My creepy female stalker
WHEN most people hear about stalkers, they immediately think of a scary man in a coat and hat lurking in the bushes, spying on a sleeping woman through his binoculars. But as we learned the second season of the Netflix thriller series
You, stalking is not limited to men. A study published by the US National Center for Biotechnology Information, which included scores of female stalkers from different countries, found that unlike male stalkers who often pursue their victims to restore intimacy, female stalkers often pursued their victims to establish intimacy.
“Common emotions and motivations included anger, obsessional thoughts, rage at abandonment, loneliness, dependency, jealousy, and perceived betrayal,” the study found. “Female stalkers were predominantly single, heterosexual, educated individuals in their mid-30s who had pursued their victims for more than a year.”
What’s more is that unlike male stalkers who usually target victims of the opposite sex, female stalkers will target other women, too — oftentimes the woman who they believe is receiving the affections of their male interest. These men and women share their experiences with creepy female stalkers.
Andre, 28, digital media specialist:
I had a co-worker who just would not leave me alone. At first I thought it was just coincidence that we kept running into each other at work, but then I tried deliberately avoiding her, and she started finding new ways to find and initiate conversations with me. She found me on every single social media platform, and would like my pictures and tweets within seconds of me posting them. I had to block her on Whatsapp because she kept sending weird little messages at odd hours. One time I tweeted that I was going to a concert, and I went with my girlfriend. The girl turned up at the concert and sat right behind us the whole time! Because of her I’m very careful of what I say on social media, and make sure I lock up my house and car.
Stephen, 37, agricultural consultant:
My girlfriend said a ‘ghost’ account kept messaging her on social media platforms, throwing insults and saying, ‘leave my man alone’ and other things. She thought it was a prank at first, and she never responded, but it kept happening for a while. The more accounts she blocked, the more were created that messaged her. One day the ‘ghost’ gave herself away by sending a picture of my privates, saying something like, ‘I own this, you’re just renting.’ She deleted it immediately but my girlfriend took a screenshot and showed me, and I was able to tell which of my exes it was based on the picture. It was this really smart but boring chick I dated for about two weeks. When I called her about it she denied it, but no one has messaged my girlfriend since.
Linda, 28, chartered accountant:
My boyfriend’s ex, who is the mother of his child, is an absolute nut job! I almost broke up with him because I could not deal with the drama. First of all she paints him as a deadbeat dad on her social media, so much that if he didn’t show me the bank transfers himself, I would believe her. He also showed me convos where he asks to see his daughter and she makes it about her.
She even went as far as to say, ‘My daughter and I are a combo package. We’re either going to be a family or not’. She messaged me with her mess trying to get me to leave him, and when I blocked her, she took to insulting me on social media, then coming by the house to talk ‘woman to woman’, which I refused to do. My boyfriend got visiting rights when he threatened to take her to court, so now she has taken to driving by the house in taxis and looking through the windows anytime the child is here.
Christopher, 38, entrepreneur
When I used to work a 9-5, there was a really smart university intern who came to the company one summer. I was supervising her, along with two others.
She performed way above the others so I always congratulated her publicly. I guess she misinterpreted it, as she clearly thought I liked her. She followed me around the building like a puppy, befriended my entire family on Facebook (including my wife), and commented on all my posts. When I tried to tell her to scale it back a bit, she broke down crying and said she couldn’t help being in love with me. I felt awful, but it was also quite flattering.