Mariella
I’ve tried to write this story several times before. I’ve never really managed to finish it. I somehow felt that there were plenty of women who lived through much worse. Women who were abused as children, women who have lived with abusive spouses for years, women who were raped by strangers. I survived. I grew up, I have a successful life. There is nothing physically wrong with me.
Lately though, I’ve come to realize that none of that erases what happened to me. I seem happy, I seem normal, I’m not. I seek out relationships with men who are also damaged. I’m unable to trust others. Sex has no value to me.
I was 15 when I met him and fell in love.
My mother and I had never had a good relationship and there was no one I could talk to about the questions I had about sex and love. She didn’t want me to date, but she never told me why. It was after I became an adult that she told me she had been abused as a child.
That year I’d met my first high school boyfriend. I’d never felt that way before about anyone. When he dumped me I spent three weeks crying. My best friend, who was 17 at the time, invited me to the beach with her and her family so I could get some fresh air and have some fun.
That is the single event in my life I regret the most. If I hadn’t gone, I’d be different.
She had a group of friends who were older than us and already in college. The day after we got to the beach, they took us out dancing. That’s where I met him. He was friends with some of the guys we were with. He took advantage of me in every way I can possibly imagine for the next year. He lied to me about everything. He told me he was 21. He wasn’t; he was 26. He told me he was still in school. He wasn’t, he’d dropped out and worked as a trucker with his father. He told me he lived with his mother and his little brother. He actually lived with his mother and his son. I fell in love with him because I was young and naïve. I thought he was exciting; I wanted to live life too quickly.
The second time I went to his house he raped me.
I didn’t give it that name. I didn’t know. I didn’t know why he was so rough with me when, if he’d asked, I would’ve said yes.
I felt I was doing something wrong when I was unable to feel anything except pain. He only came when he saw I was bleeding.
He began to take over my life slowly. I wasn’t allowed anywhere without him. I couldn’t see my friends or wear makeup or high heels. If I ever went out and he found out where I was he went to get me and tried to drag me out to his car. Twice he was kicked out of places we were at.
I didn’t leave him. I feel like an idiot about it now.
Eventually things escalated. He hit me. He burned a cigarette out on my leg.
I finally left when he got a 13-year-old girl pregnant and stole pills from my dad’s office to try and give her an abortion. She almost died.
My parents found out about him and grounded me for about a year. It was the best thing they could have ever done for me.
He tried contacting me some time later. I never let him near me again.
The last time I heard from him I’d begun working for a female rights group anonymously and was finally able to put a name on what he did to me; abuse. I threatened him and told him that if he ever came near me again it’d be the last thing he ever did.
It wasn’t my only abusive relationship, but I was able to get myself away from the others before it was too late.
My sister-in-law is about to give birth to a baby girl. I’m writing this for me and for her. So that she’ll make better choices, so that she’ll know that she can count on me when she needs someone to protect her from herself.
###
Nicky
I thought after five years of knowing and dating my ex that I was making a solid choice when I got married. We had only had a handful of disagreements and in all of those I had been the loud one, being what he called “emotional” and “girly.” However, nothing was ever violently hurtful, he just always “won.”
Not even a month into our marriage it seemed like he flipped and changed. I was left with the constant feeling that I was wrong, stupid, and small. I wasn’t allowed to make purchases without checking in first. I struggled to make friends because he managed all my time. I was being pulled away from my family and he told me when and how I could spend my time with them.
At first I tried to do what he wanted. I thought a good wife was able to give and be there for her husband and to support his leadership. Then I got tired of always being wrong and I fought back and tried to maintain my own thoughts and goals.
That’s when he started hitting me.
When I think about the abuse I remember the bruises. I remember how I felt physically and emotionally dead. I remember how I felt the night I finally gave up and resigned myself to the thought that this was how my life was going to be. I would always be scared and wonder when or what I would do wrong next to make him mad. I remember how he pinched my chest until I had deep purple bruises covering my upper body. I remember kicking him off me and he took my foot and bit my toes until they bled. I remember the sound of my head hitting the door casing before things went black. I remember how black his eyes seemed. I remember thinking, as he tried smothering me with a pillow, that if I just died then maybe he would finally be happy. I remember the baby that I lost because wasn’t strong enough to leave before things got to that point.
There is so much about my five years of marriage to that person that I regret. I lost myself and it’s been a struggle to come to terms with the emotional mess that I was. Every morning when I put on my makeup I cover up a small scar under my left eye from the last fight. It’s been hard and scary at times to leave. I haven’t always been well informed as to what my rights are, and that has made things more difficult.
This Christmas is my five year anniversary of leaving my ex-husband. I’ve always felt like there should be chips given to survivors like in AA or NA to mark these anniversaries. A little something that says, “I did the impossible and now I know what living really feels like.” It would probably need to be shorter, but I hope you get my point.
I can say I have never regretted leaving him. I feel lucky to have that clarity.
###
Thank you for visiting Violence UnSilenced, a speak-out platform for survivors of domestic abuse, sexual assault, and sexual abuse. If you are a survivor and it is safe to do so, we encourage you to share your story here. If you are not a survivor but you want to support those who are, please click around this site and find out more about what you can do.
Erratic
I have gone back and forth about sharing this. I feel like my story is private and mine, mine alone. But, I also feel that I need to share it.
I don’t remember most of my childhood. I don’t know why. People tell me stories of being a kid, a teenager, and I don’t remember any of them. Most of my memories are repeating stories other people told me. But, there are certain things I can’t forget. Certain things I won’t ever forget.
My parents divorced when I was seven and my dad wasn’t really around. Not because he didn’t want to be, he just wasn’t. He worked a lot, he was three states away. He just wasn’t there. My mom remarried a man with three children. I was the oldest, with his son being 9 months younger than me.
I remember him walking in on me while I showered, with a hard on. Rubbing himself while I showered. I remember having to lock every single door and being terrified to change my clothes, not to mention shower. I remember him walking in on me peeing and the same thing happening. His little sister, about 6 years younger than me, would crawl into my bed when we had company because they would share a room and he would masturbate in bed with her. She would cry and cry and cry. Eventually, my mom and stepdad got him his own room simply so that he wouldn’t masturbate while his sisters were in the room.
His father was no better. He would argue with my mom and throw things at her, at first. We went through so many sets of dishes. Then it turned into hitting. I remember one night where he pushed her down the stairs because my friends came over on Superbowl Sunday and were interrupting the game. After they left, he was furious. I ran to the basement stairs, thinking she was dead. She was fine. Bruised and sore, but fine. I tried to call the police and she ripped the phone out of my hand. I was told to mind my own business.
They divorced when I was 15. I had my driver’s permit and had to drive in the middle of the night to steal our stuff back from the house we all shared. I even recruited my friends. We would sneak in and take everything we could. While he was at work, late at night, whenever we could guarantee that he wouldn’t be home. Sometimes, he was just passed out somewhere while we took everything.
Around this time, I met a guy online. Not someone I was interested in dating, just a friend. He had gone through similar things and we started talking and hanging out. One night, he brought his friend, Brandon. We immediately hit it off. We started talking and one night, we all got together when my friend’s parents were out of town. We were hanging out at his apartment complex pool and I remember walking into the sauna. The next thing I know, I woke up completely naked. Brandon was sitting next to me, equally naked. I have no idea what happened. I was a virgin.
My friend later told me she walked in and he was fingering me, but I was dressed. The next day, I was sore. I could barely walk. I was bleeding. I asked this same friend if they saw anything and she told me to suck it up. I was drunk and did something stupid. We all do it.
I don’t know if this is everything. I only remember certain parts of my childhood. But, I hate being touched. I don’t like being hugged and intimacy makes me really uncomfortable. Mostly with strangers. Close friends I am a lot better with.
I feel like a stranger around my closest friends. Nobody knows this. At least not all of this. There are more days where I don’t want to get out of bed than I am comfortable with.
I feel like an asshole because people have been through so much worse. I feel like my story is meant for an advice column in a magazine, not this website. Then I remember that I am completely changed because of these experiences. I remember that other people feel the way that I do. I remember that the point is UNSILENCED. Not shame. And some bizarre sense of humility.
Everyone deserves happiness. And for someone to love them. And for someone to love. I have all of that now. Despite my craziness. Despite all of it. I am somehow happy.
###
Erratic blogs at http://erratictheblog.blogspot.com/.
Thank you for visiting Violence UnSilenced, a speak-out platform for survivors of domestic abuse, sexual assault, and sexual abuse. If you are a survivor and it is safe to do so, we encourage you to share your story here. If you are not a survivor but you want to support those who are, please click around this site and find out more about what you can do.
I-ris
How do you answer when people ask, “Was it just emotional abuse?” I don’t even know what the fuck to say to them. They obviously don’t know anything about domestic violence. I know they need to be educated, but how do you teach an alien language to someone?
I want to say, “I don’t know…
When he drugged me and raped me–
When he hit the baby on her head for crying—
When he disappeared—
When he told me loved me then called me fat and said he didn’t want to compliment me because it would make it seem like the way I was was okay–
When I so desperately wanted to leave and he held a gun to his head and said he couldn’t live without me—
When my four year old asked, “Daddy why do you always make mommy cry?”–
When he cheated on me, but wanted to kill me because I found someone who showered me with compliments and affection, and built up my broken spirit and heart–
When I wouldn’t fight with him in front of our kids and said we should go for a drive, and he went 90 miles per hour down that winding dirt road and told me he didn’t care if we both died if he couldn’t have me—
When I finally got the courage to leave and he made two huge cuts in the front of his body to remind him that I tore out his guts and broke his heart and my teenaged daughter started cutting herself—
When he told me, “If I hit you once, I might as well not stop for as much trouble as I’ll get into”–
When he called me in the middle of the night and said he had all of his guns and had taken my car keys and wanted me to beg him to come back and promise to do anything he wanted–
When he finally filed for divorce and i was yelling for someone to call the police and for him to leave me alone, trying to get away from him and throwing things behind me and he silently went into the house with never so much as an “ow,” and shortly after, when the police arrived and informed me that he had called and reported that i attacked him and his head was bleeding. When no one but him knows to this day what happened to his head, but considering that he has a history of cutting himself and he had no need for stitches or the hospital–
when i got out of jail the next morning and he had emptied our bank account, returned my (leased) car, and was using the No Contact order to keep me out of my home and away from my children—
when he tells my daughters that I abandoned them and they will lose the house because mommy wants all his money–
which ones are JUST emotional abuse?”
This is a poem I wrote and read at a local candlelight vigil against domestic violence.
The Greatest Gift
I spent twenty years with a man who abused me
Our three daughters are as beautiful as can be
Why did I stay? You may want to know
With three kids and no job, where would I go?
The girls seemed okay, it would mess up their lives
No. Women should stay home like good little wives
Besides, I did love him, he provided for us
I thought I could cover up the bad things he does
But one fateful night I went out of control
The years of abuse had taken their toll
I got up the next morning and it was all gone
All the things that had kept me there for so long
My home, all my money, along with my car
I even had to watch my girls from afar
The world around me was so bleak and dark
Til one day it hit me like a beautiful spark
The things he took can all be replaced
But my education, my memories, my love with my girls cannot be erased
If the things that bound me had never been taken
My Higher life would still be forsaken
So now I know it was the greatest gift that he gave me
By taking it all, he actually saved me.
###
