“I had photos and pictures of my childhood standing at the window”: true stories of stalker victims

Unfortunately, the stories about the followers are not limited to the plot of the sensational Netflix series “You”, where the main character Joe Goldberg, played by Penn Badgley, uses social networks to find everything about his potential victims: addresses, interests , and even the names of his friends. The character was exposed to trust in every possible way, and at first no one even thought they were dealing with a real stalker.

According to surveys conducted by Western media, every eighth girl has been persecuted at least once. And it is not at all necessary that they be from the male side. For example, in the summer of 2022, Ekaterina Darma, editor-in-chief of the BURO online publication, said on the Telegram channel that for several years she had been persecuted by a girl named Mira Mira. threatening letters and constantly calling him on the phone. “It’s not just about The Network, where he obsessively writes to me, sometimes calling my loved ones a hundred times a day (from different numbers, of course), emailing and emailing. [рассылает] He sends messages to anyone he can reach, sends insults and threats (rape, strangling, killing, pouring acid that wasn’t there…) and physically harassing me at the office and at public events in Moscow. Later, in an interview with Nadezhda Yay, Ekaterina will say that after making the story public, she received a message on her phone with the following message: “My daughter committed suicide. It’s all your fault.” However, it later turned out to be a lie. Nothing happened to the girl who followed Ekaterina Darma.

Unfortunately, such stories are not shared. Stalkers put their victims under such psychological pressure that many are afraid to talk to anyone about their problems, including law enforcement. In addition, the Russian penal code does not contain a separate clause for cruelty. It is not a separate crime to follow in terms of legislation.

However, some women who have managed to cope with the insufficient attention of the abusers do not hesitate to talk about their experiences. The Fashion Vibes collected the stories of those who were persecuted by followers. The names of the heroes have been changed to respect their privacy.

Lyudmila’s story “She opened the back door, took my daughter out and dragged her into her car”

My daughter was stalked by an ex-boyfriend for a long time. For some time they worked in the same organization, got together, but later it became clear that this was not his person and they broke up. She kept calling him and writing that they should be together and then started following him. At first, she was waiting for him after work and the gym. I can follow his car from Moscow to our house (and we live outside the city). She tried to talk to him, she, but instead assured her that all their conversation had seemed like a mere coincidence. There was a story, after which it became clear that this person was not healthy.

One day he was returning home in a taxi with a friend. As they stopped at a traffic light, this man opened the back door, took my daughter out, and dragged her into his car. He was absolutely calm at that moment, and the only thing that interested him was the question of how his parents (that is, my husband and I) were. After that, we decided to contact him, but it didn’t help. He used to wander under the windows of our house all the time. It doesn’t matter what the weather was outside: both in the rain and in the snow, his car was under the fence. We called the police several times but nothing disturbed the staff.

Soon her daughter began to meet a new man and often stayed at his house. Her ex-lover understood the address and began to protect her daughter there. The story has grown to such an absurd extent that one day, on the way home, my daughter and her boyfriend found icons under the door, along with a handful of earth and pins. He disappeared after this incident. Her acquaintances said that she had suddenly moved to another city and cut off contact with everyone.

“As I stood at the window, I had photos and photos of my childhood” – Natalia’s story

I had a friend with whom we talked for a long time. This friend of mine once asked me to rent my parents’ apartment to his employee. With the word that takes all responsibility. I agreed and asked my friend to hand over the keys himself. The new tenant independently transferred money to my family, and we did not communicate with him in any way, and we did not even know each other in absentia.

Two months after that, a strange man began to appear in my house more often. She was strangely dressed. He will come with different shoes, but will wear a t-shirt front to back. And once she even entered the entrance in just shorts. I never saw which floor it went to. Whenever I waited for the elevator, he was going up the back stairs. Then I started noticing that the same guy was starting to meet me more often near the office in a different image (i.e. completely normal). And work and home are on different sides of the city. I didn’t attach much importance to it until one case.

One night my apartment was hit loudly. I looked through the peephole and there was the same guy. I was afraid to open the door, so I decided to call the police. No one was there when they arrived. It didn’t happen again. The next day, my friend, who wanted to rent an apartment for his friend, said that the tenant had to leave the city urgently. And when he came to check that everything was okay in the apartment, he saw the messy furniture and dozens of photos of me. I also had pictures of children standing at the window and walking down the street at home.

After that, he blacklisted my friend and transferred 200,000 rubles to his family.

“Stalker constantly wrote that he knows where I am” – Irina’s story

I blogged on Livejournal in 2009. I’m not saying I’m particularly interested, but rather I wrote stories from student life. Still, I had regular readers. From time to time, there were comments from an Eye under my posts. This username was from one of the subscribers who for a long time seemed to me a casual reader of my blog.

At some point they started attacking me on social networks. At first, it had a harmless nature – likes, comments. But over time, the messages became more and more aggressive. For a while, a user with a completely real first and last name complimented me. But after being ignored by me, it switched to a different message tone. I blacklisted him but a week later the same person came back with a different name.

Then one of the scariest periods of my life began. Stalker has consistently written that he knows where I am right now. He told me what I did during the day, he knew the names of my friends and family. At first I tried to laugh because I lived in a closed city in the Moscow region and felt safe. But one evening, on my way home from the store, I got a message on my cell phone: “Leave the bags by the counter and I’ll bring it to your door myself.”

All this went on for a year. He never offered to meet me, I never saw him, but at one point, for my own safety, I asked my brother to see me off and meet me after school. He learned everything about me this year. And I am not a public person. The story ended with me moving to another city and changing my phone number. Only my family and closest friends knew where I was going. Already in a new city I have not been able to make friends and relationships for a long time, because it could turn out to me that each of them was the person who once followed me. Is my fear gone? Number. Whenever I see a message from a stranger on social networks, I worry it will be him.

What is follow?

We spoke with Nadezhda Sobolkova-Sivergina, Zigmund’s psychotherapist, with the online psychotherapy service, about the main cause of abusers and what to do when being persecuted by another person.

Stalking is a form of violence. A person who persecutes another has only one root cause for violence – to feel power. Having established control, the follower tries to lead a person into a painful experience of vulnerability and put him in a dependent position. As a result, the victim feels constant attention and inability to manage life, because getting rid of the stalker can be difficult.

A person decides to persecute when he consciously allows the use of power, control, and power over others. To impose his will, to influence a person’s activity and behavior, the follower tries to compensate for the feeling of vulnerability and inferiority.

Stalking is often a way to deal with anxiety, fill the void, and create for yourself the illusion of relationships and human intimacy. The greater the stress caused by the inability to form close relationships, the more time and effort a person spends on surveillance. Plunging into someone else’s life, the follower experiences envy or envy. Over time it accumulates aggression, which requires a real rather than a virtual outlet, so surveillance becomes the first step towards committing serious crimes.

What should you do if a pervert is chasing you?

Trust yourself, if the situation seems dangerous, it probably is.

Make the follower visible. Tell your relatives and friends what happened, post on social networks.

Stop communication. Any contact will convince the person that just following works and they keep pushing with twice as much effort.

Ask for help. Find a friend or colleague who can accompany you in desolate places.

Remember, a follower doesn’t stop following without a good reason. Don’t be afraid to file a police report. In most cases, this is enough to stop the persecution.