[CLOSED FOR SUBMISSIONS] Stronger than You 2017

Part 7: Emotional Scars Remain

                                                       Written by: @Katey_55  

I'm by no means a naive person. But I spent a few years of my life living with a master manipulator who could make a person believe anything. We met when he was doing some construction work at the hospital I worked at. I was at a point in my life where I needed something to look forward to; some excitement. 

I was in the process of a divorce, with two small children, and living with my mother. It sucked. Not to mention, my self-esteem was at an all time low. So, when this cute guy showed interest in me, I was all about it. I'm a nurse, and I'm fairly intelligent. So I don't know why I didn't see through him right off the bat.

But, like I said, he was very manipulative. Even when he told me right away that he was an addict, it didn't really phase me, because he also said that he was six months clean, worked for his sponsor, and attended NA meetings almost every day. Nothing to worry about, right?

I guess the first red flag should've been that he started talking about having a baby with me after only two weeks. I was so blinded by these new exciting feelings of falling for someone, that I didn't see that as a bad thing. I'd always wanted four kids, so I was open to the idea. He told me how he had a child with his ex-wife. He ended up going to jail for 16 months after he and his wife separated, for manufacturing meth. While he was incarcerated, his ex got his rights taken away and her new husband adopted the kid. They changed his whole name and everything. 

Again, I just dumbly took his word for it. I think of that story now and laugh at how he pulled the wool over my eyes. Other than the child being adopted by his new stepfather, it wasn't true. He wasn't incarcerated, at least not then. And he willingly gave up his rights. Of course, I didn't know this until years later, after our relationship was finally over, after speaking with the child's mother. I also discovered that there was another child that he'd never told me about. And it was scary how identical their stories were to mine. He knew what he was doing all along.

Anyway, we did have a baby together. She was born 13 months after we got together. And she had some medical issues that were really tough to get through. But we got through them. He seemed like a great father, at least to her. Not so much to my boys from my previous marriage, especially my youngest. He was never physically abusive toward him, but he picked on him a lot. 

When I look back now, I'm ashamed that I allowed him to be so mean to my kid, whom I was supposed to protect above all else.In May of 2008, my daughter was 2.5 years old when I thought it would be a good idea to marry this man whom I wasn't even in love with anymore. But I knew how hard it was to raise two kids on my own, let alone three, so I couldn't exactly leave him. Plus, he was less likely to leave me if I married him. And, financially, it made sense. I think the biggest reason was that, after dealing with my daughter's medical expenses, I was so afraid that something would happen to him and we'd be stuck with paying everything since he had no medical insurance. So, in order to add him to my insurance, we had to be married. I had already accepted that my life would never be any better than it was then, so all things considered, I agreed to marry him.

Around the same time that we got married, he started getting possessive and controlling. He'd show up unannounced at my work. At the time, I thought it was sweet. He was surprising me, right? No, he was checking up on me. Up until that point, we'd always pooled our money and I took care of paying the bills. But suddenly he wanted control over his own money, and he'd give me only enough to make sure the bills were paid, after I'd used up all of my paycheck first. He stopped paying child support for his firstborn, which I wasn't aware of. And he all of a sudden agreed to getting internet service, which we hadn't had in the two years that we'd lived in the house.There were a few times that I wanted to do something with a friend from work, but he always found an excuse for me to not go. There was a concert that I wanted to go to, and though he didn't like the band at all, he insisted on going with me instead of me going with a female friend.