It’s been a few years since you last stood before me. When we first met, you had promised me love, sanity, happiness, but it all had a price—love, sanity, happiness. All this time, with my love for writing, I had thought I was the one with the powerful language. But you were the true poet, luring me in with words we’ve all learned to highlight in our heads.
Love. Beautiful. Happy.
Bolded and italicized in my mind. Trying their hardest to drown with its thick ink the true words your anger spoke out many times more.
Hate. Disgusting. Slut. Ugly. Worthless.
Venomous words that paralyzed my legs and mind and ability to escape or scream
or cry for help.
Like God, you watched over me at all times. Even when I didn’t see you, your words
followed me, little spies, in my shadows. And if a kind hand dared to creep out of the
dark crowd of my classmates to touch my bony arm or skeleton back, the words
would jump out and snap at it until it gave up on me and retreated.
Then you would almost descend from the sky with your icy eyes and utter a single
phrase, something like…”You’re so disgusting I can’t stand to look at you.” And my
eyes would surrender to the floor and only confirm the next round you’d fire at me,
“you’re nothing without me.”
It was such a simple phrase, all the time, so easy to argue against, but they’d
be followed by the same silent fears and sadness and hurt and, “am I really like
that?”
Friends went from telling me to leave you to telling each other to leave me.
After a year, I was sure there’d be no escape. I grew almost numb to it by then, and
patiently waited for the day your fist would make contact with my face.
But no, something else had hit me. The one speck of myself that wouldn’t dare allow
anyone to treat me this way, my True Self. Chained and blocked by my own
insecurities and fear, but finally strong enough to realize I am not your words.
Having guy friends did not make me a slut. Asking you, begging you, please stop
hurting me, did not make me a nag. And I did nothing to deserve your cutting
words. It’s so easy to mistake abuse for passion, but there’s a clear difference: no
matter how heated things get, no one should ever put you down and make you feel
less than you are.
It’s been a few years since you last stood before me, but your words still lurk
in the shadows. But I forgive you. They say everything that happens in your life
happens for a reason, and it took me three years to realize that you were your own
version of a blessing in disguise. Because I’ve learned to stand up for myself. I’ve
learned what happens when you let someone walk over you. I’ve learned that I
deserve someone who brings me up, not down. And now I can firsthand help others
who are going through the same thing. Because let’s face it, it’s tough out there for a
victim without physical scars. A year and a half of poison pumped directly into my
self-esteem is just as abusive as a fist to your face. You said you didn’t know better,
and if that’s true, I will devote my life to using my words to overcome yours as well
as others’ as ignorant as you.
