I've experienced some sexual harassment and what the law would technically consider a sexual assault during my first full time job when I was 19. And several times after too, in different jobs and different stages of life. At no point in my life have I accentuated or played up my femaleness, in fact I downplayed it always, yet I've often attracted creepers for no apparent reason and now I can spot their tactics a mile off.
The sexual assault when I was 19 did traumatize me somewhat at the time. I refused to go get another job for some time and stayed in my room playing video games to forget about it. I was just a kid after all. I no longer feel traumatized or affected years later, although I do feel a disgust with anybody approaching me to flirt, especially men. I don't tolerate it. I also didn't tolerate the assault - I threatened the attacker with a knife I kept in my back pocket for work (threatened, didn't attack because he backed off after he saw that knife... and boy was he freaked, lol). I had no idea what he was planning to do after all and there was nobody else around to step in and stop him. I lost my job the next day for defending myself, and my own family did not think it was worth calling the police over. I learned that nobody can be relied upon to help me but me, so I'm glad I stood up for myself.
I distanced myself from my birth gender a lot. If anyone compliments me for anything gender-based I don't "hear" it. I just ignore it. I hate people flirting with me and will either ignore it, deflect it or walk away. I'm ok approaching people to flirt myself but I simply don't enjoy anyone doing it to me. I rarely flirt with anybody else anyway. I find it an uncomfortable thing to do or receive most of the time. Whether that was the incident when I was 19 or being trans or a combo of both I don't know but it's an issue.
I don't think about it much anymore - transition to a male will be quite a relief from the attentions of most men. I think being trans crossed wires about how I react to these things - I tend to react with hostility if someone breached my personal space, just as any cis male might with another guy, and the hostility confuses and upsets men when it comes from what they see as a woman, making them label me as "crazy." Unfortunate as it is, many women learn to deflect male attention in a non-hostile way either because that is what gets less hostile responses from men or because they are intimidated by men (or both), but I've never been able to condition myself to react in any kind of typically 'female' way to male sexual attention. The best I can do is to ignore it, which comes off rude, the worst to get angry, which makes me seem like a utter psycho to them. It's no surprise I'm not super social. I just can't be bothered dealing with that kind of thing on a regular basis. I don't consider myself good looking or anything but I've never been short of people trying their luck.
I guess I dealt with it by accepting that this was just another type of obstacle I had to navigate around or avoid. Having a partner for most of my adult life has made it easier in one sense because I can avoid those situations by pointing out "my partner is right over there". Although obviously not in another because of gender dysphoria - if I were single the issue would barely be acknowledged but when you're not it has to be ignored or masked in some way to enable you to function in a sexual relationship. That's a whole other can of worms that means I can't really enjoy a sexual relationship much in the way my partner can. I view the sex as more of an obligation to keeping a partner happy than something I care about. Sad but true. It's not like they don't offer to be just as obligated back, it's just that I don't want sex as a female or with female parts. Like, I'd rather not have any sex than do it as a female. Which as you can guess makes relationships kind of counter productive in some ways.
So I guess being the wrong gender has led to incidents that traumatized me, but I've just become adept at burying and ignoring things. I will say though that my anger on the matter of creepos has been cumulative and hasn't abated - if anything I get madder than ever if someone tries to come in and say or do something inappropriate in a clearly inappropriate situation they should know better about.
The most recent problem was with my landlord who is one of those types who likes passing comments or compliments like he thinks women need or desperately want to hear that kind of stuff. Had an incident with him recently where he was fixing my front door lock and since it was the fourth time he'd mentioned asking for a coffee when he'd been around the building fixing things for other tenants, I offered him one hoping he'd STFU and go away afterwards. He didn't though, he came in and while I was trying to have a normal conversation to keep the situation normal he started making utterly inappropriate comments. He knew I was alone in the apartment that day and that's why he pushed for that coffee. Something I've seen more than once from creepers. They know what they are doing isn't right, so they look for situations where they can get you alone.
Anyways, long story short I no longer have any patience for that crap so I called his bluff, asked him when we'd be going for the "special ride" he offered me around his properties, and then suddenly his mood changed... he started to get nervous, left in a hurry with a smile on his face an apparently ran right home to tell his wife I was "acting weird". Another sign - creepos immediately try to cover their asses with some authority figure, in this case The Wife, when I was 19 it was The Boss.... but in these situations it was the creepos who instigated everything. Out of sheer annoyance and impatience, I rang the wife, invited her round and told her to put a leash on him. I don't know, I find it harder and harder to be "nice" about these situations any more. I shouldn't have to deal with them at all.
I should mention I'm not talking about normal flirting in situations where it might naturally happen. I'm talking about people who can't control their impulses, people who take things way past normal and into rapey territory or just plain lechdom.
Maybe I haven't dealt with it yet. I don't know. I just try to avoid these situations as much as possible, even though they still manage to seek me out.
