Aspriing to inspire young women

 

 

 

 

Most of you probably wouldn’t want to spend your time with someone if they belittled you and made you feel worthless. I want you to know that domestic abuse is complicated.

 

It is easy to define from afar but when you’re standing face-to-face with it you’re not sure what it is anymore. It’s all muddled up in emotions and what you think is love.

 

I was in an emotionally and verbally abusive relationship for over a year. It was kind of like spinning in circles, things that I could once see clearly become indistinguishable and when I finally stopped turning I was sent reeling, aimlessly trying to regain sure footing.

 

At first I was reluctant, I thought I could do better. But then his subtle charm and constant compliments won me over. He grew on me — like rust, dulling my shine and tarnishing my polish.

 

After a couple of months the compliments were a distant memory. He slowly picked away at my confidence, peeling back the layers and covering them up with doubt and insecurity. I started to believe the things he said — I couldn’t do better, no one else would have me, I was ugly. A slut.

 

became hopelessly dependent, I pulled away from my friends and rarely spoke to my parents. He wouldn’t answer his phone for long periods of time, I would find flirty text messages on his phone constantly. I couldn’t trust him at all but felt I would be completely worthless if I left him, like my very existence was contingent upon our staying together and having one person who loved me, even though he rarely said so.

 

After six months I found out he was cheating on me and I was hysterical. But somehow in my debilitated state he managed to wheedle his way back into my life.

 

Around the one-year mark someone else showed some faint glimmer of interest in me and it made me realize maybe I wasn’t as wretched and repulsive as I’d been made to believe. I started to hear the desperate pleas from my friends and family that I’d tuned out for so long.

 

But the epiphany came when his lease expired. He didn’t have any other living arrangements lined up. After a few days of doing his laundry, picking up after him and paying for his appetite, I asked if this was a temporary accommodation. He said he wanted to move in with me, that he loved me and wanted to take our relationship to the next level. 

 

I was 19, in my second year of university. I told him I wasn’t ready and he would need to find a place to live. He refused to leave and made me feel guilty for even asking, if I really loved him I would want him to live with me.

 

I made a desperate call to my parents and told them what was happening. I couldn’t force him out, I needed someone to talk some reason into him. We staged an intervention. Afterward he yelled at me on the ride home calling me a bitch and asking how could I do that to him?

 

My mom and I folded up his clothes and put them in bags in the garage, my parents had to stay in Ottawa for two weeks before he returned the key he had taken without my permission.

 

After that I had to find myself again. I didn’t know who I was. But after four months of being on my own, with the support and encouragement from my friends and family I found myself again and I was even stronger than before.

 

It is far too easy to place the blame on the victim and ask ‘why would she ever go back to him?’ Maybe she doesn’t feel like she has a choice. If you have a friend you think is being abused please let them know that you are there for them and that they always have options.