The Day I Stopped Loving Him

At the beginning of our relationship he swept me off of my feet.  I had not known love and I was sure that this was it.  Life was perfect.

I think things started turning bad when we moved in together.  Suddenly I couldn't go anywhere, do anything, talk to anyone, or participate in any of the activities I previously had.  If I did, I was sure to get a verbal beating when I got home.  I was to disconnect myself from my previous life.  I remember thinking, is that how it works?  When you fall in love and get married, do you disconnect from your previous life? 

I was verbally beaten on a daily basis as I struggled to accept this new reality I had willingly entered.  I loved him.  We had a child.  I feared him.  I feared for my child.

When he left me he told me everything I had done wrong to cause the end of our relationship.  He told me he would be sure to tell our son how mom was the one that ruined our family.  Mom was the one that didn't know how to be a girlfriend, a wife, a lover.  Mom was to blame for it all.  What had I done?  I had caused all of this?  It wasn't as hard to believe as one might think.  My brain wasn't mine anymore.  It belonged to him.  He had total and complete control over every aspect of my mind.  I was to blame.

I frantically sought to get him back, to tell him I could be good, to let him know I had learned my lesson.  I still loved him and I needed to make him love me again.  I needed him back to save the family I had always wanted.

He came back.  Fate or some other higher power struck and I got pregnant again.  This was it.  We had to be happy.  I had to pull it together to create a good life for the children.  It wasn't long and I realized that I couldn't do it.  He didn't love me and I couldn't make him.  He was getting drunk and high on a daily basis and the verbal beatings were getting worse and worse.  One night on a drunken stupor he came home and tried handling our son.  I was 6 months pregnant at the time and he had no issues with shoving me down to the couch with a force that tore the cushions. 

There I was, confronting the man that I loved, and it hit me.  I was scared to death.  He was flinching at me, yelling, and out of control.  I was protecting my son from his own father.  I was pregnant with his next child, a little girl, and he had no issues not only potentially causing bodily harm to me, but also to her.  What was I doing?  Where had all of this gone wrong?  Who was this person and who was I? 

The only thing I KNEW about myself was that I was a MOTHER to two children.  I may not have been certain about much else in my life at that time, but I knew I was a mother.  And as a mother, my heart and soul served to love and protect my children.

It was on that day, at that moment, that I stopped loving him.