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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To feel shaken by this incident and want to leave work?

242 replies

Cynthiaramsey · 16/07/2024 13:22

It’s been non stop raining where I live for days. I don’t drive so on my dinner I walk to a local Sainsbury’s. Today I waited for the rain to stop and then went out, so I didn’t have an umbrella and I don’t have a coat because even though it’s wet, it’s still warm.

I was walking to Sainsbury’s and the road was clear, then I suddenly heard a car speed up. I didn’t have time to wonder what was going on because before I knew it, they drove speeding into a puddle on the side and splashed me. It was a massive puddle so the water has drenched me! It stopped me in my tracks because it was freezing and all my hair and face were wet. As the van drove off, the guy in the passenger seat wound his window down laughing and shouted “slag!” At me. I feel really upset. I know nothing awful happened in the grand scheme of things but it’s just knowing that they sped up to do that on purpose and then laughed about it and called me a name. I am back in work now but my hair is wet and my clothes are so wet they are stuck to me on one side. I feel freezing cold and want to go home so that I can get changed and then just work my last few hours at home.

Would I be unreasonable to ask? Am I being dramatic? I told my boss what happened because I walked back through the door all wet and he was just saying that they’re idiots etc but hasn’t offered to let me go home to change into something dry. So I feel like he would say no. I just feel a bit sad and miserable now.

OP posts:
Elsbetka · 16/07/2024 14:41

This reply has been deleted

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Honestly truly, you hope they crash and die? You don't think that punishment is a little out of proportion?

Yougotwhatstuckwhere · 16/07/2024 14:43

What a pair of wankers.
That was a deliberate display of 'power' (ingrained, Tate following misogynistic bollocks).
Knuckle dragging morons.
I hope every woman they meet and know thinks they smell horrendous and can't stand to be around them, ever.
If the police are receptive to finding them, I too would hope their company would be informed of the behaviour.

Yougotwhatstuckwhere · 16/07/2024 14:44

Hope you're doing ok @Cynthiaramsey 🌻🌻🌻

Cynthiaramsey · 16/07/2024 14:44

LiesDoNotBecomeUs · 16/07/2024 14:06

Perfectly reasonable to go home and get dry if you are wet and cold and cannot get warm and dry at work!

Sorry this happened to you OP. You seem to have met more of those women-hating men.

They should suffer consequences for this. (Throwing a milk-shake can get you in court. Using a van to throw dirty water seems worse.) If they don't get these- they will do it again to someone.

Is it possible that there is any CCTV on that street and (even if their action against you isn't shown on camera) that you could identify the van - and the time it is there?

As you say - reporting them to their employer would be something and wouldn't need the level of proof required for a court.

I don’t know if there’s any CCTV, it’s not exactly a quiet area but the street was a side street so all of the shops were facing the other way, if that makes sense. So they wouldn’t have caught it. There is a petrol garage though that I assume will have CCTV

OP posts:
LadyKenya · 16/07/2024 14:44

This reply has been deleted

Message deleted by MNHQ. Here's a link to our Talk Guidelines.

Looks like they are not the only sick people out there!

Cynthiaramsey · 16/07/2024 14:45

alittlequinnie · 16/07/2024 14:01

Oh OP - I feel so sorry for you.

I was cycling home about 18 years ago and two lads in an ADT van kept pulling up to me and playing "who let the dogs out" and laughing their heads off.

It was crystal clear they were telling me I was a dog.

It never occurred to me at the time - but I should have reported it to ADT.

I proper cried when I got home and I still feel awful every time I think of it now - 18 years later!

About a year after that I was cycling home and there was a bus behind me and I was coming up to a bus stop - the bus was waiting for me to pull in and a man at the bus stop shouted at me "get off the road you stupid bitch" - I cried at that one too.

I just don't understand where men get off with this sort of thing - they are just total idiots! :(

Omg this is horrible! Not going to lie, I would be in tears over that too. I’m sorry that those things happened to you 😔 why are people like this?!

OP posts:
LyingWitchInTheWardrobe · 16/07/2024 14:46

Elsbetka · 16/07/2024 14:41

Honestly truly, you hope they crash and die? You don't think that punishment is a little out of proportion?

It's just knee-jerk, isn't it? I understand where celadora is coming from. It's just one of those thoughts that needs to stay in your head and not be vocalised.

Women are getting angry about this short of stuff and rightly so.

LiesDoNotBecomeUs · 16/07/2024 14:47

Cynthiaramsey · 16/07/2024 14:44

I don’t know if there’s any CCTV, it’s not exactly a quiet area but the street was a side street so all of the shops were facing the other way, if that makes sense. So they wouldn’t have caught it. There is a petrol garage though that I assume will have CCTV

If you know that the van went past the garage and the time it did so - it would be worth checking.

Our local shop was helpful about letting us see footage when we asked (for a different but good reason).

Sceptical123 · 16/07/2024 14:54

Cynthiaramsey · 16/07/2024 13:27

Thank you, I wish I got the number plate because it was a work van, it had some sort of signage on it so they must have worked for a company and I’d like to tell them. But I didn’t even think to look properly at the time

Report and ask for cctv - they should not be allowed to get away with this, they’ll no doubt do it again

SannaK · 16/07/2024 14:55

So is shouting In the street that a woman is a slag even with evidence a criminal offence?

Is that slander?

SeeSeeRider · 16/07/2024 14:55

I once read about a driver swerving to get in a flooded side of the road to make a splash to soak someone, and it was deeper than he thought, the almost new expensive car swerved, hit a lamp post, and was a write-off. I don't know if the insurer refused to pay out.

Elsbetka · 16/07/2024 14:58

LyingWitchInTheWardrobe · 16/07/2024 14:46

It's just knee-jerk, isn't it? I understand where celadora is coming from. It's just one of those thoughts that needs to stay in your head and not be vocalised.

Women are getting angry about this short of stuff and rightly so.

And I do get that an initial reaction is often knee-jerk (although the poster did double down on it in their subsequent post).

I absolutely loathe that we're in a situation, and a society, where this kind of thing happens all the time, every day, to women and to other marginalised people. I guess I just feel like that kind of rhetoric doesn't make things any better. Not because I think women should just not make a fuss/get back in their box - I suppose fundamentally I just really.hate that women feel they have to resort to that sort of rhetoric.

crystalflex · 16/07/2024 15:00

Op I'm sorry this has happened to you. I reported a similar thing. I used to go running in the evenings. A pick up truck driver slowly along side me making disgusting comments about my body. Then the sped up and drove off, but they actually just turned round and threw a milkshake at me as they came past the opposite way. I reported but didn't get the number plate. It was by a petrol station so they were on cctv and police took it seriously. No one ever got charged though, but the company who's van it was took action and sacked the men. I was happy with that.

Hope you're feeling ok now x

MrsBennetsPoorNerves · 16/07/2024 15:02

I'm sorry that you had this happen to you, OP, but I'm glad that your manager was reasonable about it.

VolvoFan · 16/07/2024 15:04

Don't stay in wet clothes. Go home and get changed. Don't ask, just do it, you can explain later. Just in case, bring an entire outfit including underwear and shoes to work and keep it in your desk for if something like that happens again.

rewilded · 16/07/2024 15:04

Definitely report it. It is a criminal offence.

You have every right to feel upset. Sorry this has happened to you.

Yalta · 16/07/2024 15:05

I would report this to the police traffic division giving them the road name and town and where abouts on the road you were when it happened and what time it happened and then let the police deal with it by looking through the CCTV footage

It is an offence to drive deliberately though a puddle to splash a pedestrian

Cynthiaramsey · 16/07/2024 15:09

Thanks everyone. I am warm and dry now at home, with a fluffy cat on my lap. I’ve had some chocolate and I feel a bit better. I think I will report it, even if it’s just to make myself feel like I’ve done something. The thought of them just getting away with it makes me really angry. Kicking myself for not paying attention to the company name on the van

OP posts:
ChangeEmailAddress · 16/07/2024 15:11

Cynthiaramsey · 16/07/2024 13:39

Would the police take this kind of thing seriously?

They absolutely do. I was driving a tiny tractor on the road and a van overtook me and threw a cup of warm liquid (that I initially thought was piss but thankfully was flat coke) over me. Unfortunately for them they had to stop in traffic and I managed to get their registration and reported it. I made a statement and a couple of months later got a call saying that they had been arrested for something completely unrelated, and they thanked me for the report as it helped build a picture of what they were like.

Keenovay · 16/07/2024 15:15

@Cynthiaramsey Just wanted to chime in with my sympathies, that's a horrible and shocking thing to happen out of the blue on your lunch-hour. As a cyclist, when random sadistic things like this happened to me, it was often guys in a white work van (obligatory #notallwhitevanmen disclaimer). I assume pack mentality + the elevated seating play a part, though I don't understand the desire to hurt someone you perceive as smaller and weaker. I do hope you get the bastards, but as another poster said, your own state of mind comes first. Quite right you went home, it's not good for knee joints etc sitting in wet clothes, not to mention you have been assaulted.

StitchVic · 16/07/2024 15:16

Sorry this happened to you OP. It’s appalling. I was mildly splashed (to thigh height) a few months ago and I was seriously peeved (although in my case the driver didn’t do it on purpose- it still stung!). As others have already said it is an offence and I remember reading (I think on BBC news website several years ago) about a mum who had successfully got a driver prosecuted when he purposely splashed her & her toddler.
I appreciate though it’s not a route you can go down if you didn’t get their number plate. You might see the same van again if you walk that route regularly, so fingers crossed you can get the plate then.

ToWonderWhyIBother · 16/07/2024 15:18

This happened to my mum in the 80's in Glasgow town centre, she was out shopping and going for some lunch with her friend and two guys in a van did this. My mum was so angry she chased him up the street, where he had got stopped at a red light, she opened the passenger door and battered the bloke with her hand bag whilst calling him all manner of names in true glaswegian style.

Once she was finished she shut the door and advised him to think twice the next time he did this and walked back to her friend whilst the puddle was dripping down her hair and face, and trying to look ladylike.

40 years later at my mums funeral her friend relayed this story to everyone at the meal and the whole place was in stitches, it was such a lovely way to remember the fiesty lady that my mum was.

Zebedee999 · 16/07/2024 15:21

I had this exact same thing happen to me. I was walking along a quiet road that was flooded. As I was part way along the flooded section I heard a car coming from behind so I started to run knowing what would happen. But he sped up and came as close to me as possible and I was soaked head to toe in muddy water.
I got his registration number and reported it to the police as anto social behaviour. They visited the adress but both parties named on the insurance denied it was them so it went no where... but I am glad they got a visit.
I'd encourage anyone that anti social behaviour happens to to report it. In the case of cars, take the registration number.

ALovelyCupOfNameChange · 16/07/2024 15:25

glad you are home and warm

had this happen to me, I went home and cried. It was really scuzzy road water that drenched me, with bits in it. It was grim.
I also had this on the way to work once, went home and changed, work were arsey about it.

oneniltothem · 16/07/2024 15:30

They are vile !!!!!! If I ever thought one of my sons, brothers or husband behaved like this I would be absolutely livid 🤬 it is so important to teach little boys that this is not ok ! Let's face it I've not come across women doing this. I'm so angry on your behalf please report them