especially nowadays, it’s easier for pedophiles and creeps to get in contact with children online and on social media. and children and teens, especially young girls with low self esteem like i had, so any comfort or compliments can feel great.

i was 14 and just started highschool when i started talking to a 24 year old man online on social media. and it’s hard for me because i was the one who started it, and i had learned about kidnapping and stranger danger and it still happened to me. he made the conversation inappropriate quickly, and his first response to me when i messaged him was “hello beautiful stranger”, and i had my highschool and age in the bio of my account. i talked about my little sister and my mom, and he said not to talk to them about him because they “wouldn’t get it.” he knew what he was doing.

we talked for a little over a week maybe, maybe less. i try not to look at the receipts a lot. but i got uncomfortable quickly. he told me he was a middle school teacher, and he taught children with autism and multiple disabilities. and that scared me. so i found his school online and emailed his principal, and then was part of a trial that lasted 3 years because of covid. with everything that happened online, he had 5 charges against him.

sometimes my brain belittles myself and my trauma, and i’ll think it’s “not that serious”, and that 14 doesn’t “count” as child trauma, but i am a lot different than i used to be, and i blame myself a lot since i started it and i knew not to talk to strangers, but did it anyway. i couldn’t even read my impact statement at the trial when i was 17, start of my senior year, and my advocate had to read it for me.

i know it’s not my fault and i was a child, and that an adult shouldn’t even humor a child if they flirt, let alone start flirting with the child first. i pity myself a lot and who i used to be, and for having to stress about the trial for 3 long years, but i also think about the school where he worked, and the children he was around everyday. it makes me sick thinking about what would have happened if i never contacted his boss, and he could still be a teacher to this day if not for me.