*Content Warning: This piece has references to abuse and intimate partner violence, which may be triggering to some.*
I meant my vows.
My first experience with abuse was with my high school boyfriend. We were together four years; he followed me to college. I was driving him to his dorm one night and he was afraid of taking a medical terminology test online. My degree was in the health field, and I had already taken and passed the class. We argued that night, like almost every other night. I was stopped at a stop sign when I finally looked at him and screamed, “I’M NOT TAKING THE STUPID TEST FOR YOU!”
I was met with a back-hand.
It broke open my lip.
The next day was my brother’s college graduation. I told everyone I had fallen when I was drunk. Little did I know, years later, when I had a black eye, my husband used the same excuse to explain it away… I had fallen when I was drunk.
I was unaware of the degree of abuse I had survived until my divorce was underway, and I was seeing therapists and psychologists. I had become a workaholic and it was finally brought to my attention that I worked so much because I was actually respected and safe at work. It had become my escape.
It was a scary day when multiple health professionals told me that not only was my home not safe, but I had been experiencing psychological, verbal, physical and emotional abuse. It had become normal for every word I said and everything I did to be picked apart. I can actually remember fumbling on words, which everyone naturally does sometimes, and being ridiculed for lacking intelligence because of it. I was physically kicked out of bed. I was berated for how I did the dishes and laundry, I was called fat and repetitively told I had daddy issues (my father was killed when I was three).
My open wounds from my past were being used against me instead of being protected. It was a constant battlefield.
My husband called my mother a b*tch and skeletor (because she’s thin). He once screamed at me in the kitchen and told me I was a failure – at everything. I was told I was a terrible mother and wife; I was told I was neglecting him and my daughters because I was in school to get my doctorate.
I became the scapegoat every time he missed family events or things with friends because of his drinking. I was the excuse for everything wrong in his life.
I stayed because when I said my vows, I meant them. We had two young daughters and I wanted to keep our family whole. And to be completely honest, I had been beaten down physically and psychologically for so long that I had started to believe everything he said. Am I that fat? Am I being selfish going to school? Maybe everyone else really knows how to handle life better than me and I really am failing.
I started losing friends. I stopped working out. I stopped taking care of myself. I stopped feeling joy. I started drinking. Depression took over my life. I lost jobs. I lost myself.
This cycle continued for far longer than I’d like to admit.
Then in the middle of the darkness, I saw a glimmer of hope. They say it’s always darkest right before the sun rises. I wish I could say there was some instant remedy, but for me I got tired of disappointing myself. I had my kids I had to provide for, and I wanted to succeed at getting my doctorate. I had a home I had to pay for and I realized I deserved to live a happy, healthy life. I also realized the only man who could judge me was God; and He is forgiving; not critical and condemning.
Surviving abuse is surviving war and although there are often physical battle wounds, most of the damage is in the mind.
There is not a single person on earth who has the right to undermine your worth! Love doesn’t hurt.
