MJ calls what happened to her in Zion national park “small ‘T’ trauma”. She knows women have experienced worse from their partners. But she still feels the anger of being left behind on a hike by her now ex. “It brings up stuff in my body that maybe I have not cleared out yet,” she said.
Five years ago, MJ and a new partner – he was not exactly her boyfriend, and the pair were not exclusive – traveled from Los Angeles to Utah for an adventure getaway. MJ, who is 38 and works in PR, was looking forward to exploring Zion’s striking scenery; its vast sandstone canyon and pristine wading trails were on the list. But on the morning of their big hike, MJ was not feeling well. She could not shake the feeling that something was “off”; indeed, MJ would learn on this trip that her partner was seeing other women.
As they made their way up Angel’s Landing, MJ’s partner started walking faster than her. “I could tell it was getting on his nerves that I was slow,” she said. “I was like, ‘Fuck it, just go ahead of me.’” He did without hesitation.
When she caught up at the top of the mountain, they took a picture together. Then her partner hiked down the mountain with a woman he had met on the way up, leaving MJ to finish by herself. They broke up shortly after that trip. (MJ asked to be referred to by her initials for the sake of speaking openly about a past relationship.)
Last month, MJ opened TikTok and heard the phrase “alpine divorce”, a label she now attaches to her experience in Zion.
Articles like this are 99% trash
So are some comments.
So two or three “credible” stories over a century qualify for this headline? Seems a bit inflated.
I mean… it’s not a nice thing to do to someone but… eh…
What is everyone’s problem with women sharing these stories though? We’re not allowed to speak about these instances because you decided it doesn’t happen frequently enough?
That’s not what I’m saying. Don’t make it about something it’s not.
If something happens a handful of times… it’s barely a story.
That’s literally what your comment is saying - that this type of abuse doesn’t happen enough to warrant attention. Why do you have a problem with women sharing stories like this?
Apparently you can’t read.
So two or three “credible” stories over a century qualify for this headline? Seems a bit inflated.
I mean… it’s not a nice thing to do to someone but… eh…
Care to elaborate? Because you are clearly expressing that this doesn’t happen enough for people to actively talk about it.
the pair were not exclusive
…
MJ would learn on this trip that her partner was seeing other women
…isn’t that was “not exclusive” means?
Casual partners may still prefer to know if their partner is sleeping with others for a variety of reasons. The first one that comes to mind is health.
Sure. My point is, though, isn’t that already implied by them not being exclusive?
They could be not exclusive but still agree to let the other know when they introduce a new sex partner.
Y’all never heard of safe sex?
Soooo, this guy was a dick, but aren’t you just defining “exclusive until we say we are not”?
Maybe I’m getting old and have lost the lingo (very possible) but I feel like we’re redefining exclusive here.
How would they be exclusive if additional sex partners are allowed? It’s not an asking for permission scenario, it’s just keeping your partners informed of who is involved.
I’ve mostly done so for health reasons.
I still think we are saying the same thing.
“Let’s not put labels on anything, let’s just choose to not have any other partners while we are sleeping together. If one us changes our mind about that, they should be up front with the other person about it.”
“Let’s be exclusive. If one us changes our mind about that, they should be up front with the other person about it.”
Am I missing something? Is “exclusive” used for a different definition now?
They could already have existing partners and wouldn’t be exclusive, but have an agreement to inform if there are new partners being added.
Also being exclusive is a more serious type of relationship than just friends with benefits imo.
Balanced take. This kind of thing is very veryserious. But also a dilution of the term Alpine Divorce, which people have died from.
Any of these women in the stories could have died while alone on a hike. That’s sort of the point.
But it is also not true that they were at risk? Any more than you could die anywhere.
You don’t think it’s more dangerous out in the wilderness than walking an aisle in a Target?
I disagree that a popular trail with many people can be called wilderness, but I would be okay calling it a backcountry location.
There are not too many things that can harm you on such a trail compared to another comparable physical activity, like playing soccer on a field for instance. The main difference is that it is harder to get to definitive care if you do get hurt.
On the soccer field, the ambulance pulls up in 5-10 minutes when you sprain an ankle or get stung by a bee and your airway closes up. On the hike, ideally you splint yourself and walk out if you roll your ankle, And do anything you can if you get that bee sting and have a life-threatening anaphylaxis, including call 911, lie down flat on your back, take bandadryls if you have them, and use your epipan if you have it.
But in both these cases you’re never really alone because there are so many other people. And on the trail, there’s probably a higher chance of encountering somebody with first aid training than on the soccer field.
To be honest, I’m not sure what exactly the context of your question was, but I assume it has something to do with leaving somebody to hike alone on these popular trails like angel falls or delicate arch in general.
In the specific example of the article, I don’t think it was a super big deal that the original person left her to go home with another woman, because she didn’t seem too much in danger, just emotionally hurt. She even told him to go on and hike ahead of her. In the worst case, there are plenty other people who would help her if she were to roll an ankle, have car trouble, or something. And she had cell service the whole time. To me, this isn’t that different than getting up and leaving somebody in the middle of a jog in a nice neighborhood that you arrived at separately, if you had a fight with them. The biggest difference being the response time of EMS.
From reading these other comments, though, a lot of people seem to feel like being left alone on a hike would be more stressful than being left alone in the front country, which I don’t really understand, but I can accept that people would feel like that. I would hate to be abandoned at a party or at a bar, for instance – It’s not somewhere I’m comfortable at all. And I’d much rather walk back to my car alone on a popular well marked trail in the daytime.
The example of the woman at Delicate Arch is more confusing since it seems she actually was having a medical issue of some kind giving her vertigo. I don’t think the two should have separated in that case, but it’s really hard to decipher what actually happened in that situation, Especially having just one side of the story.
The example that involved the woman dying in the mountains is wildly different to me. I really don’t like how much male ego the guy seems to have in that he had abandoned previous partner on a different trip and how he had declined a helicopter rescue for both of them when they were first in trouble. In my opinion, he killed the person he was with by doing that.
There seems to be no world to me in which the situation on the angel falls trail is at all comparable to the gross negligence in that last example.
I live in an area that is densely wooded and has many, many hiking trails of various difficulty. It is always taught here that you need to be aware and ready for danger on any hiking trail, no matter how popular.
Wild animals and falls are absolutely a thing that makes being in the wilderness more dangerous than say a soccer field as you used for an example.
I don’t think it’s ever ok to leave a hiking partner except in cases of emergency when there’s only 2 people in the group and especially not because one of those people is being a jerk and won’t explain why or what they’re feeling or want to do. The lack of communication from the men in these situations outlined by the article is astounding especially for those situations.
I think we will have to agree to disagree on some points due to different backgrounds. On extremely crowded trails near me, danger from wildlife is just not common where I’m from. If I was in California, maybe I would have to worry about mountain lions, but even they do not like crowds, so I’m not sure what wild animals you are considering a risk. I think probably the most risky animal would be something you could get a bee sting and anaphylaxis from, which would be more dangerous in the back country, I agree. But it doesn’t seem significantly different if you are hiking alone and the person right behind you calls 911 in 20 seconds when they reach you, or if the person right next to you calls 911.
Some trails have fall potential and some don’t. It would be a very different thing to leave somebody to attempt half dome on their own versus a nice hike in the woods, even when going up to a pleasant summit.
I’ve heard kayakers say never boat alone, but where I live at least the same thing is not true for hiking, mountain biking or even rock climbing for that matter. Maybe that’s a rule of thumb in your area that just doesn’t exist here. I would definitely never ever swim alone, though. The common training here for hikers is to carry the ten outdoor essentials even on easy hikes, and practice leave no trace, including step 1: Always let somebody know where you’re going and when you’ll come back.
To me the biggest issue here is communication. If I was expecting to meet my hiking partner back at the car, but when I got there they had driven off already, I would be really miffed, not knowing what happened. It would be even worse if their car was there, but they were not there.
On the other hand, if they told me, hey, I’ve got to leave early, I’m going to head back to the trailhead now, and I said, okay, fine, I’ll see you next time and finish the hike on my own. I don’t see any problem doing that. To me, there’s no set in-stone rule against hiking alone, the way there is for swimming alone or boating alone, because it is just not as risky, and, in fact, is quite routine. That’s why it’s hard for me to call most back country areas near me ‘wilderness’, because they are so close to civilization, so dominated by human impacts that there is just so little added risk that you wouldn’t have in the front country.
I’m referring to bears, wolves, coyotes, and wildcats primarily. California is similar. There’s large swaths of the US that are still very much wilderness even if there is a human population nearby.
So yes, perhaps our different perspectives is what is putting us at such odds over what a big deal this is. I would be very upset at a man who is visibly pissed off at me but won’t communicate and keeps pushing ahead of me without saying what he wants.
Every day I’m thankful that I’m not romantically interested in men.
So many downvotes from pouty boys hahaha
Men on lemmy are 100% the socialist boyfriends who don’t do the dishes, you can tell by what they support and get pissed at. Orange man bad because fat and stupid? They love it and it makes them confident they aren’t one of the baddies. Patriarchy is bad and I don’t like men because of how it socializes them? They correctly call me evil.
Have you ever tried NOT generalizing 50% of the population? Surely deep down you know that’s not the right thing to do?
I can’t stress enough how much I don’t give a shit about potentially being unfair to men who think it’s a moral injustice to point out that liberals are still misogynistic even if they think orange man bad. Maybe you should look deep down and get lost up your own ass.
You are being unfair to men who do not fit that description, because you are making a generalization about all men. I don’t understand why you would choose to be hostile rather than understand your actions.
Yes, you don’t understand and yet presume you know better. That’s the problem.
Then explain yourself.
