When A Simple NO Is Not Enough: the humble eggplant gone rogue

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I have an interesting one for you this morning peeps, as it is an issue that is absolutely hot under my (very) personal collar.  I have spent 2 years full-time and flat-out working on finding my voice (my real one, the inside one), learning to speak about my vulnerability and the things that scare me out loud to other humans, and most importantly saying no when things are not right for me.  This has, at times, been an excruciating process, especially as a Class A people pleaser.  The internal negotiations around verbalising my NO have been...let's just say...heated.   So when I say NO these days, I really fucking mean it.  Hear it and respect it world, cause mama ain't gonna say it twice. 

And so with this intro, I not so gracefully pirouette into my #rantoftheday.

There is a plethora of things that are presenting themselves in the "relating" space right now, things just ripe for the picking, proper begging to be discussed (can you see i have been in England too long #towie).    And I'm planning to have at all of it.   But today, I am gearing up for a right rant about boys and boundaries (this applies equally to birds in reverse for certain, but as ever I am just speaking from my own experience here). 

So, get on board boys and girls, this is about to get raucous.

Online dating, online comms, text-based communicating is a veritable minefield filled with bombs ready to go off with the slightest of treads in the wrong patch of grass. It's a place packed to the rafters with dating disasters, communication misfires and broken internal navigation systems.  It sometimes feels as if one minute you are wandering along head in the clouds whistling dixie, and the next minute you've been hit in the heart or the nether regions with a surface to air missile, and you're suddnely scrambling around trying to work out what the hell happened. 

There's a pace to things in the land of the single dater that for my money is far too fast, so much so it's both unsettling and unnerving.  It seems these days that we far too readily, in the blink of an eye actually, somehow go from "Hello my name is Jon and I like soft fluffy kittens and long walks on the beach" to " Let me send you a dick p*c and tell you how into gag balls and anal toy play I am".  Huh?  Did I miss a clearly critical segue there mate?  I am still on kittens and blankets and balls of wool, did I miss the switch? 

What to do, what to do?

Well for now I want you to strap yourselves in, today is a doozy, so let's dive right on in. 

When is NO not enough?  

By this boys and girls I mean, what if you know your NO, you express your NO clearly, and it's ignored? 

What happens when you speak your mind, say what you want, clearly, articulately and with respect and that NO gets railroaded by someone with the self awareness of a peanut?  It's frustrating right, because let's be honest, half the battle is finding the courage to say to someone you like, what you want and don't want.   It takes balls to say to a guy you like for example "can we go slow?" or "I don't want you to talk like that, it doesn't make m e feel heard or respected".  Christ that takes guts.  That courage though goes right out the window when your reasonable request is disregarded in favour of a swift airing of someone else's penile perversion persuasion.  BOOM, your new found bravery is bish bash boshed into oblivion.  Many times I have been left wondering if my dating opposite is in fact deaf, dumb and blind and whether they required some kind of "special assistance", surely no one could not have heard anything I spent the last 5 minutes saying?  Well yes they could actually. In fact this happened only yesterday.  Twice.   

Your NO could be to anything on the dating spectrum, take your pick: no sex chat before meeting, no d*ck pics, no sex before the 5th date, no suggestive or lewd banter, no casual sex, no kissing without connection, no nude selfies, no one nights stands....this list goes on and on.  Whatever your NO is kiddies, say it loud and say it proud.  That is yours to own, and in a world that is moving at lightning speed around you, cling to it like it's your life jacket.  Own it, work it, twerk it. 

But what happens when your NO becomes some elses' coarse version of "frankly my dear I don't give a damn"?  What then?  

It's a common theme, I hear it all the time (and I phrase this from a woman's perspective because, well, that's what I am), " so I started talking to this guy, and I told him I wanted to take it slow and he just straight up told me I make him hard and he was playing with himself thinking about me and he JUST loves girls that play hard to get".  Uh. WHAT THE FUCK?  Yes, yes this happens.  More than you would think.   Just ask anyone dating online how many times they have been subjected to someone else's fantasy projection without even being asked if they wanted to participate.  Gross right?  Yeah.  Wait...it gets a lot worse.  

What really freaks me out is the prevalence of what happens far too often after this:  when the lady on the receiving end of this typically ham-fisted, poorly expressed and 100% one-sided fantasy they never asked to participate in expresses her clear displeasure at the sad turn of events, when on saying NO (quite loudly most times) to being on the receiving end of this man's mental ejaculation, their dating counterpart proceeds to blindly and indeed blatantly push past that NO, and continues only to hear the joyful sound of their own YES at the other's expense and KEEPS ON GOING.  

Guys (and girls in reverse obviously): when she says NO to sexual banter, when she doesn't ask for your d*ck pic or when she specifically states that you are making her uncomfortable by barraging her with comments about her body, asking inane question about her sex life (when did you come last is THE most pathetically unoriginal question ever uttered) or your fantasies of sex with her, why for the love of all things holy, do you continue?   Why continue to word jizz all over her, making her feel as if she the "star" of your own personal verbal bukkake film?  It is the most disgusting feeling, I cannot even begin to tell you how deplorable we think you are when we say no, and you go and do THAT in response. 

This my friends, has to STOP IMMEDIATELY, and this is why I am writing this today. Enough is enough.  

I want to shed some light on this tricky dicky issue, because far too often other than in the privacy of convos with our friends, we are too ashamed to share what happens to us when we say no.  When someone steps all over our boundaries.  For some strange reason it seems to make us feel like deep down we have done something wrong to be on the receiving end of this kind of talk. A slutty vibe we must be giving off.  Something inadvertently sexy we said that made them speak this way to us.  Or that they sense that hidden chink in our self-worth armour, making us feel dirty and ashamed and wantonly available to anyone who wants to speak to us like that after we said no.  

Well to that darlings, I say FUCK NO.  FUCK THAT NOISE.  No no no.  Not today, not tomorrow, no more.   This is NOT on you sweet thing. 

I can't tell you the aggravation and frustration I have experienced over the years trying to explain to dudes who have done this to me how positively disgusting this makes someone feel, and how utterly unattractive you become to me in that moment.  Despite any good qualities you become loathsome and letchy.   I truly never thought it possible to feel sad, hurt, violated, enraged and miserable all at one time until this started to happen after dating online.  TO first be treated as a sex object, and then upon voicing concern or dislike, to be ignored and told you're overreacting.  I wind up one stop short of nuclear, and why should I? 

Why should my NO become your fucked up fantasy YES?  

It shouldn't, it won't, and ladies (and gentlemen), the only way to combat this, is to absolutely stand by what you say, tell them how truly deplorable they make you feel, and then walk away and never ever look back.  For if they are not listening to your no now, you better fucking believe it's not going to get any better with time. 

For those of you who wonder what this feels like, having not (thankfully) experienced it first hand, here's a little summation: it literally feels as if that's person's erection or arousal comes at the expense of my vagina's tears of rage and dismay.  I'll let that sit with you for a moment.  Yes.  That is how it feels. 

And if you reading this article are one of these solo mental porn producers that have a push notification function somehow capable of overriding another person's personal sexual preferences through their telephonic device, are about as attractive as a dating candidate as a dead frog with genital herpes.  Also, just as an FYI you about a bee's dick away from being on the sex offenders register.   For real.  Cut that shit out. 

And people, when someone speaks to you that way, ignores your no, tells you their yes is more important than your no...you take your fine ass, and remove it from their world.  They do not deserve to be in your space darling, and frankly, you got to make room for all thos wonderful people that will hear your no, respect your no, and bow down to your no.  

Now, go get yourself some of that cherry pie.  

With love,

Miss Cook xoxo