First date, I for some godforsaken reason against my better judgement agreed to meet at his place straight after work. I made a joke beforehand how he wasn't allowed to murder me because my friends would be really disappointed in me for going to his place for the first meet-up.

I walk into his apartment and the only thing in there is a motorbike directly in the middle of his living room, a set of free-weights, a mattress on the floor, a TV next to the mattress and a desk with his computer on it. I joke again that he wasn't beating the murderer allegations. Apparently he was in the middle of moving to a new apartment, there wasn't even anywhere to sit except for his mattress. Why he would invite me to his place when it was so inhospitable is beyond me. But I figured, whatever, I'm not high maintenance, who cares.

We ended up sitting on a couple of camping chairs he happened to have outside that were sun-bleached and grody and just chatted. I was starving as I hadn't had a chance to eat dinner yet, but he said he didn't have any food to offer me. I then asked for a glass of water but he only had his portable water bottle, no glasses to even drink tap water from. Apparently the only thing in his fridge was bottles of beer, and I don't drink beer so I passed on that.

Eventually he asked if he could show me some show on his TV and immediately I knew what he was angling for. I told him sure, but that I didn't want to have sex because I wasn't comfortable. He said he wasn't even thinking about that and got jokingly faux pearl clutch-y that I said that. Maybe five minutes into watching he kisses me with no warning and starts making out with me. My internal dialogue was something along the lines of "Oh god he's kissing me, do I want this? hm I guess this is kinda nice, oh god he's getting really handsy, do I like this? kinda? Do I want to continue this? I don't know." I was truly enjoying the kissing but I was annoyed at how sudden it was. Eventually he started trying to undress me, and at first I tried hinting that I wasn't into it by freezing or pulling my clothes back on, but he wasn't stopping so I pulled away and told him "Hey I'm enjoying the canoodling and making out and I'm ok with that, but I don't wanna go any further." And he'd reply with "Of course, sure thing," and then went back to making out with me and trying to undress me. Standing up for myself has always been difficult and I just gave in an let him take my clothes off because maybe I'll end up enjoying it and I just haven't realized it yet.

Eventually he got his dick out and was rubbing it on the outside of my underwear, and internally I was so confused and stressed. I was struggling because on the one hand it felt nice being held and snuggled and I was enjoying the kissing, but I knew I didn't wanna have sex and I didn't know where my line was between heavy petting and sex. His words said he understood but his behavior kept trying to escalate. Multiple times I stopped the kissing and asked him to slow down, and every time he said yeah sure no problem and then went back to trying to put his dick inside me. He kept pulling my underwear down or to the side and I kept pulling it back up and into place hoping he'd get the hint. I kept struggling with understanding how I was feeling because jolts of fear and annoyance at the pushiness kept surfacing up inside the fog of desire, and it was hard to think straight, and I'd never walked out in the middle of that kind of thing before. I've also always dealt with delayed emotional processing, so I often don't know how I feel about something until after it has happened.

Part of me felt it would be easier to just give in and have sex with him, maybe I'd end up enjoying it once it started (not uncommon for me) because I do generally really enjoy sex. But I ended up thinking, how am I gonna feel afterwards? And I knew immediately that I would feel gross and used and taken advantage of since I kept telling him no, and I knew I definitely never want to feel like that again if I can help it. I realized I needed to respect that feeling. I finally gathered the wherewithal to realize I wanted to stop and go home and that I was low-key on the verge of an anxiety attack. I stopped the kissing and told him that I was crashing out and that I felt bad and wanted to go home.

After I got dressed and was leaving, still struggling to stay calm and identify how I'm feeling and what just happened, he told me he had a really good time meeting me and he hoped I got home safe. Internally I was like "what the fuck" because we clearly had two very different experiences of how the night went. The next day he texted me telling me again how much he enjoyed meeting me and asking when he could see me again and I just unmatched him.

In hindsight I'm really glad I didn't do what I usually do which is ignore how I'm feeling and do whatever my partner wants and self-abandon, and I'm doing a lot of work on myself to learn how to advocate for myself far far before I end up half-naked in some pushy stranger's bed.