IC | Giggles · @MercyGiggles
2nd Jul 2020 from TwitLonger
My experience with Xzax
Xzax's twitlonger: https://www.twitlonger.com/show/n_1sra284
When Xzax posted his statement, I was (sadly) not surprised. I was - and still am - horrified by how many other women have been subjected to this. Just from one individual. I only knew him as a Smash acquaintance after he moved to the Norcal region a couple years ago. Only saw him in passing at tournaments. Barely spoke with him, other than the usual generic “Hi, how’s life going” that you could toss towards anyone.
Due to personal life changes, I left Norcal. In the months leading up to my move, I received my first direct message from Xzax. A simple question: “Do you still go to events?” Odd, but I’ll bite. We talked a bit about leaving Norcal. He had just moved down to Socal. I mentioned moving to Tristate with my fiancé. He asked me if I used Snapchat. I told him I’d have to check my username because I didn’t use it much. He got impatient waiting for the information. My first Snapchat message from him? “Always found you really cute and since this is private we can share selfies here.” We all know how Snapchat works - he wanted to keep the messages hidden. I had to remind him that I was engaged - he feigned ignorance. When I asked what his girlfriend thought of this: “she’s chill with it, esp since I’m not sharing lewds”.
When I told him I was not comfortable with sending selfies, he would accept that and then try to pressure me for selfies a week later. The few blurry snaps I did send, or the snaps I would send to multiple friends in bulk, would be met with requests for clearer pictures, or ask why I wouldn’t send him selfies just for him.
Similarly to what other women have said, Xzax would share photos of himself, calling it gym progress. He would ask me to share my own progress. I never did.
He would occasionally make comments about my body and would back off when I called him out on it. I had to tell him multiple times that he needed to stop raising certain topics with me because quite frankly, those were topics I already told him I wasn’t comfortable talking about anymore. Looking back on it, he probably saw it like a game of tag. I should have deleted him from my Snapchat list earlier.
He kept trying to bring up us “having our moments” and how “it was fun”. I just wanted to put that behind me and move on (pro tip: wedding planning is rough if you haven’t spent your entire life planning your dream wedding).
But Giggles, why didn't you report this? I had no intentions of seeing him again. I was already barely active in the Norcal scene and wasn't looking to join the Tristate scene. I was moving across the country and I didn't have the energy to deal with the potential fallout. Who was more likely to be believed anyway?
I can’t even give Xzax the benefit of the doubt that he didn’t know I was engaged. I specifically mentioned my fiancé in my first messages to him. I had to bring it up again within Snapchat. I have not been shy about making my relationship status known. He *liked* my engagement post on Facebook. I brought up wedding planning multiple times. What does it say about a person when they will ignore all of that to pleasure themselves? It shouldn’t matter whether or not if I’m in a relationship if I don’t want to interact with him.
One of the worst part about all this? I feel that I was lucky. The messages and pictures I received were light compared to what happened to other women.