The men in my life became unbearable. The unsolicited advice transformed from mansplaining about how I should do my job or ride my bike, into aggressive instruction that productively doing my job included fucking them. This should be obvious but keeping with my theme, I did not ask. This had been an underlying current of my interactions with most of the men of this company. My breaking point was when these ugly and offensive suggestions were being shouted during a meeting I am trying to hold, and other team members do not even consider this an odd occurrence. This breaking point came with the realization that my breaking point should have come a long time before that. 

I did what I could to take care of myself. This included finding a company that not only understood my complaints, but laid it out from the beginning, that this type of behavior would never be acceptable. No woman should take anything less. I don’t care if you are a nurse, mechanic, dancer, doctor, poet, engineer or stay at home mom. Your job should be YOUR JOB and you should NEVER feel like you have to put up with terrible men just because “thats how it is in this profession”. Nope. There are people out there that care about their employees in general and make a concerted effort to be respectful to all of them. I know this now. 

Obviously, I am much happier now. Although men still give me lots of advice; they aren’t interrupting me whenever I try to speak, they are letting me participate in conversations and debates, and they are not turning every conversation into some dirty double entendre. From my perception, they are listening when I speak and understanding that I am a person that has worked hard to gain my current skill set (just like them). I am really glad but also frustrated that this is something I not only had to actively look for as a working woman but also move 3000 miles to find it.