*Trigger Warning* This article contains content that may be harmful to some readers.

It’s been a little over a year since I’ve last spoken to you, but I still can’t get you out of my head. And this isn’t in a swooning-over-the-one-that-got-away or missing-you-like-crazy kind of way. This is in a flashes-of-horrible-memories-hang-over-my-head-like-hurricanes kind of way. I can’t make it through a single day with out a flicker of a rancid memory clouding my vision, making my knees weak, or making my heart beat quickly.

And here’s the worst part, in my opinion: It’s been eight years since I met you, six years since I’ve left you, four years since you decided I wasn’t the scum of the earth anymore, and one year since I finally told you I didn’t want you in my life… But you still have a hold on me.

I’ve worked hard to become the person I currently am: the girl with a strong relationship, rock-hard values and morals, the girl with a family, the girl who’s getting married, the happy girl who is completely and one hundred percent herself. But if you were to walk up to me today, all of these things that I’ve built myself up to be, all of the things that I’d always wanted to be, all of these things that give my life vibrance and vitality, would crumble under the weight of your oppressive shadow. Similar to the saying our mothers’ used to use to teach us life lessons: if you jumped, I would too. And this is not because I want to. No, no, no. When you jump, I wish for nothing more than to fly. But your lingering presence is like a ball and chain that pulls me down with you.

Now, let’s back up for a moment. Because there is something very important that you truly need to know: I still haven’t forgiven you. How could I? For every time you forced yourself in my face to make yourself feel better, regardless of my constant refusals, that moment took the place of a happy memory with my dead grandfather. Every time you rolled over and ignored me all night because I was actually brave enough to tell you that I didn’t want something, that moment took the place of a happy memory of spending time with my sister as a child. Every time you forced me to watch you get high, knowing I had a strong distaste for drugs, so that you could “love me,” that moment replaced a night with family spent by the campfire at my childhood home. I can’t get those memories back… and more so, I can’t get rid of the memories you left behind. You not only stole my virginity, sexually abused me on-and-off for six years, and made me feel like a lesser being for more than four years, but you also stole precious memories with the people who really matter to me. You stole my childhood and my adult years all-in-one.

I try to be honest with myself and others when I think about all of the time I spent with you. I was in an abusive relationship. My friends could see that. My family could see that. It took me a little longer than them, but I could see it too. But you, years after, you still refuse to admit that you abused me. Blatantly, you raped me for years. In every one of our serious “talks” where you, once again, attempted to explore the wreckage that you left behind for everyone else to clean up, I would explain that I struggle because I was abused for years, and you (without fail) would always say, “Was I really that bad?” Still to this day, eight years later, you refuse to admit who you truly were.

I’ve moved on, and happily so. I’m getting married in a few months to man who was strong enough to not to try to fix me, but to support me in fixing myself. And he understands that I will probably have flashbacks of things you did to me for the rest of my life. But if and when we talk, you tell me how much you miss me. You tell me you will never find a girl like me again, a girl who would have done anything for you. This statement is always very upsetting to me. And here’s why: I was never that girl. When you tell me you will never find a girl like that again, you’re basically telling me you enjoyed abusing me all that time. I did anything for you because, quite frankly, you would have forced me to anyways or you would have made me feel like a worthless human being if I hadn’t.

Six years ago, I finally got the courage to stand up for myself and leave you. And I had to kiss another boy to do it. I had to drag another human being into your black storm. I had tried to break up with you before he got involved. I told you I needed a week to think about things and that I needed a week to myself. And you will still deny this to this day, I’m sure, but you told me “You’re not allowed to do this to us.” And I, of course, conceded. You took away my basic right to make life choices for myself. So, I got desperate. I couldn’t see a way out, so I did what I had to do to survive: I kissed another boy while you were sleeping. This was the extent of me “affair.” I don’t know if I would even call it that. But it gave me the courage to tell you it had happened, and I thought you would leave me immediately. You were so attached to perfect world you had created for yourself without my consent that you did the unthinkable: You told me you didn’t want to break-up with me. You made me promise to never talk to him again and that we would get through this… And you immediately called your mother and told her everything. Making me feel the same way as I did when you shoved your member in my face repeatedly. You used my shame to get what you wanted. For that week, you held me more than ever before, you were nicer to me than you’d ever been, and you frequently told me you loved me. But I’d never felt so trapped in my life. You touched me and my entire being cringed. You told me you loved me, and I returned those three little words with no life in them. Your niceties didn’t feel so nice to me. It was like a shroud had been lifted and I couldn’t put it back in place. That was the best week of my life.

Since then, you’ve tried to rope me back in a few times, almost succeeding once. You’ve even gone as far to have a baby to try to make me feel, I’m not entirely sure, jealous? You’ve moved about 26 miles away, and it is comforting to have that distance. But you still miss the girl who would do anything for you. And I still miss the person I was before you. I long for the alternate life I would have lived if you’d never used my low self confidence against me that first night that we met. And I frequently wonder if you treat all of your subsequent girlfriends the way you treated me. One of them tried to tell me you did after you two broke up, but her stories were nothing in comparison to mine. She just wanted to slander your name, while I was cowering behind it.

So now, eight years after I met you, six years after I left you, four years after you decided I wasn’t the scum of the earth anymore, and one year after I told you I didn’t want you in my life, I finally feel like I’ll be okay. You still have a hold on me, and I’m scared to death to see you or hear from you again. But my shroud was lifted, and you can’t ever put it back.