and therefore the union may proceed - it doesn’t get much clearer really does it!
I’d left the theatre and walked the mile or so back home alone through the town.
I was in a lot of pain and was using my stick to walk.
One of the homeless guys in town had come up and started talking to me as I walked. Now I’m ok with this and know a few of the homeless faces in town to say hello to but there was something about him talking to me now that I just felt was off.
He insisted on walking with me to escort me home all though town and out to (name removed) and was friendly enough but I knew that this wasn’t to help me and that something else was going on.
I remembered you showing me how to use my stick and was repeating the visualisation of his face and groin as a target for when the time came.
I kept the conversation going in a friendly way but as I reached the corner of the street where my flat is I knew that I had to lose him now rather than let him see where I lived. If this wasn’t going to work my next plan was to reach the flat of some friends close by and ring their bell and hope that their presence would deter him from further problems.
I can’t remember what I said to him but he reticently turned and left me at the corner. I went home checking that he was gone which he was.
I knew quite clearly that this wasn’t walking with me for my benefit and that there was another motive though I don’t know what it was or why he didn’t do anything.
I was very clam through the walk, for some reason I was convinced that he didn’t have a knife, I have no idea how, just sensed it - the thought of knives terrifies me. I’ve been around the military and don’t have this same fear of guns at all, but knives… I find horrific.
Before I trained I would never have been comfortable with the idea of using force on another person but last night I was shocked by the fact that I was not only ready to do that but also planning how I would do it based on what I’d learned in a couple of lessons with you.”
(Name removed)
Other comments / the “One In One moment”
This caused concern in the other women present not just for the lady mentioning the experience but also the fact that it was in a central location in the town where they too lived.
“I would tell him that I wanted to listen to music or be alone or something…”
“But then he’d know you had a phone and rob you...”
Other participants had asked how she had remained calm she said that she just