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RantI was harassed by a TIM at work, part 2
Firstly - to everyone on here who offered me support after my initial post after an incident where I was sexually harassed by a TIM at work: every single word from every one of you helped to get me through and I am grateful for this community.
I wanted to update how the situation was “resolved” though I can’t share to the level I would like to because I don’t want to dox myself as I have a mortgage and can’t afford to go full JK Rowling on the Internet.
After I filed the incident report, I had to meet with some of my workplace leadership members about it. I learned the TIM patient had some very ridiculous excuses for exposing themselves to me and pulling his dress up multiple times and not wearing underwear, and that he denied touching or commenting on my breasts. My workplace admin also felt that when they addressed his behavior, he was dismissive and denied that he was acting inappropriate. He also told them that my actions didn’t indicate his behavior was inappropriate since I laughed during the encounter (which I admit I am the queen of nervous laughter). Overall, it was unanimously decided by everyone in the meeting that the patient would no longer be welcome in our facility due to their response to being called out on this behavior.
However, today I got to work with a document in my inbox regarding the initial incident report I filed. They walked back the decision to fire the patient after speaking to his mental health clinician, who claimed that this patient has a history of hypersexual behavior which is a coping mechanism. His mental health provider said that he only acts hyper sexual in settings he is anxious in, and his behavior was simply coping with anxiety. Unsurprisingly, his mental health clinician is a fellow TIM.
So this is where it ended at. Male sexual predators are just anxious, and assault is a coping mechanism. I’m still processing my emotions on how this resulted. I’m furious, I’m sad, I’m scared. I want to escalate this but I don’t know how or who or what could be done. All I can feel now is that sick depraved men will always, always win.