During my freshman year in college a few years ago I thought I met this perfect guy. He was charismatic, affectionate, loved to give me compliments ... yadda yadda ... “Mr. Perfect” mmm hmm …
I was eighteen turning nineteen at the time and thought good things were falling into place: great guy, going to school, and doing well. I thought that I could really have a future with this man.
Even though at first things seemed to be going well that little voice in the back of my head began poking me and later on stabbing, but me being me, I just ignored it. My intuition has never failed me before, but neither has my hard-headedness. Something told me if I stayed, then there would be a storm coming. (I should have listened then.)
Have you ever met that person that knows exactly what they are doing? The wannabe Casanova, if you will. The man that practices people. A man who thinks he is steps ahead of everyone else, but can’t even tie his own shoe. Well I’ve met him. Little did I know that I was worked over, but I digress.
Impervious to my knowledge, did I realize that I was dealing with an uneducated (high school drop out), abusive, and psychotic individual. He was someone who was shunned by his family, and later on, some friends because they couldn’t deal with his manic behavior.
Later on I see a different person from the man I met a couple of months before. I see someone who abuses alcohol, people, and himself. When we first met, he wanted to rush into the relationship so quickly. I see someone who crumbles under society because of the situations he puts himself in but feels the need to blame others—someone who cannot handle life and blames others for it, mostly me. At this time I wanted to leave this relationship, but I would be a horrible person if I did. He quits his job while not being able to find another one, and then later on can’t pay his bills. I start to notice his original shell peeling away. Someone who had goals, ambitions, going somewhere, to someone who can barely get out of bed and do anything with his day if it doesn’t involve a forty-ounce in his hand.
When he became an empty shell of a man, I then started to notice his attacks towards me. Worthless, stupid, and waste of time, were all of a sudden the affection shown to me on a regular basis. I suddenly became an embarrassment because of my values of abstinence to the way I dressed. (Don’t get me wrong, I love the way I dress, but sophisticated/sexy is an embarrassment I guess.) Suddenly, My 5′3″ 115 pound frame was “fat.” These actions towards me transpired mostly because I didn’t, actually I refused, to completely take care of him. When he was at his lowest low I helped him the best way I could, with prayer and support instead of carrying his weight. I respected him too much to support his lazy behavior. Instead I encouraged him to start working and help himself. He was going through many more problems that I didn’t realize, but he couldn’t let me know that. Blaming me was his crutch. He was not handicapped and fully capable of working and I felt the need to pay for my tuition and my own rent then support his alcohol habit.
Having this on a daily basis began to take its toll on me as I’m sure it would on anyone. But during that time being so young, he has successfully made me believe that his life’s problems are my fault, so why should I leave? I have to fix what I broke right? For him, I couldn’t stay, I couldn’t go; I was suddenly stuck. Mentally and physically I wither away. My problem at that time was my hard-headedness which made me think I could help him and fix everything. My healthy mind and body begin to break to the point where I was barely 100 pounds. I started to really think that I was worthless because I couldn’t fix these problems that were invisible to me. During that time, the physical abuse started.
