Encounter in the woods with a man...was I being silly?

[Woodwalk]

I walk in a local woods daily. Today I parked in the small car park where there were around 4 cars already. Changed into my boots, tied up my hair, no one else arrived in this time. Then I set off down a trail which begins running alongside the main road to the right, to the left is an inaccessible woodland - too dense to walk through. You can only enter the trail from the car park (at that end).

I had only been walking for around a minute or two when I got the sensation I was being watched/followed. This is strange as I would only have expected to meet someone head on on the path - given that there's one entrance and I saw no one else arrive at the car park within a minute of myself.

Anyway I turned round a few times and finally spotted a man behind me, slightly off the trail nearer to the side where the road is (trees are between the main road and me). I immediately did feel uncomfortable as I wasn't sure where he had come from, and debated stopping so that he could move ahead of me. I decided against this as didn't want to make a big thing of it.

Instead I kept going and took a turn off into a large shaded area, a clearing where I could see the original trail and find a little tree trunk to sit on (and look normal!) as he passed.

Instead of passing the man followed me into the clearing. I had walked quite far into the clearing to find a tree that gave a lot of space around me. He made a beeline for me straight towards me. I felt scared, and then he met my eyes and asked how my day was going. I immediately went into flight mode jumped up blurted out something about not wanting to be followed on my walk and started to run back to the car park (around 6 mins running). He shouted after me to come back, he didn't mean to scare me, he hadn't been following me, he was lost, he was sorry, come back please.

I just ran all the way back to the car and left.

I'm a woman in early 30s the gent was late fifties I think, and very overweight, if he tried to follow me back I couldn't tell, but don't think he could have matched my pace. He didn't have a dog, but then, neither do I.

Now I'm wondering, was he innocently lost and wanted a chat? Was I being silly to run away? It doesn't really matter now as I'm obviously safe and fine but the woods is my favourite place to go and I feel really put off returning now. Need a reality check as feel a bit silly now but in the moment I was scared.

I had a similar incident once during lockdown, I was out walking with my then baby in his pram. A nornally busy pedway by a park used by dog walkers was deserted and a man followed me and kept hiding behind hedges when I looked back. I also ran away back to a busier road with the pushchair. It made the hairs stand up on my arms and I just sensed trouble. Always trust your gut in these cases, better to offend an innocent man than be harmed by a not so innocent one.

His weight and size were relevant because, if the OP hadn’t taken her chance to run away as she sensibly did, he could easily have blocked and overpowered her.
Much better to be safe than sorry. Most men would have had more sense than to approach a woman alone in the woods in that way. Definitely report him.

This. I’d report it in case this man I’d out there and could be a danger to women.

You were right OP. So he didn't shout excuse me but he thought it was fine to follow you! Glad your OK.

Not sure if anyone has suggested this OP but have you considered a defence spray (not mace spray) https://www.amazon.co.uk/Criminal-Identifier-Defence-Multi-Function/dp/B076KDXG4Y …I was followed through a very quiet park one evening by a guy who turned out to be a flasher, it was so scary and I felt afraid walking alone for a while after (I’ve got a dog but they’re small and not much of a deterrent!)…anyway a friend bought this for me and it did give a bit of peace of mind 🙂

Yes, but if you post in public, use a throwaway second profile, in case the man reads it, too, as then he would have your name. It's a safety measure, too, to keep your online information about yourself as minimal as possible.

You think that this is a thread where ‘men are at risk too’ is an appropriate thing to post? Yes, we all know that. But please tell me, how often have you walked home with your keys between your fingers? How many times has a man in a car pulled up beside you and tried to get you to go with him? How many times have you had a creepy cab driver drop you off a street early so they don’t know your address? How many times have you been threatened with violence by someone twice your size because you don’t want to give them your phone number? How many times have you been spat at and called a snobby cunt because you don’t want to talk to someone who wants to talk to you? When you’re walking alone in the woods and another man is just standing there, how many times have you thought ‘will this man rape me, will he kill me, or am I safe?

And when you’ve very unfortunately been attacked, how many times were you asked what you were wearing? Or what you expected to happen if you’d been drinking? Or what you said to provoke them? How many times have you been questioned whether you’re making it up? Or asked if you really want to ruin a man’s life by asking for justice?

How have you got the entitlement, the sheer fucking nerve, to come into a thread about the potential risk to women and girls and talk about how you’re at risk too?

It’s so sad that you can’t feel safe going for a walk in your local woods.

Another man missing the point. Women aren’t upset. We’re being murdered by fat weird men in secluded areas.

It’s the fact that he called come back that makes it even more suspicious to me. Most men who had inadvertently alarmed someone would feel really bad and certainly not want to make the person come back. They would just let them get on with it. This incident was not right.

Oh @shugglesyou misjudged your input on this one, it’s not relevant and is coming across as very mansplainy and making women wince. Sometimes it’s best to just listen and not try to share false equivalences.

@WilfredsPies

"How have you got the entitlement, the sheer fucking nerve, to come into a thread about the potential risk to women and girls and talk about how you’re at risk too?"

I just noticed his username. I wouldn't have even responded if I had noticed it before. I don't know why he hasn't been banned for shit-stirring in these kind of threads by now. It's definitely a pattern.

@WilfredsPies How have you got the entitlement, the sheer fucking nerve, to come into a thread about the potential risk to women and girls and talk about how you’re at risk too?

I'm not "at risk too." I am at a higher risk. Many of my school friends have been punched and bottled on nights out (unprovoked) and some spent days in hospital because of it. I am too old now to be drinking and going to clubs, but I always took sensible precautions because of the risk I was faced with- I never went off by myself away from people I know, I stayed away from people who were arugmentative and violent, I was always sure to cross the street if I saw someone approach me, I only ever moved from point A to point B in a taxi, and I always got out of a taxi early so they didn't know where my house is.

BEHOLD A MAN HAS ARRIVED TO GIVE HIS OPINION.

HIS MANLY OPINION ON WHY A WEIRD MAN ISN'T A THREAT TO WOMEN, BECAUSE WHAT ABOUT THE MEN.

@ButtSurgery HIS MANLY OPINION ON WHY A WEIRD MAN ISN'T A THREAT TO WOMEN, BECAUSE WHAT ABOUT THE MEN.

I agreed with OP that she was right to move away from the man and I selected the "you are not being unreasonable" option.

And yet, here you are, mansplaining women's fears of being raped, murdered or mutilated by men.

Start your own thread on VAM, not jump on one about the threat of VAWG.

@ButtSurgery And yet, here you are, mansplaining women's fears of being raped, murdered or mutilated by men.

I didn't start that discussion. That discussion was initiated by other's in the thread in response to my original post.

@shuggles

You completely missed the point of the conversation you’ve joined. This is about the specific, gendered risks that women and girls face every single day. Instead of listening, you barged in to center yourself and claim you're somehow at higher risk. That’s not just tone-deaf, it’s borderline offensive.

Yes, men face violence. Overwhelmingly from other men. Nobody is denying that. But pub fights or getting bottled on a night out is not the same thing as the constant, exhausting threat of sexual harassment, assault, stalking, and intimidation that women live with from the moment we're old enough to be seen as female. Women and girls are often attacked purely because they are women and girls. Because they walk alone. Because they say no. Because they look a certain way. Because they are not men.

You listed precautions like avoiding certain people, taking taxis, never walking alone. Congratulations, you’ve had a small taste of the kind of hypervigilance women have been conditioned to maintain our whole lives. The difference is that for us, it doesn’t end when we leave the club or pub. It never ends. We’re told to dress differently, speak differently, avoid eye contact, share our live location, carry keys between our fingers, pretend to be on the phone, take alternate routes home and somehow, if something happens, it’s still our fault. And then courtesy of men like you we hear ‘men are more at risk anyway’, on top of all that.

You’re not the target of a society that routinely excuses violence against your gender. Stop hijacking the conversation with false equivalences, stop centering men and you might be surprised at what you learn.

I’d say it’s relevant for that but also in that had he attacked her, the weight might have been in his (malicious) favour.

Always, always, ALWAYS listen to your instinct. If it told you to run to your car, dont question whether it was the right thing. If the guy was lost he can follow the path to find other people. You're safe. Nothing else matters.

I used to live in another European country and would venture out alone in the woods with pepper spray and a big dog. It was the foam type so it can’t blow back into your own face easily. I did feel a bit safer but it’s illegal here and I don’t have the dog anymore.
I have also learnt that if you walk like a man it helps with unwanted attention.
Whenever I used to walk home in London late at night, I would use this trick.

I'm sorry, are you at higher risk of being overpowered, raped and then murdered by a lone man in the woods? Are you at higher risk of being flashed or masturbated at?

Have your mates had any experience of another bloke whipping his cock out whilst they felt terrified at whether they would make the next national headlines because he can out power and kill them with his bare hands 1 on 1 easily? After doing God knows what...

I don't recall the OP expressing that she was worried about being bottled on a night out by another women who is of approximate equal strength and unlikely to have a sexual motive... Maybe she can ask you for your advice on dealing with that if it ever comes up.

The male experiences you are centering are literally irrelevant to this thread. That doesn't mean they don't matter, they just don't matter here. Again, downplaying the risks in this context, the actual context the OP was in, places women's lives at risk. Please, go away.

You really don't have a clue about the way women have to naviagate daily life so that they can do their best to avoid at the very least harrassement by men and at the worst being attacked. Ask any woman or girl that you know and I guarantee that every single one will have at least one story to tell about a disturbing encounter with a man.

Trust your gut @Woodwalk you've walked in that area long enough to have encountered men and not felt off, so something has triggered you.

I had similar once in a car park. I was grocery shopping in the evening, returning to my car. I'm always very alert on which people are where. I was caught well off guard to turn and see a man come out of nowhere - I think I had turned as I heard a car door open and this guy wasn't far behind me and was absolutely silent - couldn't hear his feet etc (most people walk very noisily). There had been no one behind me on the escalator, no one approaching the doors, or getting out of their cars as I crossed the car park. It made me super anxious and I got in the car and locked the door. Unbeknownst to me, in that particular car park there had been a man assaulting women in the exact set up my car was in - small car next to a larger SUV/van. I read it in the news a few days later, by which time I couldn't recall him clearly enough to do anything.

You will NEVER KNOW what it's like for women so pipe down with your 'more at risk' shit. You're not at a higher risk than women of being sexually assaulted, raped or murdered while walking your dog or going for a run in the park or walking to work in broad daylight or waiting for a bus or a hundred other situations in which women have been (and continue to be) attacked by men.

Your drunk, pub, night out scenario has no bearing here so bugger off with your false equivalences and educate yourself about crimes against women and girls before making such a monumental tit of yourself.