I thought I was a ‘nice guy’ but I was actually a manipulative predator

Content warning - Sexual Assault

The worst kind.

I’d hazard a guess that most people think of themselves as good people. Even hardened killers I’d expect have some sort of bastardized moral compass that’s framed in a way that determines them as the ‘good’ guy working for the better cause. I was a good guy, you know? People liked me; I had many friends and not that many enemies, well, none that I was aware of anyway. I was one of these chivalrous men that prided himself on being nice, I was damn nice, far better than any of those rapist cretins that you hear on the news. Men generally sucked in my eyes, well, apart from my friends. They were cool, but they had a lot to work on to achieve my level of niceness.

I just couldn’t understand it though; why the fuck did women go for arseholes? Why Pete? Pete punched and raped Rachel constantly, why did she pick fuckheads like him when there was little ol’ me, being nice to everyone, minding my own business, and you know, not hurting people? If I’m honest I don’t think I’ve ever been able to hurt anyone unless provoked. Why Sally? All Steve cared about was his reputation and how big his car engine was, you know? I’d have treasured that girl. I probably would have if she’d chosen me because she knew that I was into her, but, she chose Steve. Steve and I liked the same sort of women, and time after time, he’d get them and I’d be left with my hand — why?

Why me? What was wrong with me? I was nicer than ALL of my friends yet no-one wanted to pick me at all.

Funny thing. I blamed women for being socially inadequate, for choosing morons that could barely string a proper sentence together than choose someone that would be nice to them and treat them fairly. I’d cherish them, hold them, run my hands through their hair and tell them how much I loved them; women? They were fucking insane. I blamed men too; men for treating women like shit and leaving me to pick up the pieces; you could often find me talking to some girl about her problems at 2am. Yeah, that was my life, and it wasn’t changing soon. Women were strange, and it was all their fault for being that way.

I was only nice to women because I wanted something though. I didn’t have many women friends that I had a platonic relationship with, no. I had perhaps one, and I lost her later because I don’t think her husband was too comfortable with our friendship. Funny that, only proper girl that was a friend and I lost her. Anyway. I didn’t have girl-friends. I wanted to have sex with them all. I was only friends with women I thought were hot. Yeah, unnattractive women were boring, whiny and I didn’t get anything from them; I was only friends with women because I secretly wanted to have sex with them — sorry ladies if you’re reading this now and you know me! But I need to come clean as honest as possible for this message to be heard. I hope that’s fair. I promise no names, though!

I had a secret contract with these women; some knew it and kept me strung along, others were unaware and went on their merry old way. My contract was this. I’ll be a nice friend that listens to you, and you take all your clothes off and have sex with me. If you can’t have sex with me then please tell me how much of a good listener and a nice awesome guy that I am, that will give me just as much worth as the sex will — I couldn’t tell myself how much of a great guy I was because I didn’t believe that, you needed to do it for me. This is how I determined my worth, perhaps we’ll call it false courage. People telling me how awesome I am based on a complete lie; obviously I wanted to have gratuitous sex with these women, so lending my friendship was a lie. It was a lie because I wasn’t being honest with them.

I was fucking lying to them. I wanted to fuck them. Not be their friends.

Friendship was for people that couldn’t have sex.

Ironically, I could never get any sex, but that didn’t stop me from trying to come between people, between relationships, yeah, I wasn’t beyond any of that sadly. Nice guy my arse. I came in between a lady and her near-husband once. It was the very last time I did anything like that. From there I understood how messy it could get, and how much of a hassle-free life I’d rather have. I had been several months on the path to change by then, and it was about a year before I met Natalie, it was when I finally learned my lesson, that perhaps the fault didn’t lay with women, that perhaps it was me that was the problem — tough realisation for someone that thought he was the pinnacle of niceness.

Makes sense, right? I had about twenty women friends that I wanted to have sex with yet none of them wanted to reciprocate, and anyone that I met on the fly, same. Yeah, I had finally learned that when the world wasn’t adjusting for me then perhaps it was time that I adjusted for the world. Perhaps it was me that was at fault and not the world. Maybe it wasn’t just bad luck or some curse that had me failing every time, maybe women didn’t need therapy, maybe, it was me that needed help.

Finally, the chord had struck with me. Only took 26 years god damn it.

I had a tough life though, I mean I can blame myself for part of it but there was only so much I could weigh on my shoulders — like my Mum’s constant berating my Dad in front of me and when he wasn’t there to defend himself. When she had attributed his actions and generalised them to all men. I know she didn’t mean it but this was the stain that it left on me, I didn’t think much of men and their relationships with women. I was also my Mothers little cherub, it gave me my sense of pinnacle of niceness; I could do no wrong in her eyes, and then that transformed into my eyes. Of course, there was that I was an only child too which didn’t help.

Dad didn’t help much either, I was always on the defensive with him. What he hadn’t realised was that he was the person I was going to shape my idea of men from, my idol, my role model. He was emotionally abusive and manipulative, and, well, I was fucked from the outset there. The combinations of my parent’s traits were a Jail sentence and I don’t say that lightly. There have been a few times where I could have well ended up in Jail, if my Dad hadn’t pulled me out and taken me to England.

But there was help for me and that’s the moral of this story. There WAS help. I realised that I didn’t need to continue hating women for their obscureness, and I could stop viewing men through a biased keyhole. Yeah, I could get my head sorted, and I did. I changed every way of thinking that I could.

Now?

I love women now. I have like a thousand million women friends and none of them I want to fuck. I haven’t even imagined a relationship with any of them, only with my wife. See the first thing was I started to focus on me.

What did I want because obviously I wasn’t getting it.

Then I asked myself how do I go about getting that, when I knew what I wanted.

Obviously, I had to have help because I didn’t have a damn clue how to get it.

All I wanted out of life was a nice family, a good job and a good home.

I have all that now, and it’s because I met some really good people and displayed a desperation and willingness to change my current circumstances. They took me under their wing and helped me every step of the way. I couldn’t do it half-heartedly though. If I was only half in then so would my help. Why should they waste their time on someone that only wants help ‘some of the time’ — I know it, I’ve worked in the health and wellbeing industry for ten years now.

If I could describe what I went through I would call it a beautiful transformation that took me from a world with limitations to a world with practically zero boundaries and limitless opportunity. I was shown a world that I would have never in a million years dreamt existed.

We live in a good world. People are good. People have their own version of good, you just need to find that in them and then run away with it.

If this describes any of the troubles you are going through then I suggest contacting Mind or at least one of your local Mental Health Charities. I promise you this isn’t some spooky bad luck that’s befallen you it’s a perception issue, and that’s something to talk to your doctor about. Don’t be afraid. He’s the first person I went to! My life has never been the same since.