A moment that changed me: I was always a pushover – until I stood up to some teenagers

It was the evening before my 40th birthday – a freezing cold night in March – and I was travelling across London to meet some old school friends for dinner. As I walked down the stairs into the tube station, I spotted a few teens leaning over the balustrade above me. I thought nothing of it; teens hanging about aimlessly is as classic a combination as Archers and lemonade. That was, until they each threw a few KFC paper cups’ worth of icy water over my head.

I noticed it in slow-motion and, at first, kept walking. Then I realised that my hair was wet and so was my back. Without thinking, I ran back up the stairs and followed the teens, who were marching off down the main road. People on the street were watching me, obviously intrigued to see what I was going to do. What was I going to do? A few people looked at me with pity and pointed me in the right direction.

When I caught up with the teenagers, they pretended it wasn’t them. The two girls strode quickly ahead, but one of the boys hung back – perhaps also intrigued to hear what I was going to say. What was I going to say?

Still drenched, I sputtered the kind of fangless inanity I might say to my five-year-old as she pours rice all over the floor or starts drawing on the walls. Why, I asked, had they done it? The boy said nothing. I asked again and he denied they’d done anything, all adolescent swagger and smirks.

Eventually he changed tack, telling me that it was, to be fair, funny. He said it a few times, as if to hammer home his point. Eventually, after more back and forth, I remember saying, simply: “It’s upset me. You’ve upset me.” To my surprise, it prompted a mumbled but seemingly heartfelt: “Sorry, bro.”

It might not sound like much, but I felt genuinely appreciative that this teen had uttered his low-key but nevertheless disarming apology. And after spending a lifetime as a pushover, this moment was a breakthrough for me.

Historically, my kneejerk reaction to being wronged would have been to pretend that all was well, that I hadn’t been rattled; the wind hadn’t been knocked out of my sails. All good! But here I was admitting to this stranger, who would no doubt have preferred that I had quietly scuttled off to the tube, that I was upset. I couldn’t simply shrug it off – I was too damp and too shocked. Plus, I had made a promise to myself that I wouldn’t be such a walking wet wipe.

Previously, I would have done anything to avoid public confrontation, or even just discomfort. I would hide terrible food in a napkin and smuggle it out of restaurants rather than say anything to the waiting staff. I would allow myself to be overcharged, elbowed in the head on public transport, or worse, groped, and not say a thing. On one occasion I found myself saying yes to a flower subscription service in the street, despite being overdrawn and not in the market for weekly gladioli. All because it was less embarrassing than saying “no thanks”. With friends, I struggled with emotional honesty.

When I’d turned 30, at a particularly low ebb, I had pledged to change my ways. But despite my determination at the time, the results were not instant and I’d spent another decade being broadly incapable of sticking up for myself – or others – in moments that mattered, and even in moments that didn’t.

But that night something changed. In truth, it had been stirring for some time. As a new mum, I’d been forced to find my voice for the sake of my tiny baby, who was still without one of her own. I managed to stick up for her in a way that I wouldn’t have been able to do for myself, holding her place in the queue for the slide against bigger kids, or declining roughhousing from well-meaning toddlers at soft play – these were baby steps.

Back outside the tube station, I thanked the boy for his apology and, in my mind’s eye at least, we shared a quick smile by way of closure. I made my way back to the tube, boarded my train, and a few tears of shock ran down my cheeks, as I messaged my friends to say that I was going to be late.

When I arrived at dinner, they asked why I was so wet. I explained what had happened and felt a twinge of pride at their surprise. By the time I got to them I felt calm, but in a past life, I would have turned around and gone home, convinced that my soaking was evidence of something lacking in me – and the embarrassment would have stayed with me long after I’d changed into dry clothes. This, I realised, as I took a sip of victory wine, was progress.