I’m seeing lots of posts about whether men or women are more intimidating. (I am going to ignore the glaring issue in binary thinking about gender for a short period of time.)

My kids are now old enough to voice opinions. Not too long ago this sort of conversation happened at dinner. My kids said that their dad is more physically intimidating and when he’s angry they feel a level of physical threat they don’t feel when I am angry. Even though I outweigh him and could probably hurt them as much as he could.

Instead they said I inspire existential terror. It’s not that they are afraid I will hit them; they are afraid I will say things that will make them feel absolutely devastated and like they are the worst person to ever exist.

I mean, that’s kind of the thing–right? Mothers build you up or destroy your sense of self. You learn to project that same sort of expectation/bullshit on other women. I definitely do it. There are a number of women in the scene I’ve had intense relationships with and I put them on that pedestal. They didn’t ask for it. Well, one of them did and then her life got complicated and I was never a priority again. Holy shit that hurt. That felt like a stab through the heart that I am still not fucking over. I can’t be friends with her on Facebook because she talks about her daughter and them spending time together and I feel like I want to die.

But I worry that men might hit me. I worry that men might sexually assault me. I worry that men might rape me.

Both fears seem pretty valid to me.