History 2

Rewind a couple of years back, I was chronically stressed out.

My partner was always verbally insulting me or complaining about something, like if I left a plate out on the kitchen bench.  The kind of things that are not a big deal to me were a big deal to him.  He was insanely angry once when he went on holiday and I just left his mail on his desk.  He didn’t ask for any specific order, so I just left it over his desk.  He shouted out why they weren’t in ORDER, as in chronologically, and he stormed out and said something about if its not in order when he gets back that something would happen.  Well, I just piled it neatly together, not in chronological order ofcourse, can’t be bothered with that, and I’m not his secretary.  At that time we were already split up, just sharing the same house.

 

There was so much crap and trauma then, including times when he threw a postal package into my room (there were books inside, so its about maybe 6-8 kilo), lucky it didn’t hit me.  But it was the fits of rage that got me.  And he was very physical about it, pushed me out of his room, threw metal objects at the ground, punched the wooden door, which has a slight dent now.  Thinking about it now, it makes me feel kinda a little scared still, even though I have moved out.  It makes me feel scared for the little girl that I was before, like having to tolerate that abuse.  It wasn’t tolerating, it was more like surviving.  And feeling scared everyday is maybe the worse feeling. 

It’s the unpredictability.   You never know whether they are going to be in a good mood or bad mood.  The abuser always says it is your fault.  That you cause their anger.  You live with sadness, fear, guilt, feelings that you’re going crazy, because none of the stuff they say makes any logical sense, its just that you accept it because you’re stuck there.  I felt like all I had to do was move away, it always felt like that.  Been trying to move out of my house since 16 or so.  I mean this is the first time i’ve successfully moved out to live on my own, and I’m 20 something now.

Just the sheer chaos of everything.  Once you get out of the situation, you’re still depressed.  Just more stress, because now its a new situation.   I went on student exchange so I could get away from my parents and live alone, but I was depressed nearly all the days.  Even though the other students were friendly, I never felt a sense of belonging.  I was in my room most of the time, I dropped some of my classes.  I had not much money and ate pasta & sauce most of the time.  I travelled, it was part of my escapism.  I was vegetarian, and probably pretty malnourished eating just pasta.  Was pretty pale, and incredibly depressed.

The same partner who later was living with me and throwing stuff in our apartment, was the same guy who I had been seeing at this time.  And I think it was mostly the misery that drove me to be with someone who I knew had hints of some issues and problems that he was maltreating me, or that he care about me as much as he did himself.  I mean, even now, I think most people I meet, I haven’t really seen them genuinely care about me, or very few.  Maybe my closest friends.  More than himself… I guess that’s my new definition for the perfect partner.