I have come to realize two facts about myself:
One, I try to see the good in everyone. I do so until given a reason not to, and sometimes even after. Some people tell me this is my weakness, I don’t see it so much as a weakness, but that sometimes it puts me at a disadvantage.
Two, I cannot deal with traumatic experiences. I repress all of the negative, it is how I cope. I don’t remember it until something triggers me. These triggers vary from certain words or phrase being said to me, certain situations, and sometimes . . I just remember.
I lately realized I still defend you. I still look for the good in you. I defend you from the one person who is trying to love me through all of the scar tissue you left. I can’t do this anymore, you don’t deserve my defense. After coming to this conclusion, I started remembering. I started fully remembering every fucked up this you ever did to me. Instead of repressing it, I am trying to deal with it in a healthy way, but it honestly feels like it is killing me mentally.
The first repressed memory I had was when you began to treat me like your property. Your property for you to do with as you pleased, which included sharing me with other people. You got into the habit of making me answer these questions during sex- you would make me answer these questions with names of people we knew. This got you off, but made me so uncomfortable that I felt so repulsed at times. That wasn’t enough for you though, you wanted more than just answers. You started to show me photos of your friends naked. Pressuring me into saying what you wanted, then eventually you continued this pressure until it ended up with a threesome with you best friend. I tried so hard to back out of it and say no, but you made me feel guilty somehow for not wanting to go through with it. One day, you even told me to go to your friend’s house to have sex with him individually. Thankfully, he was a genuine friend to me, and noticed how uncomfortable I was when I got to his house, and he said I didn’t have to. He said we could just tell you that we did, and instead we watched Netflix. Your friend showed more care for me than you did.
The next memory was when I started college, I finally made friends. I was so happy to finally have friends since I didn’t really have genuine friends during high school. You became so jealous of them, you got so jealous that for one hour of the day I spent with them at lunch and enjoyed myself and didn’t text you as much. One day we talked about it, and you said I was going to school, I needed to focus on that, you said I didn’t need friends. I eventually separated myself from them. I was so sad because I first lost my best friend to you, you continuously downed me for being her friend because you did not like her, and you said when I hung out with her I became super bitchy. I just needed a friend, I needed someone away from you, I needed someone to help me see how toxic we were together, I needed help out. God, I did not realize how badly I needed someone to help me gain the strength to leave.
I remember how you always put me down, you always put down anything I liked. I liked alternative music, I played it in my car and you would tell me that it sounded awful, so I stopped playing it in the car, and only listened to it in private. Eventually, I stopped listening to it all together. I wanted to get a monogram decal for my car, you said I would look like a “preppy white bitch,” so I stopped mentioning it, and didn’t get it. You put me down for getting a second job, you did because you got jealous that I worked so much.. but you told me to always put work first though.
I tried leaving, and you wouldn’t let me. You fucking wouldn’t let me. You called me when you were drunk talking about killing yourself, I tried to come to you and you wouldn’t let me. I called your best friend to come check on you. You told me how you couldn’t live without me. You came over to my house the following morning, we had sex, and then we were back together.
I once went out to eat with some friends after we went to church. I didn’t realized they wanted to eat in Maryville, which was an hour away and it was already late. My phone died, I text you off their phone to let you know what was going on. As soon as my phone was charged, I was fifteen minutes from home.. fifteen fucking minutes. I text you, asking to leave the door unlocked if you didn’t want to wait for me. I apologized so much and told you I loved you. And what did you do? You were mad and you locked the door, and said you were going to sleep. It was below thirty outside. I was just lucky my mom was awake and I could go to her house.
I told you that you couldn’t lock me out because that was my home to, and you didn’t care. You didn’t care that it was freezing outside and that if mom wasn’t awake I would have slept in my car that night. You broke up with me. You left me, and I was so thankful you said it because I was afraid I never could say it myself. It was my out. I took it.
I tried so hard to give you all of me, and you only took. You took and took, till I had nothing left, and you still wanted more from me. You took away parts of myself I will never get back. You left me with a shell of the person I once was. The baggage you left is not baggage I deal with alone. Every future significant other of mine will have to also to deal with every trigger, every mood swing, every unknowing comparison I make, and I will be so thankful whenever I find someone who understands and loves me through all of this.
