Something I want to share

I’ve thought about this a lot. Especially lately (my husband and I have been watching a lot of SVU).

Last year someone I was friends with, told me I should write a book on my experience so that way I can help others and at the time, I was pissed. Who was this person to tell me I should relive the pain I went through years ago? So, I didn’t, but I thought about it. And I tried once, but I just couldn’t write a whole book on every single little detail. But a blog post that doesn’t hit on every detail could be perfect, and that’s why you are reading this.

**Warning that the below is about domestic abuse. Possible triggers.**

When I was in high school, I was the quiet one. The one who didn’t get invited (nor did I want to be invited) to all the parties. And to be frank, I don’t think we had that many anyways. We lived in country areas, so everyone was spread pretty far apart. I took dance classes, was involved in the school paper, and even took drama/directing classes. I had close friends, and all was good. Back then we could wear almost anything we wanted to school as long as we didn’t show up naked. I believe a few times I even wore sweatpants just because it was cold outside, and I wanted to be comfortable. I didn’t really date anyone, just wasn’t interested.

Until I met this guy. We are going to call him M. M was nice, nerdy, but nice and my friend E approved. I honestly trusted E with my life, he was one of my best friends.

M and I started dating, all was well. He got along with my friends and even my parents.

Some stuff happened (that doesn’t need to be gone into currently), and I ended up living with M. At the time, he was living with his father (who has mental disabilities due to an accident) and his fathers’ girlfriend.

The first night I was ever slapped in my face by someone other than family was when M and I were home alone. I blamed myself immediately, apologized and sat on the other side of the room quietly. After that it just became a habit. Not all the time at first, but every so often.

M and I had a rough time of it. After his father’s girlfriend decided she wanted to be with her new boyfriend, she made everyone move out of the house. M’s father went to live with his aging mother in PA, and M and I went to stay with his other grandmother a few hours away. Things got worse.

The hitting, the pain and even the yelling became more frequent. M’s brother found out and tried to talk to him about it, but M didn’t want to hear it, so he jumped out of the truck while they were stopped at a stop sign. Heck, one day M even threw a computer at his brother. Luckily, he caught it before it smashed him in the face. It was getting a bit scary, but still the good days outweighed the bad, so I stayed. I mean where was I going to go anyways? I had no money, my family wasn’t speaking to me, and I had no friends nearby. I was stuck.

The worst while we were living there was when M punched me and got me in my face. I don’t think I’ve ever seen that much blood come from my nose, ever. After bleeding all over the dogs just cleaned blanket and standing in the bathroom for what felt like half an hour, my nose stopped bleeding and M apologized. He said that I moved in the direction of his fist, and he was aiming for my shoulder.

We moved out of his grandmothers and ended up in PA with his other grandmother and father. I thought it would be a good move, but turns out, it wasn’t. The abuse kept going, and it was easier for him now. We had the entire basement to ourselves, and no one upstairs ever heard anything. I worked, he worked for a short time. No one knew what was really going on. He would yell whenever things didn’t go his way. He’d blame me for things not being right. If I even mentioned anything about computer parts on the floor, he’d freak. I never got anything new. Whenever I wanted or needed something new for my computer it ended up with me getting whatever part he didn’t want, and he got the brand-new stuff. Why? Because that’s how it was supposed to be.

On Christmas one year, he proposed. Stupidly, I said yes. Why? Probably because I still had no where to go. I was just barely talking to my family; I was in a new state and had no options.

One night (after we got our two little dogs), M was angry and pulled the blankets off the bed with one of our dogs in it. She yelped and it was clear her foot was broken. I wouldn’t let him near her for a while. I kept her on my side of the bed on my pillow, took her and her sister to work with me (I was a nanny, so it was easy). Eventually it healed, but it took a while for her to trust him again.

Eventually M’s grandmother passed from her cancer and we once again, moved. This time back to MD. We ended up renting a townhouse with some other people. Things continued the way it was going, but now he worked full time, so I got breaks. I worked two jobs to cover expenses.

He would go out and hang out with friends. He’d meet people at work and agree to build them computers so he would go to their houses. Normally he would make me go with him unless it was a girl. Then he’d go alone. I suspected things, but I just figured that maybe I’d get lucky, and he’d leave. He even had a girl he used to date to message him saying that she loved him and missed him just to show it to me. I guess he wanted a reaction out of me.

Whenever I didn’t have the correct reaction toward something, I was hit, or yelled at. It became normal. I thought he would grow up and grow out of it. Looking back now, I see it just wasn’t an option.

We moved again, and again. He owed people money and things, but never delivered. He burnt bridges with friends, family, even jobs.

We ended up landing near his mom. Renting a couple places. By this time, I was talking to my family more, agreeing to spend time with each other, slowly. It was a process. My mom was also verbally abusive, and I swear up and down she’s bi-polar or has some other form of mental illness. My dad always said she just has a short fuse, but I know there has to be more to it.

Back to M. Now that we were closer to his mom, we spent a lot of time there. Which was fine, I liked his mom and stepfather.

One day, I got a call from M. I was mad (and at work), so I didn’t answer. Not long after, I listened to his voicemail he left since he never leaves voicemails. He was arrested after being pulled over for going close to 100 mph down the highway with a suspended license. I left work early, called his mom and dropped my car off at her house. We went and picked up his car from the side of the road, took it back to our rental and we drove to the police station to get him.

He was pissed. Didn’t want to talk about, didn’t even want to apologize for making us stop our day to deal with his crap. To this day, I still don’t understand what he was doing or why.

He decided we should get married. We had never set a wedding date since getting engaged and he was really pushing for it. I wasn’t. I even cried the morning of. But still, I married him. At the time I thought, well maybe once he’s married, he’ll realize he needs to act like an adult and work and be a good human. Nope. Things went down after that.

We moved, again. This time in with a friend of his. I worked full time, he worked part-time (he needed time off to you, do whatever he wanted).

In November his friend and his girlfriend, M and I decided to take a trip to Boston. They had been once, and we had never been. So, we packed up my car and headed up there in November. I had planned to meet up with a friend of mine who lived just outside of Boston. He was a fellow writer and we had only chatted online. M wasn’t overly thrilled, but for some reason was okay with it but only if his friend’s girlfriend (we’ll call her J) went with me.

Shortly after we got to our hotel J and I went to meet up with my friend. Thing went fine, the next day however, they didn’t.

We were only in Boston for the weekend. Saturday morning something crawled up M’s ass and he was a jerk. To everyone. When we all got in the car, he acted even worse. It was the first time that his friend (we’ll call him K), and J had ever seen him act like this. This was normal for me to see.

He drove like a crazy person almost getting us into an accident. K yelled until M pulled over. K demanded that J and I get out of the car immediately. We did, but M yelled at me to get back in. For the first time in EVER someone was standing up to M in defense of me. K told me no and he was taking care of things. So, I didn’t get back in. M sped off into traffic, while the three of us walked to a donut shop for coffee.

K told us to stay put and he took my phone in case M called me. K walked back to the hotel and had them change the key cards so M couldn’t get in. When he returned, we made our way into Boston while the three of us enjoyed the day and evening. M eventually calmed down enough to apologize, he and K talked in private and while things were ‘better’ they weren’t like they used to be.

The rest of the trip went well.

Things just kept going down since that trip though. The way he acted, how he put us all in danger, and seeing K stand up to him really set things in motion for the next couple of years.

Life with M just got worse. He started telling me things he wanted, sexually that I just wasn’t comfortable in doing. M and I used to play a game online together. An MMO game where we chatted with others and spent a lot of time together. In this game we had what they call a guild (basically it’s like a Facebook group). Either M or I was the guild master at some point, we switched it back and forth several times (more on that later).

But M didn’t like that I had made friends on the game.

M and I moved again, but this time, in with my parents. We still played in the evenings, but M really hated that I had other people to talk to. So he told me I couldn’t talk to them anymore. He made me remove them from my friends list in the game, delete their friendship on Facebook. It was just bad.

I still was able to chat with them in secret through an email I set up.

My father passed in 2011. The day he passed, M followed the ambulance to the hospital. For the first time in a while he was being kind. Until he had to run back to work to drop off money (at the time, he was delivering pizzas for a place in our town). He promised to be back as soon as he dropped off the stuff at work. It was about a twenty-minute drive there. I waited. An hour went by, then an hour and a half. Almost two hours later, we were about to leave the hospital (my mom’s boss was taking us to grab a dinner since none of us had any food). I called M. He was at the house. On his computer. I guess coming back to the hospital to help your wife deal with stuff after her father died was just too much work. I was pissed. And that moment really started to make my mind turn.

Then one night, M decided he wanted something sexually from me. I didn’t want to. I was tired, not feeling well and had to get up early the next day. So, I took some Nyquil and went to bed.

The next morning, I woke up sore all over. Inside and out. I thought it was just the flu, but M laughed when he woke up hours later. He joked and carried on about how easy sex was with me when I was asleep.

I cried. I went in the bathroom and stood in the shower crying. And that was it. I couldn’t and wouldn’t do this anymore.

Things escalated to a whole new level when one-night weeks later M found my secret email. He saw I was still talking to my friends and blew up. Dragged me across the floor and shoved his knee into my neck.  My mom heard the commotion and came upstairs. Asked what was going on and saw he was hurting me. Her response; “Don’t do it again.”

Not, “get out of my house for hurting my daughter.” Or “Your done here.” Just a simple, don’t do it again.

I spent the next few months going back and forth. I talked to my friends from the game, and they offered their suggestions. The holidays sucked without my dad, I was sad all the time, M didn’t care though. He was now working full time, but nights. Which was great for me. I worked days. We hardly had any time together.

The last night with M in the house, he called me early in the morning. It was still dark outside. He begged me to come downstairs. I said no, I was tired. He came upstairs and went right to sleep.

When I got up a couple of hours later, he was asleep, my mother had left for work, and my sister wasn’t home. This was my chance.

I called my friends who lived about an hour away. They agreed to come to the house and help me get M out. Throughout their drive, I thought I was being crazy, but they kept telling me I was doing the right thing. When they got there, I went upstairs, mustered up all of my energy and woke M up. I told him he needed to get out. He was confused, didn’t understand. I explained again. I told him I was done, I couldn’t and wouldn’t do this anymore. I was unhappy, always hurt and I didn’t want to be with him. He cried. He actually cried. He called a friend of his and tried to get his friend to talk me out of it.

Nope. Nothing worked. I stood my ground. I agreed to let him take MY car until get got somewhere safe. My friends wouldn’t let me stay there, so I went to their house for a bit, they drove me home later that evening. My mom was home. M was gone.

She asked, I told her he left. That’s all she needed to know.

I got out. I was free (or so I thought).

M started with the poor me act online. Cried to everyone. Begged me publicly to take him back. Claimed he went to the hospital with a broken heart. Part of me felt for him, but another part of me told myself this was the right thing to do.

Then the threats started. Threatening my family, friends, etc. That guild I mentioned earlier. Well it was in my name when we separated. He begged for it back. I told him no. I wasn’t doing that to the community of people that were there. He threatened my life. I still said no.

Finally the threats stopped. He backed up and started doing drugs. I begged for a divorce after the one year that MD makes you wait. He said no. Wouldn’t sign paperwork or anything.

I met someone, J. I begged again for M to sign papers, he still declined.

Then out of the blue, he agreed. Why? Because HE met someone and now wanted to be free of marriage. After a year and a half separated, we got our divorce. I was officially free of M forever.

J and I continued dating, got engaged and are now happily married. Life is different now. I see how toxic M was. How much he never was going to change. He didn’t want to. I have messaged M a few times to let him know when the dogs we once shared passed. He expressed his condolences and that’s that.

I know my story is long. Not nearly as bad as some, but it’s still abuse, and it happened. It sucked. And things with J were hard in the beginning because of it. It’s taken me a long time to get to this point. To the point of sharing my story and I haven’t even shared every part.

Many people say, “why don’t they just leave?” It’s not that easy. Trust me it’s not. And even after leaving, you still have to wonder if you will come face to face with them again. Or their family. Now that social media is such a big part of many people’s lives, it’s harder to escape.

I am lucky. I got out. I found a man who loves me for me. A man who encourages me and encourages the things I want to do. My time with M feels like another life sometimes and that’s good. It means I’m moving forward and growing.