Attention: If you are in an abusive relationship please copy and paste the website link in your incognito browser! Then delete this website from your internet history asap.
^^ I wrote the above because I wanted to make a video. I wanted to show how personal this is and how I know we can survive it! But I didn’t want an abuser to hear it and it trigger anything.
Lets begin...
Its safe to say everyone wants to be loved. I for one desperately aimed to find someone who would have made me feel the fairytale we read in books, or ideal images found on social media. We find relationships to end in marriage and seek the growth of a family and more. We all have different explanations as to why we fall in love or want to be loved, but sometimes that love turns into a nightmare.
Sometimes we get into relationships with someone who hasn’t healed from their traumatic past. They have a desire to gain power and control others. They can be female or male! They feel they are a priority so they use abusive tactics to dismantle equality in the relationship. But I must tell you that this is a learned behavior, they experience it in childhood friendships or relationships, or society they grew up in. And instead of healing from it they tend to pass it on.
This explains why it’s NOT YOUR FAULT! Maybe I started the argument and it triggered an anger in them, but it is not my fault that my lover decided to inflict pain as a result. We all have disagreements; this is true, but it is not our fault if they strike an abuse just to win or control the disagreement.
Abuse in relationships doesn't normally start the week we start dating them. In fact, in some relationships abuse starts after MARRIAGE. They start off with emotional abuse, verbal abuse and financial abuse. As in “you don’t look beautiful if you wear this”, or “why do you do that, you need to do this….” but because we love them, and we are comfortable with them, we ignore the red flags. The verbal abuse turns into mental abuse, it no longer means they are telling us directly we aren’t beautiful but they make small judgements to make us feel not enough. Small gestures like forgetting a doctor's appointment or misplacing the remote controller seem petty but can cause a huge argument to aim at how we think of ourselves.
If I didn’t fill up the gas tank in the car every time it hit the half mark, and I let it get to the quarter tank… I was told I was an “irresponsible child”, who knew nothing about life and without them my car could have broken down. Something we all know can be a foolish thing to say. But having told this more than once along with more verbal abuse I started to believe it. Yet, because we love them, because there are better days and we still believe the good outweighs the bad. I thought that we had more smiling moments. I reminded myself that every relationship has problems, so I/we stay with them. We start to fear for our lives, the relationship goes from verbal abuse to physical abuse. Arguments rise and now bruises appear on our face and our body. Some people need facial reconstruction all because their lover assumed they lied. However, there are some relationships that never get to physical abuse because the mental abuse has done all the damage.
Side note: Some relationships don't outweigh the pros with the cons, often times people don't know they are in a abusive relationship because their abuser has mentally challenged them and persuades them with excuses that they are right and anything else learned before them is wrong. So the whole time you think you were wrong and yours parents were wrong because your narcissist said they were right and they care enough to teach you the right way. The literally mind trick you into this so you never really think your being mentally abused.
Real life example:I remember waking up with a black eye because I felt they had too much of the blanket and I tugged for some, I was “doing too much”. Or this one time I had a concussion because they thought I went through their phone.
It is so easy to ask “Why don’t you just leave?” “Why don’t you just break up with them?”
Leaving is complicated and hard! Please understand that leaving is dangerous! But if you haven’t gone through the mental damage then don’t ask. If you haven’t been beaten down by someone whose past is shown behind closed doors... whose lover was probably beaten as a child and mentally abused; they don’t know how to properly love. Instead they recreate the cycle, recreating the love they were taught to be true.
I had attempted to leave multiple times. Once I was kicked out the house and still they found me. I felt that if i didn’t go back to them I would be in more harm. My lover at the time even locked me in the car with them and proceeded to drive to a lake, yelling in the car “if you leave me then we both die”. I pleaded for them to stop the car and still no use. Until I promised them I would stay.
It’s not easy being in an abusive relationship, you are led to believe that without them you are nothing. Over months you are convinced that this is our lives and we must settle. We believe lies so much that we grow fear to leave. We believe that if we do leave we will be another blood bath or another missing poster. We believe that because we won’t find love anywhere else we want to stick it through. The hardest part is that because we are in a relationship with them we feel obligated to have sex with them, so even on days where we say “no, I don't want sex tonight”. It is still a must, even if it's forced. Abuse is about power and control, leaving means you are destroying that power which can make them more violent. So come up with a safe plan!
Understand that again...IT IS NOT YOUR FAULT! And YOU CAN LEAVE SAFELY. You are beautiful and more than enough. Your abuser sees that and it creates a insecurity in them. Your greatness motivates them to want to destroy you BUT do not allow them to keep going. Know that you are strong! You are not alone! You are allowed to talk! You are not a mistake, in fact you were created for success. ALL of your feelings are valid. It’s okay not to be okay some days. You are MORE THAN ENOUGH ! You are worthy! No is no ! And you have every right to fight back if they force sex on you. You WILL find someone who will love you, scars and all. Someone who will give you the fairytale love and help you heal.
I understand everyone's situation is different and maybe you are the one that starts the fight, and that leads to more abuse. Admit that you have a flaw and work on it, talk to your partner and see if time apart to heal and work things through can help your situation. But if you fear for your life or the safety of your family then my advice is to leave.
I understand that the abuse is damaging and the aftermath of it all is permanent. There are days where a simple disagreement can trigger me to become silent and hide. BUT know that your body will heal, and so will your mind. You will defeat anything life throws at you after it is all done! Instead of being a victim YOU WILL BE A SURVIVOR!
If you know someone who is in an abusive relationship please give them affirmations, and be their strength when they want to give up. Be their support!
See Part 2 to this blog to come up with a safe plan!