When women run alone, an uncomfortable topic

The murder of three women that had been out on runs just a few weeks ago seems to have created a flurry of discussions on the subject. There are so many different opinions on it and no matter what stance you have, you will have a large group of people strongly disagreeing with you so please realize this is MY opinion based on my own personal experiences and I don't in any way want to upset someone or tell another woman how they should go forward with their running, this is simply my view.

 Sadly, women being murdered while out running is not something unheard of. Just follow the news around the country and you will hear of it, maybe not often, but often enough for me. When I was nine years old, I was very close to being kidnapped while out riding my bike, with a friend, in broad daylight, in a highly populated neighborhood. Had I not had the good sense to listen to the voice within me that told me I was not going to make it to my apartment building and instead ran into a random person's yard and onto their front porch, I feel pretty certain that I would be dead.

  I basically blocked this from my memory for many years, my mom not taking me all that seriously when I told her the story once I got home and I think my child's mind just accepted my mom's theory and I shut it out. It wasn't until I was significantly older and replayed it that I saw how very close I was to being gone.

 I don't remember exactly what age I was when catcalling and whistling began if I was walking home from the school bus, or out jogging, but it basically became something that I accepted as a way of life. I would roll my eyes and avoid eye contact with whomever did it, I really didn't care. It wasn't something that made me fearful and I figured they thought they were complimenting me so whatever.

  When I ran in highly populated areas, I would occasionally have men run alongside me and try to chat. One came right out and told me he would meet me there at the same place the following day to run with me. No "hi, how you doing?" Just sort of a command.

 I gave him an "are you nuts?" expression and moved along. Oh, I guess I failed to mention that several of these incidents, including the last mentioned one, I was newly married so sporting a wedding ring quite clearly on my left hand.

 It wasn't until I had had two kids, and was still being hollered at whenever my husband wasn't running with me, that I became angry about it.

 One particular day when I was running with my husband and pushing both of my boys in the jogging stroller, my husband sprinted ahead for the last stretch of our run while I just jogged slowly along, when a van pulled up alongside of me and my boys, a teenage boy jumped out, another sat in the back with a video camera, while a third teen was driving. "wanna race?" the boy shouted as he ran alongside of me, apparently to capture this on video. I looked towards my husband, who was quite a ways of ahead of us but had just turned around and the teens saw him at that very moment. "Get in the van!" the driver shouted, seeing that there was a man in the vicinity, and off they took.

 Yes, it was harmless, but it was disconcerting to me, a mom that just wanted to push her kids in a stroller along the beach and had that been my boys, I would have been furious. The fact that they thought it was fine to harass me, until they caught sight of my husband and realized he was with us, also made me upset. If I am with my sons, now that they are older, or my husband, nothing. If my husband and sons are outrunning me, a car passes them without a word and I get hollered at.

 I have been followed out of my neighborhood on the one and only nearly dark run I ever went on alone and had a man expose himself to me on a long desolate stretch of road. Several people, mostly women oddly enough, thought it was funny. I wasn't one of them, and to this day I will not run in the dark alone again.

  I don't dress in an appealing fashion in any way shape or form, not even in tank tops. I think there are just men out there looking for an opportunity when it comes to situations like the flasher or the teenagers. Maybe also the catcallers. I think the only people ever saying that a female is asking for the attention because of the way she dresses are the actual perpetrators. No one in their right mind blames the woman and I do not believe we live in a world of "rape culture," the new buzz word, in this country What we do live in is a world where there are mentally ill and evil people out there and that is why I choose to run safe. Which for me means in well travelled areas when I am alone, out in the open where cars will be going by on a regular basis and never at night. I know that no matter what I wear, if there happens to be a sick individual out there, I am quite possibly a prime target based on the fact that I am female and he has an opportunity.

 I do teach my boys that catcalling and leering, hollering at a woman, is just completely unacceptable. It's harassment and disrespectful and all I can do is hope other parents choose to do the same but there will unfortunately always be mentally ill or just out right evil people living amongst us and we just never know when they will strike. I don't consider this living in fear, I just consider it living in (an unfortunate) reality.