Mental Slavery Is Abuse

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Looking back on my 10 year relationship and 7 year marriage, I realize I was a victim of mental slavery.  I was in an abusive relationship and I had no idea.  He didn’t lay a hand on me ever, the abuse was mental.  He played mind games that kept me feeling like I was never enough.  I was always making excuses for him when friends and family would ask me questions relating.  See, I knew he loved me and I’m such a hopeless romantic that I believed love would conquer all.  

But sometimes love isn’t enough!

 I’ll go back to the beginning to give you all some perspective.  I met my husband in junior high school.  I had a huge crush on him throughout highschool.  We were all friends in the same circle.  We kissed in the 10th grade and dated one time before he left for the Army.  He joined the military after highschool and I moved to Miami.  A few years later he was getting deployed to Iraq and asked me if  I would write to him.  So I did.  Our love evolved over the months of exchanging letters.  A year later he was coming home and wanted to be with me. He had another wife at the time, but I didn’t care.  I loved him and he loved me.  I wanted the life he sold me in my letters.  I didn’t care about anything else.  We were inseparable at in the beginning.

 He had a very high sex drive, higher than most men. I know this because I’ve had my fair share of men in my time.  I thought, at first it was because he was in Iraq for a year without the touch of a woman’s body.  Things changed when we were living together.  Years went on and he still wanted to have sex multiple times a day even after doing it everyday.  At first I would just do it.  I faked orgasm after orgasm, year after year to keep my husband happy.  I ended up loosing my sex drive because I was sexually burnt out.  Slowly, I started telling him how I felt. Thinking to myself he was my husband and he would understand.  His response was that he wanted to feel wanted and I didn’t want him the way he wanted me. He didn’t feel wanted because I didn’t crave him.   I tried to explain that he didn’t give me the time to want him.

This went on for a few years.  Faking orgasms until I couldn’t anymore.  Speaking up caused arguments and me feeling guilty for not wanting him.  How could I not want him when I loved him so much? I questioned myself over and over again.  Crying at night when he was sound asleep.  I would compensate in other ways when my sex drive was absent.  Our house was always immaculate.  Dinner tasted restaurant quality if not better.  The boys were well taken care of and I always looked perfect upon leaving the house.  You would never catch me grocery shopping in sweatpants.  (I do now)

By this time I was well aware of his alcohol addiction.  I never brought it up because it would be an argument.  I tried to trick him into quitting.  Working out together worked for two weeks.  Then I told him that he smelled and tasted so much better when he wasn’t drinking.  He didn’t quit he just drank more pineapple juice to mask the bitter taste on his semen.  If I wasn’t fucking him, he wanted me suck him. “You’re my wife, why should I have to masturbate?” was his comeback line. Friends and family were concerned about his drinking and I made excuses for him.  He had cheated multiple times and I always took him back.  

All I saw was the man I fell in love with. Again I made excuses for him.  I lied to my family and I lied to myself.  I was blinded to the truth.  I even gave everything up and moved to Puerto Rico hoping island life and it’s magic would fix our broken marriage.  It didn’t though.  3 months later I took the boys and left him on the island.  The truth is, I can never be happy with him because he broke me years ago.  I need to love myself.  I’m finally loving life again.  Very slowly.  I know who I am now, or at least who I want to be. I’m being true to myself this time.  Never again will I let anyone make me feel like I’m not enough.  I will never again fake another orgasm!

The Facebook Fake

  I had what I’m sure everyone I know has. I had created an online world that was picture perfect.

Perfect alright…on Facebook!  

I spent my days “checking in” locations everywhere I went.  I was always taking kissing pictures with my husband to show everyone how in love we were. It didn’t matter what was happening in my life, I  would share my world.  Constantly uploading new pictures of my boys and our happy family.  

Vacations, dinners, events! You name it, I posted it.  

Anyone on the outside looking in would think I had the perfect marriage.  Then it happened.  One day my relationship status changed from married to separated.  My inbox was flooded with questions.

“Omg!” “What happened?” “Are you ok?”

 “Yes I’m ok,” I would say.  I was fine I’d declare. I wasn’t fine, but I came to a point where I decided to stop pretending.  I wanted to BE happy.  I mean really happy. I didn’t want to just look happy on my Facebook timeline. I couldn’t bear to put one more staged photo online. I couldn’t accept another comment from people I loved telling me how amazing my life was.  I refused to go to bed at night only to lay next to the man who was supposed to complete me, and feel so lost and lonely.

 During this time in my life I would endlessly scroll the news feed while living vicariously through my friends and families photos.  Daydreaming of what if’s.

This wasn’t happiness it was emptiness.

 I wanted to see the world for myself.  With my own eyes and not through someone else’s photos.

I wanted to smile authentically and not staged.

   It’s so easy to live in this world when you can pretend that your problems don’t exist. Social media is like creating an image of how you want your life to be for the world to see.

 I can go back into my photos and reflect. Remembering arguments that happened right before I smiled for the camera. You’d never know my pain at the time of upload.  Just like an actress, I’d smile for the camera. Next, hitting the infamous “upload” button and then going right back to my argument.  Pretending I was having an amazing day.  

It’s so easy to get caught up in the world of Facebook and social media.  Don’t get me wrong now, I love seeing all of my friends and family. Especially people I miss who don’t live close enough to visit.  

It’s just that I often wonder how much of  what I am seeing is genuine? How many smiles are masking tears? How many kisses are hiding deception?  How many parents are sheilding their children from sad realities?

I couldn’t live that way anymore.

  I became so good at faking it. I adopted the motto fake it until you make it as a personal mantra.  

A distinct memory that was a pivotal moment in my revelation. The day Andrew, my youngest son graduated VPK.  That morning I found out my husband was having an affair. Well actually I found out about a previous affair.  That was his attempt to mask his current affair.  I spent the whole day in tears.  I couldn’t cope so I went for a drive. The tears were so heavy I had to pull over and park in a random lot. I really can’t tell you how much time passed in that car with those tears. I finally gained my composure enough to face reality and drove back home.  Not my home as we didn’t have one. We were living with his mother at the time. I managed to clean myself up, and got as pretty as I could. We went to the graduation ceremony as a family.  A “happy” family. I smiled for the camera, uploaded pictures, and checked in to the preschool as any proud mother would do the day her baby moved on to kindergarten.  Inside, my heart was broken, my world had fallen apart!

 On Facebook it was another perfect day in my seemingly perfect life.

Andrew on his graduation day