ashol33

[ashol33]

Closing the Book

We will not see eye-to-eye.

Since Feburary.

You kicked me out. Kicked Mason out.

You took back your key.

You ignored me.

I read a self-help book.

We dug for buried treasure and found it.

We went to the movies.

We laugh.

My friends tell me how good it is to see me happy again.

We went to softball games.

Mason made new friends.

He graduated.

I wrecked my car.

I haven't felt bad about myself.

I haven't felt like a burden.

I haven't cried.

I haven't changed and you still don't know me at all.

I see you for who you are now.

Afraid.

Petty.

The proud owner of 5 years of Mason's allowance, birthday, and Christmas money.

The sole occupant of a house with walls that remember when it used to be a home.

You avoid your feelings at all costs and call it strength.

You are not strong.

You used anything, including me, to keep yourself from discomfort.

Do you remember when I said it felt like you were sexually assaulting me?

You were.

It brings me indescribable peace to know that you will never touch me again.

Have the life you have earned.

[ashol33]

To be clear, I will never forgive you.

You are the second father-figure to completely abandoned him in less than a year. He woke up, went to school, and never stepped foot in his house, his bedroom, again

Fuck you.

I'm reading a book called

"Why Does He Do That?"

I highlight the things you did to me in yellow.

Orange is his dad.

It has opened my eyes. Made my jaw hit the floor.

Women who were abused by their boyfriends, husbands.

Victims talking about their experiences.

And they're saying WORD FOR WORD what I said to you. How I told you I felt. How the things you were doing made me feel.

And you made me feel fucking crazy for it. You made me out to be a piece of shit because your ego couldn't handle accepting the fact that you hurt me. You made shit up in your head and then treated me like that person you came up with was me.

You told me I was manipulative. You turned anything I did into something nefarious.

You're smarter. See through the bullshit. Stronger. Don't need to acknowledge emotions, especially mine. Cause I'm manipative. Deceitful.

It is the cycle. It always comes back to that. You're mean, I get hurt easy. I want to talk about it.

But you can't do that. Even the mention of my feelings has you doubled over crying.

How dare I hold a mirror to let you see yourself. I don't know this man anymore.

BLAME ME! I DARE YOU!

The girl in the book said she felt like she was sexually assaulted because she was.

And so was I.

You never wanted me. Or him.

You wanted somebody to fuck to make you feel good about yourself, and I am fucking done sacrificing my time, my body, my mental health, for someone who has shown and told me, time and time again, that he does not want me.

My entire perspective on you and our relationship has changed. I was naive. I took you at face value.

"A woman gets trapped into trying to make the man feel better, but nothing she can do ever brings about any lasting change in how he treats her. He still blames his behavior on her supposed flaws and insists that she's the one who has changed, not him."

"You can cause your partner to feel hurt or grumpy or even angry, but you cannot make him treat you badly."

"He calls me disgusting names, and then an hour later he wants sex. I don't get it."

"He would say that I talk on and on and that I'm self-centered."

"I just can't seem to live up to what he needs. I'm trying, but he doesn't think so. And now when he's really angry or frustrated, he says things that cut me down. ("Just looking for a man to live off,)

"The emotional effects of partner violence are a factor in more than 1/4 of female suicide attempts and are the leading cause of substance abuse in adult women."

"He justified all of these behaviors because of ways he felt hurt by her."

"He will come up with new and more creative ways to make her feel responsible for his emotional distress."

"A nonabusive man doesn't use his past as an excuse to mistreat you."

"A man who was genuinely mistreated in a relationship with a woman would not be using that experience to get away with hurting someone else."

"Most abusive men have close relationships with people other than their wives or girlfriends. Do they abuse their other loved ones?"

"An abusive man's emotional problems do not cause his abusiveness. You can't change him by figuring out what is bothering him, helping him feel better, or improving the dynamics of your relationship."

"An abuser gives himself permission to take action on the basis of his beliefs."

"Just as common as the abuser who blows up because dinner is late, is the abuser who blows up because she failed to anticipate needs and desires he hadn't even expressed."

"Why does he think you're always complaining? Because in his mind, a woman is supposed to be listening, not talking. If she expresses herself at all, that's too much."

"The abusive man has a reason to exaggerate and ridicule his partners statements: he wants to avoid having to think seriously about what she is saying and struggle to digest it. He feels entitled to swat her down like a fly instead."

"The abuser tends to see his partner as less intelligent, less competent, less logical, and even less sensitive than he is. He will say that she isn't the compassionate person he is. He often has difficult conceiving of her has a human being. This tendency in abusers is known as objectification or depersonalization."

"Uses words to assault her humanity, reducing her to a degraded sexual body part."

"He distances himself so far from her humanity that her feelings no longer count, or simply cease to exist."

"Did he just suffer a disappointment? She caused it."

"He may not demand to be served dinner, but rather erupts because of some way his partner failed to sacrifice her own needs or interests to keep him content. He plays up how fragile he is to divert attention from the swath of destruction he leave behind him."

"When he begins to control the woman and take advantage of her, he will find ways to convince himself that it's not happening or that it is her fault."

"A man doesn't tear down his partners self-esteem out of a desire to help her."

"He pressures you for sex. This is a sign that he sees women as sex objects rather than human beings. If he says you need to have sex with him to prove that you truly love him, run."

"He will say things like, 'you're just angry because you aren't getting your way, so you're saying I'm mistreating you.'"

"It will never be the right time, or the right way, to talk about your feelings."

"He denies being angry, although he obviously is."

"He tells her that she is mistreating him."

"His outlook makes it impossible for an argument to proceed toward anything other than the fulfillment of his wishes."

"She is always wrong in his eyes."

I trusted you. I took the damage, the blame for your unhappiness.

You are the cause of your unhappiness. I will not be made to feel responsible for your insecurities and sadness.

You acted like you had it all figured out. Healed the ego issues so many other men have.

YOU fucked up.

YOU are responsible for your actions and words.

You did this.

And now I have to heal from the things you did to me.

Go to therapy.