Woman calls Planet Fitness ‘the cheapest option’. Then a disturbing gym encounter leaves her shaking: ‘I just want to enjoy myself’
Going to the gym should be simple. You work out, mind your own business, and expect other people to do the same.
But one woman says going to Planet Fitness has become uncomfortable because of the attention she gets from some men. During one visit, she says one man took it far enough that she finally decided to say something.
TikTok creator Em (@emsecret051) says she noticed a man repeatedly staring at her while she worked out. She made sure she was not imagining it before confronting him, but says she was still “shaking” and “so scared” when she finally walked up to him.
Eventually, she had enough
Em says she goes to Planet Fitness because “it’s the cheapest option” and she likes saving money. However, she claims attention from some of the men there has made going to the gym increasingly uncomfortable. “Men relentlessly stare to the point where it really, like, kills my motivation to go to the gym,” she says.
Em says she does not have the same experience at her college gym, where she claims there are no older men around. At Planet Fitness, however, she says she has changed how she responds when men look at her. “Usually I glare back and, like, I’ve stopped smiling back at them, which sucks,” she says. “It sucks to have to adjust from being a nice person to a rude person just so people aren’t weird.”
During this particular visit, Em says one man was staring at her “bad.” Still, she did not immediately confront him. She says she repeatedly checked whether he was actually looking at her because she did not want to make an accusation without being certain. “I kept making sure that he was actually staring at me because I didn’t want to be the a**hole in this situation and make accusations,” she says.
Eventually, Em says she became too uncomfortable to continue ignoring it. “I’m so uncomfortable and so over it, and I just want to enjoy myself,” she recalls. On her way out, she decided to approach the man. Em says she was frightened enough that she was physically shaking. “I’m shaking. I’m so scared,” she says. “But, like, I had to say something.”
Instead of immediately accusing the man of staring, Em began with a question. She asked whether he had a husband or wife. The man allegedly told her that he did. Em then revealed why she was asking. “Would they be okay with you staring at a 20 year old?” she asked. According to Em, the man responded, “No.” “Well, maybe don’t,” she told him.
For Em, the confrontation mattered because she says it was a rare moment when she actually spoke up instead of simply trying to ignore behavior that was making her uncomfortable. “Moral of the story, it felt really good to stand up for myself for once,” she says. She also encouraged other women to speak up when they feel able to do so, despite acknowledging how frightening confronting someone can be.
Commenters largely focused on Em’s decision to approach the man. “Props to you for confronting him!” one person wrote. Another suggested a possible way to avoid similar encounters, asking, “Have you tried a different time of day?” One commenter offered a different perspective, writing, “the guys are always looking some just want u to know they are.”
Em’s account does not establish why the man was looking at her, and the interaction is presented from her perspective. What is clear from her video is how strongly she says the experience affected her: she went from trying to ignore the attention to confronting the man even while visibly frightened by the prospect of doing so.
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