Alex

Thank you for sharing and the names of people who might benefit from this. I will add them immediately.

How did you know to add me? I'm Zara. Was in a abusive relationship for 6 years, he could have easily killed me. That's why I left in the end. I was going to be one of those statistics!
Year long battle with the police and him stalking and harassing lead me to a mental breakdown and getting an eating disorder. +100lbs in a year. The stress made me get fybromyalgia. (Chronic fatigue and pain syndrome)
I met my fiance, but still fell into a black hole. Eventually decided I wanted to lose. The weight and get fit 305 days ago, discovered and loved exercise. Promptly fell ill again... 100% rest for 6 months, finally found out it was liver tumors from my contraceptIves. Had 3\4 of my liver removed 1st March. Still recovering! Started running 4 weeks ago and I'm improving, I've got off my anxiety and sleep meds, I'm getting fitter and enjoying life. Still on antidepressants and resuming counselling, but really fighting for my happiness. 80lbs still to lose, but I know I will get there! I'm a fighter and determined little monkey when I want something! The past no longer defines me. Its made me a stronger, better person who has a lot of compassion and time for people. Well done for getting out too guys.

Zara x

Hello my name is Cooper. It is still hard for me to think of what I went through as abuse even though I was accepted and stayed in a domestic violence shelter in Mississippi 2 years ago. My husband was a drug addict; he caused us to live in a hotel because he kept steeling money. I was waiting tables working 60 to 70 hour weeks just so I could exist or have a roof over my head and food. Sometimes I had to hitchhike to work. He wouldn’t get a job either. He also got our cars taken away. For the longest time I was, bitter, angry, and ashamed but also afraid. He would literally yell so loud that I was terrified that we would get kicked out of where we were staying and I would be homeless. He did make us homeless several times. I recall thinking what if he gets the car taken away and we get evicted again I’ll have no place to sleep. He also would run his head into walls, break his hand because he hit the walls so hard to scare me, numerous suicide attempts while in my presence when I would try and leave. The worst thing he ever did was drive out of control in the vehicle like he was going to kill us. I had anxiety disorder about being cars before meeting him. Worst he used my education against me. Plus my father had been an alcoholic so I had empathy. He knew I understood that addiction was an illness and he had mental issues that added to the problem. I almost finished my master’s degree in rehabilitation counseling. He would tell me I was going against our wedding vows and reference the bible. He would tell me I had nobody, family or friends to depend on and the only people who ever cared about me was his family. And it's partially true. He never told me I was ugly, never hit. He would keep me from leaving though. He would manipulate me with what he knew my fears were. I left him and I gave him another chance moving 17 hours away. I was so ashamed of how I let him treat me and what I had become. I hated myself and I suspect it showed. He left me to work with the carnival (He used to be a systems administrator making over 60000 a year) stealing my entire pay check, with no car, walking to work at 5:30 in the morning 3 miles, and got us evicted. I wanted to walk in front of a car but thought with my luck I would probably live through it. And then who would take care of me? I finally got him to leave early last October. I lost everything I owned. He lost my father’s ashes andthat has been hard to deal with. I tell myself that they were just ashes, but still hard. I had to declare bankruptcy, after being sued and garnished for his ER visits to get pills. My student loans are in default and so I am having to pay 200 more than I pay in rent into them until January, plus 4 years back taxes to the IRS. Here is the good news... My divorce finalized May 11, 2012. I have a job in my field using my education with decent pay, I have a nice apartment, furnished with hand me downs that were given to me, a 500 dollar car that someone has been letting me pay 25 dollars for every 2 weeks or when I can, I have made payment arrangements with student loans, the government, and lost just since leaving him over 35 pounds. Another 20 pounds the year before while we were separated. I don't have to beg for food, I don't have to hitchhike or walk to work in 13 degree weather in the dark, I know that my shelter is permanent because I have the money to pay for it, I don't worry about what will happen next, when will I get sued again or garnished. I just need to adjust to life after this. The social awkwardness that developed from 10 years of this pushes people away because I have that need for human contact so badly that I seem desperate sometimes. Life was so dysfunctional for so long. For many years he would hug me and I would feel nothing, I didn't want people to comfort me because it didn't make me feel anything. I was numb and shut off. Now I am beginning to live again. I have made amazing progress. It's hard to believe I am the same person. I also can drive on the highways again and developed a stronger faith in God. MFP has been the best things that has happened for me in years. I have a voice again and people that care that I can reach out to. I am so grateful for that.

As the creator of this group, I am going to try my best to explain my own domestic abuse story. From the beginning there were red flags. I choose to ignore them. This was probably becuase of my innocence, my niavety, and the fact that i didn't want to deal with it. At first, matt was always there for me, understanding, sweet, charming, and so many other things that I needed at the time. I had just moved 2.5 hours away from home to teach in a little rural community alone. Matt was the support and the comfort that I needed. We became attached at the hip very quickly and started dating. Looking back at it now, i feel so stupid. Why did I just let a stranger randomly into my house and my heart. after we had been dating for a couple of weeks he started showing signs of minimal jealously. This jealously was misplaced from a previous relationship where the girl cheated on him. I continued to console him and let him know that I would never do anything like that! For matt is was so hard to leave him becuase sometimes he was the most amazing person in the world and I was closer and more comfortable with his family than my own. I still love his family. It toke about 5 months of continous arguing and the slow development of mental and emotional abuse before it became physical. It was so slow that it was hard to recognize it and at points I became used to it or I didn't take it seriously. It was like he was slowing chipping away at me until there was nothing left. The first time violence occured it was more on himself. He cut himself several times with a knife saying he would kill himself if he found out I was cheating on him (from the beginning he always thought I was or was going to cheat on him). A couple months later and the emotional and mental abuse was even worse. At this point i was the victim but at the same time I still loved him and thought about the matt that I feel in love with. Becuase of all his manipulation he made me believe that my family and my friends didn't care about me and that i was worthless and unworthly of being treated good. He was controlling to the point that i stopped using my own computer and phone. He made me feel isolated most of the time and that him and his family where the only friends i had but at the same time he thought i was flirting with his bother. On top of the manipulation be was constantly calling me the worst kind of names hundreds of times a day. He would say it with so much anger and hatred. I became numb and dead inside and I would just try to ignore him and hope it would get better. He wasn't always physically abusive but there were times where I had bruises all over my body, there was one time that he hit my head so hard that it put a whole in the wall. Once he pushed me, I fell and busted my nose and tooth. I've had bloody noses and once he choked me so bad I pasted out and he had to wake me up. He would pull my hair to grab me. Handfulls of hair would just fall out after. He thought that I was trying to flirt and have sex with anything with a ****. After months of this, i stopped caring and i didn't care if i was alive though I felt scared for my life, and that whatever i did or whereever i went he would find me and kill me. There were several months were he just glared at me. I was completely alone and in hell. Part of it was that I felt bad for his situation. Half way through the relationship get got a knee injury and since then he has had multiple knee surgeries and has been helpless. I felt i was stuck becuase of my job and becuase he needed me. Lucky we never had any kids. Good news: I recently left him, I have a newfound passion for life, life and living it doesn't scare me anymore like it did before I meet matt. I am living with my mom and have a strong support system. I am getting left for my migraine and i am being proactive (and not a victim) to being healthier and happier.

hi. thank you for the invite. i just recently was talking to a friend about how i don't know a single person that GETS what i've been through or deal with, still, on a constant basis. i can't get away from it, even though i am legally divorced and we don't live together or interact much.

my story is long, and there were SOOOO many red flags that i didn't realize were red flags until i was 15 yrs in and had 5 kids. my upbringing lead me to believe that most of what my relationship had going on, was normal. i didn't realize it was ABnormal. :-( it took a lot of people to convince me and then scary stuff to do anything about it.

it's a very long story. too long to type it all out. my biggest issues are that i currently still have to deal with his need to control my life, and my kids' lives. he is big on trying to micromanage me. and he was and still does spy on me on a regular basis. being monitored for years, messes with your head. BIG TIME.

he likes to send veiled threats via email or text. and loves to send me documents that are all about the faults i have as a parent, and what i'm going to do to fix them. the most recent one lead us to a meeting last week with a parenting coordinator. we had agreed to that in our divorce, should the need arise with the kids. he felt it did and told me i had to go or i'd be in contempt of the document. i went. it was basically a forum for him to put me down in front of someone else. i wasn't having any of that. he wants to know things like " do you have a smoke detector in each bedroom?" and " what is your policy on allowing the kids to open the front door when someone knocks?"

he told me that the kids get nothing out of going to child care while i'm working out at the gym and therefore he wants to know WHY i take them 1-2 hrs a week? i started dating someone and he told me he had every right to have a sit down with him because he is allowed open access to people in the kids' lives. he also told me, in front of the parent coordinator, that he can ask me any question he would ask a baby sitter or day care provider!! basically that's all he sees me as. a baby sitter.

i've been stalked, trailed by a PI, spied on for years, told i'm lazy, a B*tch, slut, wh0re, threatened with weapons, you name it. he moved out first and then cleared out the bank acct and gave me a small amount of money to pay all of the bills and buy food. i asked for more so i could make sure i had grocery money every month, he said no. i told him the kids and i were going to get food stamps and he told me that was a good idea.

he makes my kids cry. :-( a couple of them do not like going to his house when it's his time. they cry and beg me to let them stay with them. he just laughs at them.

there are just so many things. i have supportive friends. not so much family though. but, no one i know understands how hard this is. the condescending texts and calls and emails. like i'm an annoying gnat he has to deal with. i have the books "why does he do that " and " when dad hurts mom" both by lundy bancroft. i HIGHLY recommend them!!!! they will make you sick to your stomach but they help with healing and moving forward and processing a lot of this stuff............ i did a year of counseling with a domestic violence counselor. i did group therapy and had my kids seen too.

i know that i am still not great with interpersonal relationships. i was a totally different person when i was with him. it's taken about 2 yrs to get back to ALMOST where i was before we met ( personality wise). still working on the physical aspect. but, i'm not sure how much of that came from being with HIM vs. just having a lotta kids in a short amount of time. i don't really know........

i hate to say i'm glad there are others that get it ( cuz i wish NO ONE did) but i am glad...... i look forward to "getting to know you all."

I am not sure about y'all but I after leaving my spouse I came to know myself again. I was looking back over my blog back to my first entry after leaving. I am still amazed at how strong I really am, how strong y'all are too. I just thought I would share it because I have a feeling y'all can relate:

from November 2011 : Somewhere in search of my life I may have actually found myself. And don't hate myself anymore. I am not living for someone else's pain and agony. I am no longer drowning in their chaos and putting myself as the bottom of the abyss. I am rising from the ashes and finally escaping the flames that have held me prisoner so very long. I can stand bravely alone knowing I have shed the shame and fear that bound me so tightly and made me so unhappy. I can be me again or whoever this stronger version I am discovering now is. Happiness is something I would never acquire having sought it outside myself for so long. If I didn't like myself it was foolish to expect others to see something redeeming in me. Yet, I was so tormented, living in such chaos I could not see. I know I still have many challenges to face and I will get through them. I am no longer without hope, which is a concept that had escaped me in my torment. Hope was lurking deep inside of me just asking to be released. I'm not sure why God allows us to reach such despair before setting us free from the pain. There must be reason in this all.