Why did you stay?!

If there’s one question I get asked more than any it’s “Why did you stay?!” Sometimes there’s a variation on it like when someone thinks to add the phrase “for so long” to it.  It’s asked enough that I know those who don’t ask are simply being polite and not voicing their thoughts. The answer to either is the same and by no means simple.

I always told myself that I’d never be in a relationship like that. I was one of those people who were the first to hear stories like mine and blurt out, “So why the hell doesn’t she just LEAVE?! What an idiot! ” I find when I pose questions such as those I end up understanding all too well.

Abuse rarely starts out at full throttle. If it did, maybe the statistics wouldn’t be as high. But there’s an intelligence most abusers seem to have that all too often is overlooked.  I am by NO means praising, promoting or otherwise attempting to put them in a positive light – serial killers are typically very intelligent too.  All that I’m saying is simply they tend to be masters of their craft, no matter how evil.

Much like a poisonous plant, the abuse pops it’s seemingly harmless head out of the earth appearing as innocuous as any other – it might be harsh words or a temper tantrum of sorts, all excused away by blaming it on a bad day or extenuating circumstances…always things beyond that person’s control. They spend an uspecified amount of time “making it up” to the person they “love” and things are smoothed over, just like new…for awhile.  I’ve learned that they’ve actually labeled this as the honeymoon phase and it’s as toxic as the abuse itself because it’s the key ingredient to keeping the abused in place.  I can’t generalize I guess because I only know my own circumstances, but I can tell you that my soon to be ex-husband was a master of the honeymoon phase.  During that time, he was the perfect husband/partner/lover/friend.  There was nothing he wouldn’t do for me or to me to please.  He doted, petted and loved beyond expectations.  So much so that it made his empty apologies and promises appear to have substance..not just once, but every time…for well over a decade at least.

The next time might be a week later or as much as years later, but when it arrives, much like that poisonous plant that’s been left alone, it’s grown, as if tended by an unseen hand. But one thing that doesn’t change is the fact that it’s excused away by being blamed on something outside that person’s control.  I assume that the size it grows to is determined by a laundry list of factors.  I only know that mine was going to keep growing until it was over one way or another.

Looking back, it’s so much clearer…I sincerely hate that bitch Hindsight.  I guess it also helps that I started keeping a diary of sorts in 2007 in the form of a calendar.  I know that it had at least a slight impact on my final decision to leave, but it wasn’t until almost 5 years later that I actually read it.  A few months ago, December 2011 to be exact, I took the time to go through it, day by day, trying to make some sort of sense of things, asking myself what I assume are the usual questions – why was I still there at the time, what could I have been thinking, how did it get so far…

One week in particular stood out…the worst cycle yet.  Wednesday, May 9, 2007 to be exact.  The calendar entry simply read: “Very bad night! Held a gun to my head & threatened to kill me.”  While you’d think that’d be what stood out most, it wasn’t…it was overshadowed by the entry on Saturday, May 12, 2007 which read, “He didn’t drink. We spent the day together – it was a very good day.”

I read that entry over and over again. Really? REALLY?! “A very good day”?! A day spent with the same man who less than 72 hours earlier had spent three hours torturing and tormenting me with a loaded weapon could be described as “very good”?!

This is the part where someone’s supposed to thump me in the forehead…or grab me by the arms and shake me, while screaming into my face “What were you thinking?!”  But what I was thinking was that I’d survived.  I’d lived to see another day and do so with a whole new appreciation for the smallest of things. If there’s anything good I can take from that experience it’s that  I find it much easier to let the things I have no control over, both big and small,  just go because I realize there’s really nothing I can do. Carrying dead weight like that does nothing but harm me.

Apparently, reading back through, I see that I’ve digressed – no surprise there for most who know me…but back on task!

In the beginning, I stayed because I wanted so badly to believe that it would work…that he loved me as much as he made me feel loved…that I was worth more to him than the way he made me feel during the abuse.  At the end, I stayed out of fear…fear that he would keep his promise to kill me if I left.  Seems in the beginning he was more convincing during the make up stage and at the end he was more convincing at the explosion stage.

I don’t expect anyone to understand…especially if they’ve never devoted all that they are and all that they have to another.  And if you are that sort, as I was, I suggest breaking that nasty habit.  Sometimes the price is far too steep and you don’t realize it until the bill is due.

Not sure your situation qualifies as abuse? If you’re making excuses that sound anything like: “Well at least my husband/boyfriend/girlfriend isn’t that bad…” please take the time to look at this website.