After some very public abuse allegations a month ago, women everywhere started a "why I stayed" campaign, giving their reasons for staying in an abusive relationship.
I started thinking of all of the reasons I had stayed in my relationship with my older children's father for five years.
If I heard him coming up the stairs I immediately wondered what I had done wrong. He called me every name in the book and I thought that so long as I didn't believe it then I wasn't being controlled. Did I think I was a "stupid bitch" or a "stunned cunt"? No, of course not. I was a strong confident woman.
He blamed me for his behaviour, he told me that if I didn't push his buttons he wouldn't react that way. I knew better, I would confidently say "it's not my fault that you are abusive".
What I am getting at here is that I am, and always have been, strong, confident and sure of myself. People have this image in their minds of women who get abused and how they must be too weak or have such a low view of themselves that they put up with it. I said all the right things, I told him I wouldn't allow him to speak to me that way, that he was abusive and I didn't deserve it - but every night I still let him crawl into bed next to me, every fight I accepted his apology, I even posted all over Facebook about how much I loved him.
Why?
I stayed because I saw leaving as giving up - admitting defeat.
I stayed because I wanted the perfect family.
I stayed because he had me convinced that maybe I was exaggerating.
I stayed because "all relationships take work"...right?
I once had to call the police so that I could get out if the house with my infant daughter - he had been screaming and throwing things all morning and I was terrified that he'd hurt me too.
But I stayed.
He once told me "maybe if you had gone to the gym more I wouldn't have cheated on you"
But I stayed.
He constantly told me that I should quit my job because "wives and mothers who care about their families don't spend all of their time in a bar"
But I stayed.
He constantly told me that I was lazy and needed to get a full time 9-5 job to pull my weight, that when he met me he thought I was smart, and going places but that he was wrong.
But I stayed.
He cheated on me for a total of 8 months - starting when I was pregnant with our son.
But I stayed.
On more than one occasion my daughter wiped the tears from my eyes and said "I'm sorry daddy's so mean to you" she has even insterted herself between us and yelled with conviction "HEY! Stop yelling at my mum!"
But I stayed.
I wanted the perfect life, I wanted to perfect family. I didn't want to admit to myself or to anyone else that I had gotten it wrong. I thought that it would just be a weight that I would carry on my shoulders. That as long as he never touched me, or hurt the children then I could just handle it.
I figured that was just my life - and I was strong enough to handle what it threw my way.
So why did I leave?
I left because I imagined a day where I had to wipe the years from my daughter's eyes as she cried the same tears I have been crying.
I left because I wanted my son to grow up in a home where women were treated with respect, so that he too would respect women.
Even if he never treated the kids the way he treated me, I was showing them it was acceptable by staying. I don't want them to be part of a relationship like that if their parents. I want them to be happy.
So I left.
I still have scars that no one will ever see, I still fear that others will begin to get so aggravated by me, I still wonder if maybe it was my fault.
But I'm that much closer to freedom.
