[Serious] What was your experience when you were mugged?

The next victim of the same robbers after me did an interview with the newspaper and said that he was familiar with firearms and for some reason he knew the gun wasn't loaded by the sound it made. He was able to get away from the two men simply by running away. He almost didn't even report it. On the other hand I was actually physically abducted and driven around in the robber's car.

When I tried to talk to people in any detail about the actual event they would become Captain Hindsight. Always with perfect 20/20 vision and a PhD in crime prevention tips. They would say things like "you never ever get in the car", "if you do that you're a goner for sure", and "your best chance is to always run". I understand now that these are pretty solid pieces of advice, but at the time I was very young and emotionally immature. The fear of being shot was enough that I complied with every demand of the robbers. My unfamiliarity with the area, having just moved there,may have also played a part in my terrible decision to not run. You wouldn't believe how scatter-brained you can be when a gun is in your face.

Long story short, I wound up feeling like a fool who complied with the demands of two strangers who had a gun that probably wasn't even loaded. An idiot who didn't have enough sense to just simply run away from the bad guys. These feelings made it impossible for me to "process" the events at that time. Better to just push the details of my robbery deep down into my stomach and not talk about it than get a thousand earfuls on how I didn't even have enough sense to get robbed properly.

Anyways, it was twenty years ago and I have only really talked about it a few times. I am older know and realize that my improper reactions under the pressure of armed robbery were not my fault. The unfortunate reality is that crime is a fact of life. Robberies happen. If I were unlucky enough to be a victim of gun violence tomorrow I would handle it better this time.

It's been good to get this off my chest. Thanks for listening.

/r/AskReddit Thread Parent