Chew me up & Spit me out

There’s talk of psychological abuse in relationships. These kind of relationships can be hard to detect because there are no bruises to look at as a result. There is sometimes little to no physical evidence that this is taking place and sometimes, the person in that relationship has no idea it’s happening. I know this and I can relate to this because I’ve been in a relationship just like this. It took me a very long time to realize how toxic of a relationship I was in. Even after the split of this relationship, I wasn’t fully aware of how much damage this person had caused me. I don’t even know how I didn’t see it or walk away from it when it was happening. Looking at it from an outside perspective I can see why all my friends told me he wasn’t good for me. But while I was in it, I seem to have always come up with a cover up or an excuse as to why he acted the way he did when in reality there was no excuse beside the fact that he did not care or respect me.

Let’s call him Eric (I’m sorry to all the nice Erics in the world because I am about to reveal some horrible things about this “Eric”). Eric and I had previously met when I was just fifteen years old. He was my sisters friend who she met in high school. He was in our local community college which is where my sisters and my future high school was located. I always heard of the cool adventures my sister would go on with him and how he would always buy her and her friends food. He was older, had his own truck and apparently had lots of money to spend. At this point in time, I never interacted with him because I was clearly underage. I saw him when I would hang out with my sister and her friends – by hang out I mean watch my sister and her friends have fun, I always liked tagging along with my sister. The point is, I had seen him before and interacted with him briefly enough to develop a minor crush on him. After my break up with my previous boyfriend (refer to my first heart-break post), I started continuously talking to him.

We began by flirting on comments on our Facebook posts and moved onto Messenger. One night on my one of many lonely distraction drives, I decided to text him and ask him if he wanted to go out for coffee. Guys, I wish I had never gone to Starbucks with Eric. I just… if I could turn back time I totally would and I would taken a big ass detour from Illinois Ave. As ya’ll can imagine, we went out for coffee and after that, that became my distraction. My way of not thinking of my ex. My pass-time. We would talk for hours about things I really don’t remember and eventually, I developed feelings for him. Most of this took place toward the end of my senior year and progressed in the summer. Looking back at this whole “relationship” literally makes me nauseous. I can’t even believe I was ever into this guy. ANYWAY… Once summer came along, I obviously had more time to hang out with him, so I did. Or so I thought I did…

He loved hiding me from his family, his friends, EVERYONE. I was not allowed to post where I was at because it could create suspicion that I was with him. There are two times that I clearly remember that at the time I didn’t realize how majorly fucked up they were. One was a family party of his. We drove to his house which I wasn’t allowed to go in, not even step onto the front yard or a look out the window. He told me to wait in his truck while he went inside and told me he wouldn’t be too long. I sat snug in my seat and patiently waited. One hour passed, he did not show up. TWO HOURS pass and I’m still in that damn truck. I receive a text telling me to walk to the park that’s a couple blocks from his house because he’s gonna take longer than he thought. I try to be understanding and so I do as I was told and I walk to the park. After-all, he’s looking out for me and doesn’t want me to be bored in the truck. He wants me to stretch out my legs, right? Pft Right. He not only made me walk to the park, but he made me walk back to his house when he was ready to go! THE AUDACITY YA’LL. But I wasn’t able to see the bad in this because I was blinded by… love? Second time. This particular time he was house sitting his aunts house who had left to Mexico. He picked me up from my house and told me he was gonna show me around the house and we were gonna hang out and watch movies. We get to the house, he gives me the little tour and we go into this small room with a box tv. Moments later he tells me he’s gonna hang out with his friends and he isn’t taking me with him because I was too young. I was 18 and I couldn’t drink. So it made sense, right? Off he went with his friends and left me at a house in a neighborhood neither him or I knew. I didn’t even have my car to leave, not that I even thought I had that option. I didn’t even consider I had that option. That night he was gone till 5 in the morning. I watched a couple of kids movies because that’s all that there was. When he got to the house drunk all he was able to tell me was how childish I was to watch those movies and that that was the reason I couldn’t hang out with his friends. I was too childish and I looked too young.

When I moved cities to go to college, he would visit me and I thought that meant he liked me. My first night there he bought me and all my roommates drinks. A 23 year old man hanging out with a bunch of 18 year old’s drinking wine coolers. What a catch he was. During this time he somehow managed to weasel his way into my apt. I never complained because I was so eager to please him. To prove to myself that I could win him over. To prove that although I couldn’t keep my ex I could keep this older, cooler guy. While he lived with me I cooked, I cleaned, I washed, I did everything for him. I brittled my friendship with my friends for this guy. While under my roof, he never paid rent. Hardly ever paid groceries. Hardly cleaned. When he was laid-off of work I would give him a weekly allowance so he would have some kind of money. I even got a credit card so he could use for food that he promised he’d pay for and he never did. I had a part time job and went to school full time. I always made sure he was set. He never even offered to pay for one of my books or make sure I had eaten that day. I thought that because I did all these things he would finally want me. He would finally accept me. He would always tell me things like:

“You’re so thin. If you ever get kids and get fat, I’ll never like you. You’ll definitely get stretch marks and get cellulite.”

“Your boobs are so small, when you lay down they disappear and I don’t like that.”

“I like blondes, but you could never pull it off because you’re too dark.”

“My grandma says I shouldn’t be with you because you’re not pretty enough.”

“You don’t have boobs or a butt.”

I have been bullied before and I had gotten to a point where I had accepted my body. I love seeing Victoria’s Secret models because they have my body type, just taller. I had that mind set, but every time he would say things like that they just kept getting deeply engraved in my brain. Imagine loving someone who had so many “flaws” that you never even considered because you just wanted to see the good in them. No matter what I did, there would always be something wrong with me. He insisted that he did not want a girlfriend,

“I like being single because I can leave you anytime I want.”

“I can do whatever I want and not worry about you because you know we are both single.”

“You can’t get mad at what I do because I told you I don’t want a girlfriend already.”

“I told you before to not get feelings. It’s not my fault you got feelings for me. I told you not to.”

Year one passed. The second year he spent it looking for other girls. He would go through his tinder account and show me how many girls he’d match with. He would show me all the white girls and tell me I’d never be as beautiful as them. I could be pretty sometimes, but I would never be as pretty as them. I could never compare to their beautiful blue eyes and blonde hair (These are all things he would say). Just to let you all know, he is a dark skinned, Mexican guy with a patchy beard and mustache, beer belly, measuring at 5’4′ (at most), crooked teeth, accent, had bad spelling and diction, was a warehouse worker with no outside hobbies, no goals or aspirations or desire to move out of his parents. I am only stating all these FACTS to paint a picture, not to belittle him, only to show you all what I was dwelling over. For some strange reason I just had to have him because I thought that was as good as I could do.

Since he lived with *leeched off of* me, I always knew if he would leave at night and notice when he came back. I never restricted him from going out with his friends because I was never his girlfriend, not that I would have anyway, but at this point in time that was my mindset. One night he told me he was going out with his friends, like usual. He didn’t come back until 8 am. That morning after sorting out laundry, I asked him what he’d done last night and he said he’d hung out at his friends garage and had a couple of drinks. They didn’t go to a bar or anything. He didn’t know I’d found a valet ticket in his jeans from that night dated with last nights date. This is when I became suspicious, because clearly all those other times weren’t enough of a red flag. That night I looked through his phone and found out he had been out with a girl. All night. Until 8 am. He picked her up and dropped her off. She sat in the seat that I sat and that single thought had me feeling so disgusted. It made my skin crawl to know that someone had shared the same space I had. The space that was mine, but not mine at the same time. I called her from his phone about 5 times, but she didn’t pick up. The next day, we went out and I was visibly upset.

“Why do you act like such a bitch?”

“This is why I don’t like going out with you.”

“You’re making me mad cause you’re mad.”

He didn’t know that I had looked through his phone. After doing me wrong only one night before he had the audacity to try and make me feel bad about how I was feeling that day. No regard to my emotions. No “are you okay?”, “whats wrong?” simply, “you’re a bitch”. After this, I was worn out. I felt like a chewed up, spit out gum. I was tired of trying.

Every insult and negative comment he made towards me was like a punch to my mind and self-perspective. I’d look in the mirror and see a glass half empty. This relationship felt like three years of emotional beatings and drags. It took a lot of self healing to be where I’m at now.

FAST FORWARD

For the last couple of months I knew I didn’t want him anymore. I couldn’t stand him. He knew it too. He tried to keep me. He did everything he should’ve done when I wanted him. He sent me flowers to work. He let me pick the movies. He brought me my favorite snacks. He brought me around his family. But I was so worn out and tired of feeling worthless and I left. I cut him off. This post has gotten way longer than I intended it to and there’s still so much more I have to say, like how I got over him, how I came to realize he was wrong and I wasn’t, how I dealt with his wrong doings while in the relationship, how I overcame his distasteful criticism. I’ll make a part two next week with all this information, but for now I want everyone to know that you don’t have to stand by someone who belittles you just because you want to be enough. You are enough on your own. Thank you for reading!