#YesAllWomen I got beaten as a kid by my dad. My mom got beaten and smacked around by her hair, by my dad. Broken ribs, broken teeth, you name it. I got beaten as a grown-up by my dad.

I almost got raped in my twenties, and almost got statutory raped at 14 by a 30 year old. I got pushed and bullied into sex by partners more than once. I got touched on private parts without my consent by married men or men on the street, and I was then told by other men, friends who knew me, that I probably provoked him or gave him the ok.

I got stalked and proclaimed dead to my friends by an emotionally unstable man for months, while common friends regarded his relentless advances as harmless.

I got hands and fists raised in my face by my male boss.

I got verbally assaulted and physically threatened by men in traffic and in parking lots.

My econ professor asked me for bribe or sex to let me pass the exam, and other male teachers over the years have given me lower grades or dismissed my opinion because I am a woman.

My thesis coordinator refused to believe my dissertation was written by me and only let me publicly defend it after other men intervened on my behalf — I had not bribed or gratified him otherwise, and thus he didn’t feel I should be able to graduate. He tried to sabotage me even during the defense of the thesis.

I have been propositioned by my bosses more than once, and — in one case — bullied and sexually & verbally harassed until I resigned, because I refused him.

I have spent my teens and my twenties in constant fear of walking the streets alone at night. I got accosted by men just walking on the street. I got more catcalls than I can remember.

I can’t be the front person in my own business because I’m too young and a woman. My own husband pushed me out, and feels I don’t need to participate in meetings with male business associates.

I have spent my twenties being ridiculed for being a woman, and not considered up to par with a man. In meetings, conferences, male participants still think I’m just a floozy, and at times I had to play the wide-eyed innocent gal to get the job done.

I still paralyze at the knees when someone raises their tone and has a threatening stance towards me, while on the inside I am screaming at myself with frustration.

I still fear one day my dad will beat my mom to death. And she still chooses to stay with him because she loves him.

And I’ve heard hundreds of men say to my face that women in their lives got beaten because their mouths are too big and they had it coming, cheated on because they’re only one person, and as a man it’s okay to cheat.

BUT last year was the first time I dialled 112 when my dad was smacking my mom around. My nephew was in the middle of the screaming match, trying to pacify them like I did since I was 3. So I unlocked my phone, dialled the number, and my finger trembled on the green button the whole time. My knees were paralyzed but somehow I knew I had a way out. I went over there, asked him to just leave the room for a bit, to go outside and calm down, so we can talk. I asked him to tone it down for the kiddo. Nothing worked, and he was raising his fist to smack her. So I pressed the green button.

I didn’t have the chops to “ruin his life” by going forward, “it wasn’t serious enough yet”. So I thanked the operator when she asked if I needed police to come, and told her it had resolved — because he was too stunned for a minute to keep fighting. The second I hung up the fighting started, but now I was the target of his anger. He wound up again, like a snake coiled and ready to strike, fingers pumping the air, moving towards me to strike, because I had dared to call, to get between them, to ask him to go outside to cool down “in his own house”, so I dialled again.

He sat there stunned, not moving forward, and while I was talking to the operator, trying to decide yet again if it was enough, if he would move forward to strike me, I can’t remember how and when, but he disappeared from sight. I only then noticed my nephew plastered to my legs, looking up at me in fear.

My knees were paralyzed with fear, and underneath it was murderous rage. I knew if the elastic band that kept me paralyzed had snapped, I would have fought him to the death. I had done that before once, when he was pummeling my face in, the last time he beat me — it was because he started beating on my brother, my mom intervened, I stepped in for her, and he thus got the chance to take revenge for all his frustration at my life choices.

On that day, last year, my dad left to the in-city apartment, and only returned a month later, claiming I had thrown him out of his own home. My mom, again, declined to do something about it, and believed indignation and harsh words were enough punishment. When I told her how I felt, how I was, and still am, so very afraid he’ll kill her one day, she told me she feels safe. At least I got to tell her how I feel, how much her decisions to take him back over and over again have hurt us as much as his infrequent but harrowing outbursts.

When my husband first got BB guns, I learned to use one with my dad in mind, for next time.

***This post exists only because I need to purge this out of my system, to know I had the guts to say this out loud. It took me 30 years to realize I had to stop looking or demanding a “white knight” moment from my husband, as frustrating it is when he won’t stand up for me. I need to learn to deal with it myself, I need to un-paralyze myself in a meaningful and sustainable manner, that does not repeat the patterns I’ve seen or grown up with. I hate being so conflicted about my parents, I hate having lost that implicit trust, but from here on out, what I do with my life and how I deal with situations like those above is strictly up to me, and I can’t place the blame on either of them any longer. Not even on my husband. I need to build my own peace of mind.