I was a victim of cyber bullying. It was not the first time actually, but the other time I didn’t have a voice to fight back. Last night I had a chance in real time to confront my attacker and fight back. Thankfully the visual has been removed from social media, but it has left me scarred.

As many people do on facebook, they ask their FB community for recommendations on a multitude of things, which is fine as we are all looking for the same thing, which is we want the best we can do in our lives. It could be a restaurant recommendation to spend your date night, finding the right person to clean your house, or in this case something travel related.

I don’t like to comment on these posts. Most people know someone in the travel industry. Everyone has the right to choose who they want to give their business to, even if it is not booking with a human but a computer.

Someone else I know tagged me in the recommendation process which I appreciate referrals always, but I would prefer if they came privately as I don’t want to get a notification every time someone recommends someone else and says they are best out there and can beat any price.

There were about 20 comments on this thread. Someone I knew from a past contact deliberately choose to comment on the one that had my name attached. This person had an agenda which was to berate me in public, say horrible things about my profession, my ethics and business acumen and more.

After someone on the thread defended me and said that if the prices were equal they would give the business to me. Again this person could have chosen one of many comments to state her erroneous, ignorant comments, but she chose this one and again attacked my credibility.

My reply to her was simple – leopards don’t change their spots, your behavior here proves you are the same as you were before. That fueled this person to be vile, disgusting and so disrespectful I was mortified.

I sent a private message to the person who started the conversation and thankfully agreed and deleted the post.

As a friend of social media I would ask you please not to tag me in your comments in the future. I have been a travel professional for 27 years. I am very well respected in my industry and if you choose to use me for your travel plans I appreciate your business and I am glad I earned your trust and respect.

As Ellen says at the end of her show, be kind to one another. Words hurt people. I am still not over what happened last night.

Thank you for reading. It would mean a lot to me if you shared this post with your community to show what cyber bullying looks like and how it makes people feel. It is not a good feeling.

Live your best life,

Lisa