Are You Ok?
A chance encounter on a quiet afternoon became a life-changing conversation. This powerful reflection explores the hidden impact of childhood sexual abuse, the burden of carrying shame in silence, and how a simple question, “Are you okay?”, can open the door to healing. It reminds us that survivors are never alone and that compassionate listening can make all the difference when someone is struggling.
An Active Bystander
Many years ago, I was out walking and I saw a man sitting on the ground, leaning against a wall, taking swings from a bottle of vodka. It was 3pm in the afternoon.
“Hey” I said. Partly because my mum had taught me always to help people, and partly because I was nosey.
“Hey” I said again. “You ok?”
He looked up at me; his eyes were bloodshot and wet. He’d been crying.
“Why are you sitting here?” I asked gently, crouching down to his level.
“Why not?” He said.
“Sure, why not indeed. But it’s unusual to see someone sitting here so I just wanted to ask if you’re ok.”
“What do you care?”
“More than you realise, I think. What’s going on for you?”
“I left home. Had a fight with my wife. Not got anywhere else to go.”
I sat down beside him on the dirt path. He told me he’d had a fight with his wife this morning before the kids went to school. He had shouted at her, and she had asked him to leave, which he did. Stopped at the shop for a bottle and wandered around aimlessly, drinking his way through the contents.
“That sounds hard. What was the fight about?”
He told me how his wife wanted to let their 10-year-old daughter go to school camp, but he didn’t want her to. His daughter desperately wanted to go, all her friends were going, and she hated that he was trying to stop her. They had all fought about it. The deadline for the decision is tomorrow.
“So, you don’t want her to go?” I asked.
He told me that he definitely did not want her to go. He started sobbing and reached for the bottle. I asked if I could take the bottle and he agreed. I put the bottle behind me and waited.
He told me that when he was about her age he had gone to school camp. And when he was there, he had been sexually abused by one of the camp leaders. He was terrified that the same thing would happen to her. He had never told his wife, never told anyone. He was ashamed and felt dirty and had never wanted his family to know this had happened to him. He didn’t want them to see that wee boy when they looked at him. For over 20 years he had carried this painful secret with him, getting no support and with no one to tell him he was not to blame, that he was just a kid.
He wanted to keep his daughter safe, but he hadn’t realised how much it would hurt.
As we talked, I found out he had come to the river to finish his bottle and had been planning suicide. He didn’t know how to live with this pain and couldn’t see any other way out.
I asked if he knew that there were organisations that he could talk to, who were able to offer support to people who had gone through similar abuse in childhood. That their staff would listen to him and help him process how he was feeling and how it had impacted his life. But also, how could he get help to start to feel better. He told me he didn’t know that these types of organisations existed. He told me that talking to me felt good and he might like to talk some more.
We talked a bit more. We called his wife and she drove to meet us. When she arrived, he gave me permission to explain our conversation to her. We looked up the support organisation’s website together and agreed she would help him call them.
Then they drove away and I cried and cried. I never saw him again and as much as I really wanted to, I never tried to contact him. Because what I think he needed in that moment was someone removed, a stranger, the safety of telling someone that he didn’t know and would never know.
I’m glad I was passing that afternoon because it was a privilege to be his stranger, to be the one to unload some of his shame, take some weight, let him cry and to be the one to tell him he doesn’t need to carry this all alone.
His story is etched in my heart now. I think about him often and hope he is ok. He is my reminder to always ask if someone is ok. Because sometimes they might not be… but they might just need someone to sit with them for a little bit while they find their strength and figure out what comes next.
