I’m beingtreated differently since about 2015.

As anadult, I’ve always commanded respect.

I’m tallerthan average for a Dutchman

(who aretaller in general compared to most other countries)

and whileI’m not a body builder or an athlete,

I easilyfill a doorway,

which wasalso why I worked as a bouncer

and coolerand later as a security officer.

I startedto get a bald spot

when I wasbarely in my twenties,

so I shavedmy head,

which addedto the intimidation factor.

Apart frommy size, however,

I tended tolook a bit oafish

 — big, but not particularly dangerous,

until Ifocused my attention on someone.

When Iworked security,

myco-workers told me that

while I wasalways calm and soft-spoken,

I lookedlike someone you don’t want to piss off.

Even biggerand stronger men tended to worry

when Ientered into an altercation,

mostlybecause I was so relaxed under tension.

I quitworking security and became

aPre-Conflict Control instructor in 2011,

when I alsobecame a stay-at-home dad.

Suddenly,walking around with my infant son and baby daughter,

I looked lessintimidating,

but morelike a Big Friendly Giant.

In late2014, I was in terrible pain from kidney stones

and hadthree surgeries in 2014–2015.

The lastsurgery cost me my left eye —

it turnedout I had Closed Angle Glaucoma

and thepost-op medication blew up my left eye,

renderingit mostly blind

and theremaining vision 20% was extremely photophobic.
So sensitive to light

that evenif the light hit my closed eye,

it hurtlike a bitch.
The solution was to cover my eye

and sincethe light would creep around my glasses,

I had towear a patch.

The patchchanged the respect I generally commanded before —

I wasn’t justsimply big,

but the‘pirate patch’ made me look badass.

Iimmediately noticed an enormous shift in attitude —

men wereoften intimidated,

butchildren thought I was the coolest dad ever and women…

before thepatch, if I was interested in women,

I had totake the initiative to flirt with them.

Suddenly,women would approach me and flirt with me,

which wasalmost a shock to me.

A lot ofthe stories here are about

beingtreated respectfully in shops and restaurants.

I noticedthat no matter whether I wore my leathers

Denims

Or a suit

It was thepatch that made sure

that nobodywanted to piss me off by not showing me respect.

Whenever Itake off my patch, the disrespect returns.