Lifting The Veil - Tumblr Posts

So painfully familiar.

This is important hello (x)

Good riddance.

2017 was the year I woke up. I will hold on to that.

A text message he sent me some time in 2016. I saved it in my notes as I switched phones in early 2017. I saved it at the time because it gave me hope that we would date again.

After becoming reclusive at his request for nearly 2 years, I’ve started putting myself back out there.  Not dating (possibly never dating), but getting back to my hobbies and socializing with friends and acquaintances.  The hard part has not been getting into the swing of things, it’s been navigating conversations.

“The last time we talked you told me you were working on getting back together, is that still where you’re at?”

“Uhm.  No.  That’s ... not ever going to happen.”

Most are polite enough not to inquire further, but it’s kind of overwhelming (and I had completely forgotten) how many people I previously said these things to.  How many more corrections will I have to make?

“... for what it’s worth, you never looked like you were happy...”

Im reading through all the text messages in the last year because I'm trying to find something specific. I have a year's worth as I purchased a new phone around the new year in 2017.

If he wasn't telling me to buy something for him, he was telling me how awful I am. There is basically no other content. For an entire year.

With every day that passes, I am so much more awake and aware of the horrible HORRIBLE things he did to me.

Inglorious Bastard

In the early years of our cohabitation a movie I wanted to see was in theatres.  We had plans to see it, but life had prevented us from going for a few weeks.  

Finally, a weekend came where we were free and I suggested we go.  He told me he’d “already downloaded it” and “didn’t like it very much.”  I was hurt because it was supposed to be a date, and he’d known how much I was looking forward to it.

I was hurt more when I was sorting through his laundry  like a good wifey and found that he was stupid enough to leave the ticket stub in his pants pocket.

I confronted him about his lie.  He clearly couldn’t explain it away, so he told me that he went alone. I tilted my head and told him that I was pretty sure he went with his ex girlfriend *.  He admitted it defiantly.

I was upset. 

He told me he lied to me because he knew I wouldn’t take it well and he should be able to see a movie with whomever he likes.  If I were a more reasonable person, he wouldn’t need to lie to me.

Man of his word. When it suited him.

It was early days, so the movie thing made me angry.  He knew I was looking forward to something and he took it away from me.  And did said thing with his ex.  And then lied about it. Twice.

When I am angry, I need time to calm down.  He never understood this.

While I was at work the next day, he bought me flowers when he went grocery shopping.  He did that periodically at the beginning, but it was never for me.  It was so I would shower him with praise for doing something so sweet.

I still wasn’t in the praising mood.

He called me a bitch and he told me he’d never buy me flowers again.  If memory serves correctly, he stuck to his guns.

This was nine years ago.

*

“The Crazy Ex”

This is how he and I referred to her. I am not proud of this. He told me that while they were dating once she had an argument with herself and one of her “selves” talked in a demon voice.  She then proceeded to throw herself over a fence.

That did not prevent him from spending time with her.  She was in my apartment on a semi regular basis, always while I was not there.  Until the time he said he found her sniffing around my jewelry box.

I was furious.  I don’t have much of actual value, but I do have some heirloom pieces.  Plus if she was snooping there, was she also checking out my underwear?

He told me that as a gift to me, he would not allow her into our apartment again.  He knew that her being around upset me, and that he wanted me to feel comfortable in my home.  How generous.

He told me also that she tried to blow him one time and he stopped her despite being very tempted to proceed.  I don’t believe this story, but I’m not sure what part I don’t believe.  

I also question every story he ever told me about her.  Did any of this actually happen?  I’d love to talk to her but I absolutely fear the repercussions.

Kettle meet Teapot

He was a cheater too.  I don’t think I ever mentioned that.

Funny enough, neither did he. 

This is what 'waking up' feels like

“I have suddenly learned, without any apparent reason, that I have been lying to myself for ten years.”

— Jean-Paul Sartre, Nausea (via nauseadaily)

He cut me off a year ago today.

Best thing he probably ever did for me.

“What would make someone want to stay in a relationship like that?”

It’s been two years tonight, as of this very moment. Two years since the first time I hated him for a minute. 

It took the worst thing that ever happened to me to get me to even consider leaving.  And it still took me a year.  

I feel the need to repost.

We’ve hit Anger, for now

A few years ago, my friend’s city had to be evacuated due to a wildfire. Pictures from the evacuation process look exactly what I (an atheist, and admittedly not a theology expert) picture Hell to look like. It is pure terror.

Once my friend was able to return to her residence she found that it had burned to the ground.  She and her partner had lost everything.

I remember her telling me the frustration she felt  trying to talk about it.  She heard a lot of “but at least you’re ok, it could have been so much worse!” My experience is different than her’s, but I understand her now much more than I did then.

I am Angry.  Yep, Capital A.

When I actually sat down and looked at the numbers, I handed him 6 figures.  I got years of therapy and the prospect of never being right again  nothing.

When I think about how I’m killing myself to pay off debt that I got into to appease him, and scraping pennies together to try to get myself even half way to where I was with him, yeah, I get Angry.  

I am angry for the life he stole from me. 

I’m furious  he’s sitting in MY home, with MY bed and MY furniture, and gifts MY family got us, with MY money lining his bank accounts and MY trinkets and heirlooms that have no real value in this world aside from the memories and connections they have to me lining his shelves and cupboards. 

I have tried to talk about this, and very well meaning people, tell me  “It’s a small price to pay.”   “You’re lucky you got out.”    “It could be so much worse.”

Listen, no one feels my mortality or how “so much worse” it could have been more than me.  You weren’t there when he was threatening me with kitchen knives, putting pillows over my face, smashing my head against walls, pushing me down stairs, or threatening me with tools.

You weren’t there. I was. I know. I get the fucking flashbacks that remind me any time I’m feeling too comfortable.  Do you really think the other stuff is  “a small price to pay?”  You have no idea.  

I know, they mean well, and they’re trying to make me feel better, but they aren’t. They’re trivializing my loss, and making me feel as though I should feel guilty for being angry.

I’m entitled to my rage; I will take it and let it wash over me.

Him: YOU ARE SUCH A STUPID LAZY FUCKING CUNT. WHY THE FUCK SHOULD I LET YOU BE HERE? I'VE TOLD YOU A THOUSAND TIMES. THIS PLACE IS SO FUCKING FILTHY. I CAN'T EVEN INVITE SOMEONE OVER. IT'S EMBARRASSING. JUST BECAUSE YOU GREW UP IN FILTH WITH YOUR FUCKING PARENTS DOESN'T MEAN YOU STAY THAT WAY. I KEEP FUCKING TRYING TO FIX YOU BUT YOU'RE SO FUCKING USELESS AND HOPELESS.

Me: *quietly tends to the plate and glass in the sink that spawned this outburst*

Him: *glaring at me*

Me: *makes eye contact quickly to reassure him that I am not ignoring him (because he really REALLY doesn't like that) but not long enough to encourage a smack to the face or more yelling*

Him: what?

Me: *smiles and shakes head*

Him: What? You don't want to talk to me? Fine. Fuck this. *Goes to the basement to play games for 6 hours*

Me: *exhales silently*

Self doubt, my old friend.

victims of abuse be like, this person has now made me cry myself to sleep about 30 times, i have flashbacks of things they’ve done and said to me, they know how to hit me right in my worst insecurity and guilt so i feel horrible for days and months, their comments make me feel worthless and like i shouldn’t even be alive, and being around them makes me feel small and meaningless and sometimes suicidal but maybe that’s just me, maybe they’re not abusive? i have to give them benefit of the doubt, what if i’m not justified to kick them out of my life?

"It's so important that I stay strong through his dark moments. He needs me and I just need to work a little harder next time to make sure he's not unhappy."

“Just how many times did you tell yourself “it’s okay, I can take it” while being aware that the same thing done to anyone else would be cruel and hurtful, but it was different for you, because you were used to it, and that made it okay?”

— And then they call you “too sensitive”. (via furiousgoldfish)

I wonder how I would handle the normal day to day stress of life he hadn't been manipulating me to distrust and hate myself in the formative years of my early adulthood.

Most people learn coping skills during those years; they figure out how to 'get on with it' in the face of challenges.

I don't have coping skills except for avoidance. Distraction. Or I sweat and visualize all the ways I'm going to screw this up or not have the skills to be successful.

I am defeated before I begin.

Was I always like this?

I wrote this post in the early weeks of freedom. Nearly three years later I'm still discovering new impacts of the damage.

Rinse, repeat.  Rinse, repeat.

I have started writing a number of my posts with “The worst thing about an abusive relationship is….” and then having to erase it because it isn’t true.  I can’t call this particular aspect or experience the worst thing.  It’s all the worst thing.

Coming up on 3 years this month. Can confirm: best thing he ever did for me.

He cut me off a year ago today.

Best thing he probably ever did for me.