It’s hard to really put into words who I was before this part of my journey happened. Honestly it’s hard to remember. At the time, I would have said I was just a normal 26 year old. I had moved to Fort Worth for grad school and after I decided that school wasn’t the place for me, I made the decision to stay in Fort Worth. I was working and had friends and was just happy and things were good. At this point, I would say my relationship with God wasn’t the main priority. Don’t get me wrong I wasn’t a wild child rebel but I wasn’t close to God. I really don’t like saying his name at all and even now, I rarely say it. Around the time I met him, I was still in grad school and the way we met was like a dream. The guy I met that night swept me off my feet and there was such a deep connection. I’m not going to lie- I was smitten. Everything about him (or should I say everything he showed me) was just what I’d been looking for. Between this night and when we started dating, there were just a lot of things that looking back now, I see were red flags. Actually they were neon-blinking signs. We would talk and went on dates and then he would disappear. He would come back around and then bail. This went on for about a year. At the time I didn’t know that I was going through kind of a lost period. I was questioning a lot of things in my life and was very, very insecure. Fast forward to June of 2010, I don’t know how to explain it but we ended up talking and one day he came over and just never left. At the beginning, things were good. The newness was still there. He definitely had a temper and would fly off the handle at the littlest things. But it was never directed at me. However, slowly he began to isolate me from my family and friends. And for me, my family and friends are everything. He would berate me and make fun of me for talking to my mom as often as I did. It just became easier to not talk to her as much. While we were together, I saw my best friends, maybe three times and he would never want to meet them. He would constantly tell me how lucky I was to be with someone like him and that I’d never get anyone as “hot”. When you hear those things enough, you just start believing them. About 5 months into our relationship was when everything changed for the worse. Let me stop here and add that I tried to look happy but inside my heart was twisted up and I just felt like something wasn’t right. I ignored it and pushed the questions and doubts back. I’m not stupid, I saw his phone and that he was talking to some girl and when I asked him about it, he freaked out. It’s really hard to think about and talk about. But that was the first night that he physically abused me. I’ve never been hurt as bad as I was that night (up to that point, anyway). At one point he actually took a beer cap and scratched it so deep in my chest I still have the scars. I had always said “I would never ever in a million years stay with someone who abused me.” But the truth is you don’t know until you are there. He had me so convinced that I was nothing without him by this point. Where would I go? How could I tell the people I love that he beat the crap out of me? After he had calmed down he was so apologetic. Man he was so good with words and he made me really think he was so sorry and that he would never do it again. He begged me to stay. In my head, I knew I should run but my heart wasn’t sure. He played on my love for him and my insecurities that were just below the surface. After that night, I learned something. I learned how to get really good at lying. When my family asked me what happened to my chest, I would reply that my cat, Apollo, had gotten mad and scratched me. The reason why I got that good at lying was that despite the presents and promises, that night was just the beginning. He did it again and again and again. In the course of about a two year relationship, I was kicked, choked, burned with cigarette butts (even more painful than I could ever describe), spit on, punched in the face, bitten, and this happened more times than I could ever count. Life was unbearable but I was so brainwashed. He would punch me in my face and I would apologize. I shouldn’t have been so stupid and made him so mad. I can remember standing in front of the bathroom mirror, covered in bruises from head to toe after a really bad night with him and I didn’t even cry. I was so numb and I honestly believed at that time it was my fault. If I was better, smarter, prettier, he wouldn’t get so mad and he wouldn’t beat me up. I also learned how to cover things up with makeup, long sleeve shirts and hats. I avoided my family and when I had a mark or bruise, I’d lie. I burned myself on my straightener when he’d burned me with a cigarette butt. I hit my head on a cabinet when really he punched me in the forehead about 20 times. I’m not sitting here and saying poor me or putting all the blame on him. I was at such a low place that it was easy for him to swoop in and just take over. To let him start really slow and quiet at first, filling me all of these things. Over time I really believed it…. I was stupid, I was weak, I was ugly and fat and I should thank God everyday that he picked me to be with, I’ll never be anything without him. I’ll never be with anyone as good as him. Everything I did was wrong. Everything I said was wrong. I apologized for everything. He would beat me and eventually he stopped apologizing. But I always apologized for whatever I did or said that made him mad. There was a point closer to the end of our relationship where I started to feel like I had enough. I didn’t know if I could or how it was possible to get away from him. The abuse (physical, mental, emotional) was happening every single day. I would get ready to leave and he would say that he would kill Apollo and me first. So I would get scared. He had proven that he was very capable of hurting my cat and me. I’d want to leave again and then he would start to say that if I left he would kill himself. I thought I loved him and how could I live with myself if he killed himself because I left? The next time I really tried to leave, he told that he would kill my parents and me. I know it sounds like talk but I knew just what he could do. I was so isolated and knew that people would judge me for staying about two years. I felt so trapped and so low and I can remember laying in bed thinking that the only way I was going to escape this hell was to kill him. I really felt like there was no other way. I don’t really remember how it happened but Evan and I were at my parents’ house and my mom saw the bruises on my face. I’ll never forget the look on her face when she saw and really realized what they were. The day before he had been especially brutal and he had actually hit me full force with a baseball bat. I’ll never forget her crying and without me saying anything, she knew. That day, I took him back to Fort Worth and went back home to parents. God could only direct the way that day unfolded. It was like I stopped lying and hiding and just admitted what had been going on. I went home with just what I had in my car. All of my possessions had been pawned. I had no money, no job. Nothing. I was a shell. I was empty and broken and felt like the worlds biggest disappointment. It was so hard to face my parents. I had everything and I threw it all away for him because I believed all the lies he told me. I let him hurt me so bad that I still have the scars today. I was at a place where I was so far from God and so insecure that this abusive con artist just slid right in and took over. It was hard to face my parents. It was even harder to face God. I felt so much shame and regret and hurt and brokenness. This was in 2012. Fast-forward four years and as I’m sitting here, it is physically painful to think about this. However, I’m here to say that redemption is possible. It has been the hardest, longest, most painful journey of my life to come back from those two years and what he did to me. I can honestly can that because of God, the amazing support of my family and best friends; I am not the person I was. I had to apologize to a lot of people and I had to make amends but the people who truly love me never hesitated to forgive me and restore relationships. God has used the last four years to take me from a place of intense shame and darkness to a place where I don’t want to throw up when I think about him or the past. He has brought me to the place where I feel free. When I was with him I lost an apartment, four jobs, and racked up a lot of debt. God met me in my brokenness and slowly began to move. The physical scars healed and faded but the emotional ones were a lot harder to get over. I had this tape in my mind that would just play and replay and play again of the things he said to me, the horrible names he would call me. Even now, I still have to fight the replay. Words can do cosmic damage. Four years later and I am at the best place I’ve been in. I have a full time job that is the biggest blessing. I have an amazing tribe- my family and best friends are my rock. I’m paying off all the debts I’ve accumulated so I can move forward. Let me just stop here and say that once the hurt and shame began to heal, a lot of anger began to creep in. Anger like I’d never felt before. Anger towards him for hurting me so bad- nearly killing me a few times. There were some moments when I just wanted to find him and punch him in throat. I was also really mad at myself. Mad that I let myself get in that situation and staying in it. Mad that I was so weak and so insecure it was that easy for him to take me over. The anger was actually the hardest part to get over. My intense anger towards him was not affecting him in the least. It wasn’t hurting him. It was only hurting me. It really is like taking poison and waiting for the other person to die. I had put so many hours and so much work into this healing process and the anger was hindering it. I had to get to the place when I got right with God and truly felt forgiven for the hundreds of mistakes Id made. God met me where I was and took me by the hand and led to a place of restoration. I’ve retrained my mind to not hear the endless bunch of lies he told me for two years. I had to retrain myself to believe that God still loved me even though I let him down in astronomical ways. I am not the thousands of horrible things he said to me. I am beautiful and worthy and am here for reason. My scars indicate where I have been, they do not have to dictate where I’m going. I guess my goal in sharing this part of my life (something I’d much rather hide and forget) is to hopefully show to power of God’s grace and redemption. I feel so strongly about women who are in relationships like the one I was in. Society tells you that you should have left. You could have gotten out. It is not that simple. When your partner is so deep in your mind, you believe everything he says. Words are so powerful and can destroy you from the inside out. No matter what he says, society says, you weren’t weak for staying. You didn’t deserve what you went through or are going through.
In writing this and really looking inward, I’m realizing that hiding from the past doesn’t change it. I think what I went through has given me a different perspective. It makes me want to see past the façade and the smile people show and really dig deep. Now, I don’t want superficial small talk or sugarcoated words. I want relationships that are deep and meaningful. I have learned that my relationship with God and my relationship with myself are things that take the highest importance. I have to take what I have learned from what I went through to be a better person, to be more loving and kind. I don’t know how the rest of my story will play out. For the first time, I can honestly say I feel so excited and so hopefully for the future. It’s still hard to look in the mirror and see the scars. But God is changing how I see them. Looking back, I can see that even when I felt so alone, God was always right there. He is reason that I am alive because there were dozens of times he could have just killed me. My story could have ended so differently. I can’t even put into words how thankful I am for my family who surrounded me, supported me and loved me through the darkest days. And my best friends! Oh my goodness! They know who they are and to have people who know my past and love me anyway, to have a safe place to go with no judgment or expectations is something I treasure. I’m so thankful that God didn’t leave me, even though I left him. I bought the “grace upon grace” necklace from Dear Heart Designs during this journey because it really spoke to me and described this season of growth and restoration. I’m alive because of grace. I am here- healthy, happy and healed- because of grace. I have a future and so many wonderful things in my life because of grace. And someday, through grace, I want to use my story and my voice to help other women. If what I went through could touch one person’s heart, this would all be worth it. Life is beautiful and fragile and hard and fleeting. This whole experience has taught me to really grab a hold of life and soak up every moment. To put other people’s needs before my own. To show people that they matter. Their story matters. KINDNESS is so important and the world needs more of it. I’m just one person but I can make a difference in the lives of people around me. So because of grace I can say that even when it’s hard and hurts and you think there is no possible way out, there is. Just keep looking. The love & light bar can be purchased here.
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1 Comment
Keith Brown
10/30/2016 07:40:17 pm
Sarah,
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