Why Didn’t She Just Leave?

Abuse is a very sensitive subject. It’s an extremely personal experience, one that no one signs up for because they want to be abused. It has a lasting effect, in the moment and afterwards. The recovery from abuse is also extremely personal, and not something I’m sure is ever fully recovered from.

Abuse happened to me. I am thankful to say that I realized it was happening to me before it killed me. Not everyone makes it to that point. I went through years of therapy and tears. I struggled for a long time to get to where I am today. These days I am thankful for everything that I went through. I am beyond thankful to be living the life I am living, with the people who are in it.

I spent five years with a ‘man’ who abused me. It was not always physical abuse. It was not always bad days and horrible experiences. I do not have just one reason why I stayed for so long. But I am at the point in my healing that I realize the reasons why I stayed are no longer as important as my decision to leave was.

I left. I finally left and it is one of the best things I have ever done for myself. It is not easy to speak about such things with other people. It takes a certain strength to share such experiences. I’ve had to be strong many times in my life but leaving that abuse made me stronger. Speaking about the trauma is a part of the healing that comes in spurts, only here and there as time moves forward. However, it is definitely a necessary part of the healing process.

I say all that to say this: I’ve decided to share some of my experiences. It’s a very emotional decision I have made, however, if it can help even just one person to leave the abuse happening to them, it is worth it. This series is going to be hard to read, especially if you can relate. This is the trigger warning for any and all kinds of abuse. Continue reading with that in mind.

To end this blog, I’m going to share an email that I typed and sent to my abuser. It was my first experience being hit by someone who claimed to love me, someone I chose to have in my life. Looking back now, abuse had already found a home in that relationship but the incident that occurred and resulted in this email was the start of the physical abuse. It was the start of my lies to those closest to me, the support system who stuck with me and eventually helped me leave. This email is my cover-up to an extremely traumatic experience. It is an insight to the mind of a person being exposed to manipulation and gaslighting.

The year was 2016. It was Saturday night, the second weekend of June. He and I had recently been fighting and long story short, he punched me in the face and broke my jaw. And I didn’t tell anyone the truth about that for years.

FYI: Everything has been copied and pasted, please excuse the typos. The only edits are to names and contact info.

• From: Krystal B <x.xxxxxxx89@yahoo.com>
  Date: June 13, 2016 at 7:07:02 AM EDT
  To: Sxxxxx Xxxxxx <x78xxxxxx@yahoo.com>
  Subject: so…
  ok..so this is awkward. but… i have a story for this- for outsiders. for the kids.for my boss/work. Xxxxx asked me yesterday why my tooth was hurting and i told her well…its embarassing to say why. i asked her if she knew what i meant when i said adult drink..and she shook her head yes. and isaid well i had an adult drink last night and had too much of it. and…i wasnt paying enough attention to what i was doing and my surroundings and id had a pretty bad day so i was angry. and i tripped or tangled up or something and went into your laptop table. with the long pole that sticks up. i told her i hit that pole just right and my mouth was open when it happened and my jaw snapped shut and made my teeth clink together. and when my teeth clinked togeher with force that it chipped my tooth and bruised my gums. from punching the wall i screwed up my hand/knuckle and im sure my boss will ask me about it and i havent decided what to say about that. i think im just going to say the truth and say i punched the wall out of anger. i had a lot of reasons to be angry saturday. but i told Xxxxx that i made a mistake saturday, an embarassing mistake, by letting my anger and emotions dictate how much i drank and my reaction to ‘tripping into the table’ she looked at me like i was lying and she said ‘how did you trip into the table? you had to have been sitting down or something’ and i said ‘why?’ and she said well because the table is low so how would you hit your head? and i said ‘babe if you go look at the table that pole goes all the way up past the surface of the table and its perfect height for my face to crash into.’ i also told her that because i consumed enough of the adult drink in a short period of time that i dont really recall EXACTLY what happened. when i discuss the possibilites of oral surgery with my boss im going to make sure and say that you didnt come home from that plumbing job until right before midnight and that this happened before you got home. im sure this is hard for you to swallow. its very, very hard for me to swallow. but, you and i will work through this. and it will make us stronger. i haven’t had many emotions/feelings since saturdaynight/sunday morning. i havent had many thoughts about the incident. i know we both played our parts in the whole thing. and i know we both made mistakes and its embarassing and shameful. but love encompasses all emotions and feelings. and if we have the love i thought we had…we WILL find a way to work through this. id been reading these books…probably correctly filed under ‘relationship help’ and i came across some bullet points that resonated with me and i was compelled to write them down a couple weeks ago…. im going to type them here for you to read:
•  ~ Expressing the change you desire to see without attaching a time limit
• ~ Showing appreciation for the slightest move toward change
• ~ Showing acceptance and love regardless of change

Alot of people will read this blog post and say, ‘I would have left right then and there.’ Good for those people. I was not one of those people. My life up to that point was traumatic in its own right. I had always been surviving. I was always ashamed of needing or wanting anything, even basic human decency. My childhood was not a pretty one. I’m sure that is part of why I stayed for so long. But this incident is only the start of the physical abuse. Those broken bones and bruises have since healed. The damage to my mental and emotional well-being took a much harder hit than a broken jawbone. Stay tuned for more.

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picture taken from: https://slate.com/human-interest/2015/07/free-legal-representation-for-domestic-violence-victims-level-ground-for-survivors-and-their-batterers.html

Disappointed.

there’s an ache inside of me, there’s a part of me that bleeds, but what is broken no longer bends and some consequences never end

 it seems every time i try to speak the words fall off my tongue, they break apart on the rocks below, where dreams and nightmares are one

pleas mean nothing to you as you do another round, you’re too high up there now to ever come back down

my hope remains in agony and the smoke chokes up my lungs, the past remains in ashes and the future never comes

the truth shall set you free, the answers in the mirror, open your mind when you open your eyes, the whispers will get clearer.

Image: The Phoenix Rises From The Ashes/ Bojan Jevtic/ scene360.com

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Note To Self; For When You Are Down

hey you,

yeah, you there, fighting back tears. i see you. and believe it or not, you are glorious.

Generational Curses Can Kiss My Ass

A mom holds a special place in life. She teaches a lot of life lessons, different for everyone in their own experience.

I have not felt close to my mother in years, and then some. When I try to go back farther than that, I do not have memories I can recall of my mother.  

Being a mother myself, I have come to realize that my mother has not had an easy life, nor people she can rely on. That breaks my heart. It is hard to know that this has crippled her in her own motherhood. But I understand she has  done the best she could, with the knowledge she had at the time.

I want a closer relationship with my mom than what i have now. I feel like I’ve tried, like I’ve reached out and let things go.

My dreams tell me otherwise. My feelings tell me otherwise. Our conversations tell me otherwise.

There is a pit in my stomach at the thought of my mother. There is so much regret. But I know it’s not all mine. And what is mine, I’m not sure what to do with.

I also have so much gratitude for my relationship with my mother. It’s provided me with so much knowledge on my own path of motherhood. It really is true that there is positive in the negative, light in the dark. And vise versa…

So, I’m going to write my mother, whether she writes back or not. I’m going to make amends so that I have peace. Because I deserve it and way more important than that, my children deserve it.

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Picture from: medium.com

Questions

as the ceiling caves, my heart beat quickens.

is there a lesson in the infection?

i suppose it should all burn down, no more loose ends, no reflections.

the path is unclear, no directions.

the debris will feed my misconceptions.

the damage will influence my confessions.

thunder rolls with persuasion and lightning strikes with aggression.

control is an illusion and love, perception.

is it perhaps a never ending question?

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It Ain’t Love

I have been through so much since I decided to leave a toxic relationship a couple months ago. I am glad I left, though, because who knows what else would have happened had I stayed.

The Other Side

accept the fate of your mistakes. let shit go, whatever it takes. look in the mirror, quit being fake. take all that bullshit and go away. you’ve been broken too long. sad, sorry, and alone, forever looking for home. 

Looking Back…

Hindsight is a special thing. You can look back and gain an understanding that can be used to better your future. When in the throes of chaos and passion, confusion and pain, things are blurry and hard to process.

My Mind Matters

I started a journey of self-discovery four years ago, after a traumatic event took place. I started therapy and stuck with it for two years. At that point, I decided I needed a break from looking with-in. I stopped therapy. Some more traumatic events happened. My doctor suggested undergoing a psychological evaluation. I waited an entire year after that suggestion, through many more traumatic events, to finally undergo the evaluation.