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Where It All Began
Thank you so much for following my recovery journey as I have taken you through the
phases that led me to pursue treatment for my trauma and PTSD surrounding a very unhealthy and toxic relationship. This part of my journey, “Where It All Began,” will explain the very beginning months of my relationship with my abuser. I saw signs of things that concerned me and I easily ignored them because of all of the “love” that I was receiving. When I started the relationship, I had just come out of a long term relationship that left me truly heartbroken. I was someone who was watching my friends move on with their lives and were starting to get married. I wanted to be in love, too. I loved the idea of love and I desperately wanted what others seemed to have. I saw signs in the whirlwind beginning of our romance and kept brushing them off because I thought I must have just been over thinking it. I was being showered with love, gifts, words of affirmation and having someone tell me that they wanted to marry me which was what I wanted to have in my life. I ignored the red flags because I assumed some of these must just be normal things in a relationship and I struggled as time went on and I didn’t know how to exit. I didn’t know at the time what love bombing was. I didn’t know that this could be such an unhealthy and toxic thing when it was coming from a narcissist. I didn’t know I was being groomed to become so dependent on someone that I would have no way to leave if I needed to. I hope
that if you see yourself in this piece of my story that it will help you think about your
surroundings. I hope that if you see someone else that has been in my shoes that you will share it with them.
I met my abuser through an online dating website in December of 2008. This was way
before the time of “swipe left, swipe right.” Early on in online dating, you had to actually make an effort to connect with someone. Log in to your account from a desktop computer with slow internet. If memory serves me right, I was “waved” to and then I was able to message him. My abuser and I connected on one of these online dating sites a couple of days before Christmas that year. I remember emailing back and forth on Christmas Eve and early in the day on Christmas Day. We started to talk on the phone Christmas Day night and spent hours on the phone that night together. In our moments of early emails and calls we talked about so many things and about everything in our life. I shared with him my love of musicals and shared with him that at the time I was listening to the “Spring Awakening” soundtrack on repeat in my car and on my iPod. I was so in love with the music of the show. We talked about our families, mutual friends that we had from the town that I attended college in, his job, my master’s degree program, our past relationships-including his recent divorce.
Shortly after this initial conversation, he told me that he purchased tickets to see “Spring Awakening” at the Fox Theatre on Valentine’s Day. I told him that was great and asked who he was planning on taking. He replied, “you.” This caught me by surprise! I was immediately anxious because we hadn’t met yet, and to be honest, it freaked me out a bit. I was silent for a moment, and he said “if we don’t work out dating, I would love to take you as a friend. I bought these tickets because you told me how much you wanted to see this
show.” I remember, in that moment feeling unsure and a little freaked out by a man that I had met on the internet, whom I hadn’t yet met in real life, purchasing us tickets to see a show out of town, six weeks away, on Valentine’s Day. I felt extremely freaked out and unsure. I took a deep breath and thought to myself, isn’t this what I wanted? A man that would be romantic and think of my needs and that wanted to make me happy. I shoved away the nervous energy I felt and told him “Okay, that sounds great.”
The next evening we had plans to meet in person. I was currently living at home with my
parents. I had just graduated from college the May before and I hadn’t found a job and was focused on pursuing my master’s degree. I told my mom I was heading to Peoria for the night and that I had a date with someone that I met “through a friend of a friend.” I was so nervous to tell her that I was online dating, I didn’t think she would approve. I got dressed, put on a new burgundy blazer that I had got for Christmas the day before and headed out of the house. It was decided that I would make the trek up to Peoria and we would have dinner at Granite City. We decided that I would drive to his house where he lived with a family member, and we would take his car to the restaurant. When I was driving to Peoria and taking an exit towards his house the fog was just starting to set in. It was so warm for the 26th of December, I didn’t even have a coat over my blazer.
As I pulled up to the house, I called him to let him know that I was outside. I didn’t want to go to the door, it felt weird because he lived with a family member, and I didn’t really
want to meet anyone. He came out to meet me, we shook hands and introduced ourselves and he opened the door to his car for me and we headed on our way. We chatted the entire drive to the restaurant and my nerves started to melt away. He seemed like such a nice and genuine guy, and I was very much looking forward to our date. We walked in, were seated and began to look over the menu. In these days, when I would go on a dinner date, I would always pick a few different things out on the menu that I would enjoy, and I would make my order based off what the other person ordered. I never wanted to order something expensive if they were only getting something small and I did my best to try to match what they would do financially because I wanted to be respectful. I remember that he ordered a Diet Coke and a steak so I ordered a glass of water and a steak as well, just a different kind. We chatted as we waited for our meals.
I will never forget one of the questions that he asked me and my response. I can still hear it in my mind like it was yesterday. He asked “Are you Republican or a Democrat?” I was caught off guard quite a bit and responded, “You aren’t supposed to discuss politics or religion on a first date.” He responded “Well, politics were a factor in my previous marriage ending in divorce.” I figured if he was so matter of fact, I was going to just throw out my reply. I said, “I was raised in a Republican family but I have a lot of mixed views. I believe you should vote for the person and not the party.” He responded, “Okay, my last wife was a Democrat so I wanted to make sure you weren’t. I plan on being a Senator before I retire so I am just making sure you will feel the same way about politics that I do.” I laughed and responded in a very matter of fact way as I thought to myself, "I don’t care what response I get out of him and I am just going to throw this out there,"-- “Well, I was raised with my mom at home and I want to be a stay at home mom, if you support me, I will support you.” He told me "That’s good." and then described an ideal family to him that would look good on a postcard. I was completely baffled. Still to this day, the fact that conversation occurred still blows my mind so much so, that I have probably told that story to anyone who has asked about the beginning of our relationship.
We finished up dinner and he asked if I would like to watch a movie? It was still
somewhat early and I told him that was fine, but I needed to get back on the road to head home right after and he said okay. We got in the car and drove to Blockbuster Video; we picked out a couple of movies and went to check out. When the person working at the register asked for my date’s phone number he told them and the clerk replied "Are you (my date’s name and his ex wife’s name)?” My date responded that they were divorced and he could remove her from the account so she couldn’t use it anymore. The way he responded felt so odd to me, so matter of fact and filled with anger. I stood there uncomfortably as he finished the transaction, and afterwards we headed back to his house to watch the movie. He told me on the way home that his grandmother would still be awake because she generally waited up for him and told me he was going to introduce me to her. I was unsure but also felt it would be very rude if I was going into her house to watch a movie and didn’t at least say hi. He introduced me to her, there was some chit-chat and we headed back to his room to watch the movie. We watched the film and by the time it was over the fog was so much worse. I was worried about driving home and not being able to see well enough. He asked me if I would like to stay, offered me the bedroom and he would sleep on the couch. I sent my mom a message that said the fog was too bad for me to drive and that I was going to stay at a (friend from college’s) house and that I would be home first thing in the morning. I was nervous because I didn’t have things I needed to stay over, like essential medication, but I also too nervous to drive back to Lincoln with how bad the fog was. That night, we ended up talking until after four in the morning and then eventually fell asleep in his bed, on top of the comforter with all of our clothes on.
We woke up the next morning and I told him that I needed to get home. He said he
would like to take me to breakfast first. Reluctantly, I agreed and we went to Perkins. The conversation continued and all the while I was eager to get home. I wanted to take a shower and brush my teeth and get out of the clothes that I had slept in. When we finished, we headed back to his house, and I was planning to get directly into my car and head straight home. When we pulled up to his house, the driveway was full of cars. I asked him what was going on and he told me that his mom’s side of the family was over to celebrate Christmas. I said "Okay, I will leave right now, then," but he asked me to come up and meet them. I was not comfortable with this. I hardly knew him. I was a mess wearing clothes that I had slept in the night before. My hair needed to be brushed and I had mascara under my eyes. I told him that I wasn’t ready to meet his family, and I looked terrible anyway. He told me that I looked great, and they wouldn’t care. He grabbed my hand and against my wishes led me up the sidewalk and to the front door to join his family.
The next few hours were enough to make my mind spin. He introduced me to his entire
family, sat me on the couch in between him and, I believe his sister, held my hand, talked about how great I was and the things we were going to do. Told them of the tickets to the musical he had purchased. They told me how I was so much better than his ex-wife, and that she was terrible (which made me incredibly uncomfortable). I remember nervously smiling as I was trying to smooth down my hair and wipe off the mascara under my eyes. They would tell me that I was prettier and dressed better than his ex-wife. The whole thing was so overwhelming. I kept trying to leave to head home and they kept encouraging me to stay. I eventually was allowed to leave but only after I promised to come right back to hang out with them some more, to go cosmic bowling.
That first date and family meeting led to a very quick romance. Within the first week
and a half we spent every day together. He was buying me multiple pieces of jewelry and telling me how great I was. We talked about everything. I found out that he wasn’t actually divorced, they were still waiting to get in front of a judge and have it finalized. That was a shock because I thought he was divorced. The week went on, we celebrated the arrival of the New Year, and he told me he loved me. The next week, I decided to introduce him to my mom. Everything felt so fast and rushed, but if things were moving that way, I knew I needed to have them meet.
One evening, he came to Lincoln and picked up my mom and I at home. We ate dinner at the Blue Dog and went to the movies to see Marley and Me. During dinner, I remember him telling my mother that he loved me, all of the things that he did at work, about his income, told her about his rental house, his plans for the future, so on and so forth. We went
and saw the movie and he dropped us both back at home. After my mom got out of the car and let us say our goodbyes, he wanted to know how I thought it went. He knew that she was going to be his future mother in law and said he wanted to make a good impression. After he left and I went back inside my family’s house, I asked my mom what she thought of him. She let me know that he seemed like a very nice man and that he seemed to care about me, but it concerned her how much he talked about money when he didn’t know her and he didn’t know me very well. She was also concerned about the fact that he was telling her how much her loved me when we had only known each other for a short period of time.
Within the next week I got a call that he had booked us a vacation to Mexico. I was stunned. It seemed so fast for something like that to have happened. The whole thing was such a whirlwind and although it felt very fast, he was constantly showing me how much he loved me, and he made me feel so special. Before we left for Mexico in mid-March, he asked me to move to Peoria. I told him that I wouldn’t want to live with him and his grandmother, that didn’t feel like a good idea for me, and he told me that he would help find me a place to live. We got a lead on a house that I really liked and then left for vacation. When we got back, his now ex-wife told him that she would be vacating the home that they lived in while they were married, and he decided that I should move
in there, instead. I had a lot of hesitation about this. A lot. I didn’t like the idea one bit. But he told me he would not continue to look for a different place for me to live, I could live in this house and that was final.
I moved in towards the end of April. I had made a lot of new friends throughout the time that I spent with him in Peoria that Spring, all of which were his friends. We would go out and party at the bars and that was where I first started to see the signs of excessive drinking. When he would drink, he would DRINK. He didn’t drink daily, but when we went out with friends, he drank to get drunk. The first summer that I lived in the house in East Peoria, I saw firsthand how much he could truly drink without having a bar tab and it was a lot. I also started to see how my boundaries were not respected. There was a Friday night that he told me he wanted to have a party and I told him that I wasn’t going to be off work until 8:00 and I didn’t really want to come home to all of that. He made it clear that if he wanted to have people over, he was going to have people over. I told him that he didn’t live there and that it was my space, and I didn’t want to come home to a ton of people after 8:00 pm, I knew that I would be tired. When I was finishing up at work, I told him I was heading home and he told me that he was there with some friends. I remember specifically asking if he at least put away the dishes that were in the sink and cleaned up the kitchen so I wouldn’t be embarrassed by the way I left the kitchen that morning. He told me he did, and I let him know I would see him soon. I figured a few friends was way better than a party. When I pulled up at home, I couldn’t pull into the garage because the driveway was full, and so was the street. I was so upset I thought that I was going to burst into tears. I walked into the house through the garage door and found the kitchen and living room were full of people. The weather hadn’t been great, so people were inside at this point instead of outside. There he was, standing in the middle of the kitchen, holding a drink and telling me to “lighten up” when he saw the disappointment on my face. To make matters worse, he was standing next to the sink that was full of dirty dishes. I almost lost it. I was so angry. I remember telling him, the least he could do was clean up before he brought all of these people into my home. He quipped to a response of “this is MY house and I LET you live here; I can do what I want.” I remember being so upset and heading to my bedroom. He kept telling me to chill out and just have fun and stop being uptight. He was saying these things in front of his friends; this was also not the first time he had spoken down to me in front of friends, and it wouldn’t be the last time. This was something that I begged him to stop all the way through til the end of our marriage.
This was just one example of how my boundaries and our relationship were not respected in the first short few months of our dating. Whenever I would bring this and my other concerns up, he would consistently tell me things like “it’s his house, he allows me to live here,” “you don’t even care about all of the hard work that I do,” “I am just trying to have fun and you need to relax.” There was a time when one of his friends wanted to watch a pay-per-view fight on my cable and have people over. I didn’t want to do that; this particular friend of his was never totally kind to me. I eventually agreed to let this happen, but I set parameters on a few things. His friend wanted to bring in a bigger TV and I said no, because with my furniture, there wasn’t a lot of room in the living room. I got home that night from work and my living room furniture had been moved around and a huge TV was in the middle of the living room. I remember saying something to his friend and this person responding to me that “(my abuser) said he could because it was his house.” Throughout the short time that I lived in this house, I heard that repeatedly. It didn’t matter that at this time I was living there with a roommate, and we were both paying rent. That we were the only two that lived here (at that point in time, he would frequently rent out the basement) and he didn’t live there. After a while I couldn’t really take it anymore and I started to look for places that I could rent and move out on my own. I figured if I wanted my space and boundaries to be respected, I had no other choice. I looked around a lot online and went and looked at a few places in person. I was trying to set things up so I would be able to make my exit.
I hit some unexpected roadblocks along the way. I lost my job at the car dealership that I worked for and when I asked why I was told that I had been warned about taking as many phone calls from (my abuser) while I was working. This was a huge issue because he would call me up and be angry about one thing or another and it was a constant fight while I was at my desk. When I was told this and I stopped answering my cell phone at my desk, he would call my work phone. This went on for a couple of months. It was disrupting the business environment and my employers eventually had enough. I was let go on a Saturday afternoon, after my shift that August. I got home that evening to another party that I wasn’t in the mood for. I decided that I had had enough.
After a lot of thinking, I made the decision that I was going to end the relationship with
him. On a Thursday evening, I made a nice dinner and invited him over to eat on the
back patio. I was so nervous. After small talk I eventually worked up the nerve to tell him that I wanted to break up. To say he was upset and angry would be putting it lightly. After a long fight, and me begging him to go, he left. I was nervous, upset and on edge. After he was gone, I locked all of the doors and windows and tried to sleep. I woke up the next morning to him banging on the door, demanding to be let into HIS house. I just laid there in bed, frozen, not responding to the calls, texts or the incessant banging at the doors, waiting for him to go away. Eventually he did. The stress from the night before and the morning was too much. I took an antianxiety pill and drifted back off to sleep with my phone set to silent. I woke up later with more texts and missed calls than I can remember. There were voicemails and text messages with him begging for me to talk to him.
Eventually later in the day when he called again, I answered. He begged me to talk to him and I cautiously agreed. I didn’t want him to come to me, so I went to him. I met him at his grandmother’s house, and we started to talk, and he asked me if I was hungry. We drove to a Steak and Shake that was around the corner and brought back food and sat out on the back deck and talked. He was so apologetic and cried so much. I felt bad for him, he really seemed as though he was sorry. He promised that none of the things that I spoke
with him about the night before would continue to happen and he told me that he would change. He loved me, and that I was his priority. He didn’t want to lose me and he would do anything he needed to do to not have me leave. He said he couldn’t continue to live without me. He offered for us to go to couples counseling so we could make sure that we could continue to strengthen our relationship.
I reluctantly accepted his apology and told him that we could just forget that the night before and that morning had happened. Little did I know that this wouldn’t be last time that he would beg for forgiveness and the first of many times that I would stay in the relationship after I tried to leave because I knew it wasn’t right. This the first in a series of many times that this would occur in the next thirteen years.
I hope this piece of my journey sheds some light on how I ended up where I did. I hope that it helps you see that the abuse and manipulation that I encountered didn’t just happen overnight. A lot of things led to the incident in July of 2019, and a lot of things occurred before the abuse began in the physical sense. Emotional and mental abuse are very tricky things. Most people don’t realize that they are having this happen to them. Friends, family and trusted confidants may say things to you like, “are you sure you are okay?” or “you shouldn’t let them speak to you that way,” among other things. You may begin to question if there is something wrong with you, you may have your self esteem beaten down so low that you truly don’t think that you are worthy of love the way you should be loved. That no one else will love you, or that you aren’t good enough, that you need your abuser to survive. I understand this because I was there. I share my story to help bring awareness to anyone that may be in these circumstances. Abuse can happen to anyone. I encourage you to ask for help if you need it, or if you know someone that is in need, that you let them know that you are always there for them, that you hear them, see them and believe them.
I thank you all for being apart of my recovery journey, I want you to know that I hear
you, I see you, and I appreciate you. Please tune in next week when the final piece of My
Recovery Journey is published.
If you or anyone that you know is a victim of domestic violence (including dating violence) there are resources out there to help you. Call the National Domestic Violence hotline to help find resources in your area.
National Domestic Violence Hotline
Call: 1.800.799.7233
Text: START to 88788
Online Chat: https://www.thehotline.org
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