I was only 17 when I thought I met the love of my life. We had only dated two weeks before “we” fell in love. It was about three weeks in when I learned he had another girlfriend, but I “was special”, so he broke up with her for me (I saw this happen via text). From there started a three year relationship that followed the typical patterns we see in emotional abuse: the tensions building, the explosion, the reconciliation, and then the calm. It’s fair to say we had a lot of explosions. Over time I will share my experiences with you from the last 11 years of my life so that maybe you learn the signs of emotional abuse that could help save yourself or someone you love.
This boy, he made me feel special. As a cyclist, he would ride his bike 10 miles to my house (almost daily!) to make out with me in the garage. When he learned I was afraid of thunder storms, standing outside and kissing in the rain helped expose me to my fear. When I was hurt, he helped me. When I had a headache at school, he went out and got me ibuprofen. He was always sending loving messages and “Forever and Always” became our motto.
I would say the abuse started with the cheating. I was just so thrilled that someone so handsome could be so into me that I forced myself to believe him every time he said it was a mistake… because in the end he came crawling back to me right? He was my first in many ways- first love, first real lust, first sex.
Slowly but surely he kept me away from my friends and distanced me from my own family to the point where I went months without speaking to them. He started to get upset with me when I told him the girls at school would tell me they were all sleeping with him because I “shouldn’t believe anyone but him”. There were 3 abortions from 2 different girls during the time I dated him… he figured if they had had the babies he would not have used drugs as often… now that he has a child we know that isn’t true.
Whenever I would say I was leaving him or needed a break, he would immediately became suicidal. There were two incidents where I had to contact the police department. The first, he was evaluated on the spot and taken to a hospital for treatment of depression. The second serious suicide message I received from him also led me to call the police… but he saw their lights as they pulled into the driveway. I didn’t know it at the time but he had swallowed a full bottle of pills. When he saw the flashing lights, he made a run for it. It took police from four different townships 3 days to track him down in the woods. He was hallucinating and a mess. Thankfully the police got him back to the hospital but for years I dealt with him saying if I left that he would make another attempt at his own life. I now suspect that this is due to Borderline Personality Disorder but his only current diagnosis that I am aware of is bipolar II, although as a mental health practitioner myself I don’t think that is accurate, or at least not all.
I broke up with him in person one time, I drove to his parents house to tell him (yet again) that we were over. Before I knew what was happening, he slammed his head into my car repeatedly. I couldn’t stop him. I was paralyzed. Over and over I watched his head dent my car. After what felt like forever, but was probably 20 seconds, he stood up as blood poured down his face, glass from the car window stuck in his forehead. But he had already had two trips to the psychiatric hospital and was not about to go backs. He begged me to help him and unwilling to leave him in that position, I snuck him into his parents house (he’s 29 and still living there). We spent maybe an hour in the bathroom, hiding from his parents, as we cleaned up his face. As for my car, I told my mom his ex came after it with a baseball bat- that’s how big the dents were.
Before I knew it, he was using drugs more and more, ended up getting married to his “second best”, had a child, came crawling back to me before his divorce was even finalized, relapsed on drugs, nearly failed out of school and lost multiple jobs for not showing up for work… How I ended up here today is a long story and if you’re interested I would be happy to share how I am working on staying away from him… to this day 11 years later. Emotional abuse is tricky- just when someone has you at the point you want to crack, they make you feel like the most important thing in the world- but that good part lasts only momentarily. The abuse- its essentially nonstop. I’m writing this blog not only as a form of therapy for myself but as a caution to anyone out there finding themselves in similar situations. We need to stay strong. We need to stay away. We need to put ourselves first sometimes. As for this ex-fiance of mine, perhaps he will read this one day. Perhaps not. I only hope it will have a positive influence in at least one life.
Dating the WRONG guy 101 