Oh, I can imagine how scared you must have been! I had a similar incident in my bar/dancing days, and it terrified me - lucky for me I never saw the man again. I live in a big city, and bad things happen all the time - makes a single woman afraid to go out alone.

Just a thought Junkyard Girl. I take it you work in retail, you say "this man was there when I left the store." BE CAREFUL if you work with the public, some men who so much as get a sales woman who merely asks if they need help, you end up with a hanger around-er for the entire rest of your shift, necessitating a call from Security.

I have been followed too, but thankfully, lost them. When I was much younger this type of thing happened more frequently...maybe now that I am older, strangers don't as often assume that I am so naive and trusting. But...at this one mall close to my apartment, there is one door leading into the mall that most of the time, has loiterers hanging around. I have often had some of them try to accost me, on my way into the mall. I am not afraid to be rude, some crime prevention advice also states, that this is what some criminals hope to get, is a woman who is afraid to be rude, who thinks she has to be "nice." So don't be afraid to be rude.

For me to be open to being interested in a man, it has to be someone I have seen around for a while, so that they are not a complete and total stranger. I am never going to be the the type to give out my phone number to some stranger I just met out of the blue.

Sounds though, like you are already very careful. good for you!!

Many times.

I have had men follow me from store to store in the mall.

I have had men follow me while I'm walking my dog. In my previous home, there was a neighbor that did this. I knew he knew where I lived, so this bothered me more than when it was random men, I would just keep walking around until they gave up and went away rather than lead them home.

I have had men physically block me from walking away from them (say, in a bar I'm at the bar getting drinks for me and friends, he will position his body to block me from walking away).

When I was a waitress, I had a customer (not a regular, even, someone I'd never met before) ask me for a ride somewhere else after work. I declined. When he left, he hung around in the parking lot (this was at midnight when we were closing) until the owner went out there and made him leave.

I once had a regular obscene phone caller. He would sometimes call early in the morning while I was asleep, so I was kind of groggy trying to figure out who was calling. One of those times, I asked who is this, he gave a name (steve or something), I said who, he said we met at a gas station (he described the one near my house) and I gave him my number. Never happened, and it worried me he'd picked a spot so near to where I lived that we had supposedly met... did he know where I lived?

As far as I know, I've never had someone actually follow me in my car.

I'm not afraid to go out alone, but I'm sure there are plenty of men who have been offended because I will walk away from someone I feel is being overly familiar and starting to invade boundaries. And I'm also quite sure most of them don't mean any harm, but most men, have not had similar experiences with women (and the ones who have, probably haven't been by someone a foot taller and 100 pounds heavier than them) and don't understand that there ARE plenty of men out there who are scary and threatening and we have reasons to be wary. Especially younger guys, I think older ones have in many cases heard enough stories from wives, girlfriends, and female friends to get it a little bit.

I have no problem being rude! LOL I had just moved to a new town once, and found a place I thought would be nice to hunt shells. I was unaware it was a local lunchtime pickup spot! I was just shell hunting, and this man came and put his arm around me. I said very loudly "Get your hands off of me!!!" There were enough other people around for him to be embarrassed, and say he was sorry. I found out what the place was that night while talking to a friend, and I never went back there again. We laughed, because that man was probably shocked at what I did. I wasn't really scared, because of how many people were around. Little did I know, they were all looking for...well...you know! LOL

This is all too scary! I had a mad approach me as I was getting out of my car one evening. He asked me if I had anything to help him out - he was out of gas and needed to get somewhere with his daughter. The scary part was that he was right in front of me as I was getting out of the car, which made it difficult for me to have gotten away if he had pushed further. I had had a very hard day at work and was not in the mood. Plus he startled me so badly that I didn't think of being afraid at the time. I was just tired and wanted to get home, and he was interrupting me. I just looked at him and told him "today is not the day", and I guess he knew I meant it. He finally said OK and walked away. As I think back, he was probably meaning some harm. But I wasn't having it that day - luckily that kept me from thinking about it, or I probably would have shown more fear and weakness.

That is so scary!!

You mean other than the crazy woman who showed up uninvited repeatedly to my house and tried to get in? The one that told my 11 year old what EXACTLY she wanted to do to me? The one I had to call the cops to get rid of?

Other than that one, no.