strongerthanyouthinkyouare

[strongerthanyouthinkyouare]

New Year Will Be A New Me!

This year was extremely rough, to say the least.

On November 5th, 2023 I was beaten, I couldn’t walk, and thinking wasn’t an option for me. I realized I had a traumatic brain injury at the time thanks to a doctor I spoke with a few months later. I had thirty-three bruises that covered my entire body. I could barely move and still had to be a mother.

I sat in the shower that night combing chunks of hair out of my head as I sat there crying in pain from the abuse I endured that day.

I left after I could walk a little more and moved into my father’s house without my children while my husband lived at his father’s home.

I couldn’t even take care of myself, how could I take care of my children?

My dad took care of me. He helped me to the bathroom, helped me change my clothes, shopped, and cooked for me. He watched me cry in pain and cry over the loss of my family that I worked so hard to create over 11 years of my life. He still loved me when I would be aggressive towards him because I didn’t understand what was happening to me.

After A Short While

I completed my associate's degree in March and I was unable to get excited because I was struggling so hard to see that I was healing. I still struggled with walking but I realized that I couldn’t just sit in my house alone. I started to go to church, and visit friends and family thinking I was healing.

I explained to my husband I was done with him after I left. He beat me I couldn’t go back to him.

My husband assumed I was seeing someone by word of mouth because I stayed with a friend I knew wouldn’t let anything happen to me. We were roommates a long time ago and I needed someone to listen. If you know me you know I am not one to do what he accused me of doing.

My husband cut my phone off and dropped my children off at one in the morning making it harder for me to heal. He only managed them for a short time, 2 months, in their entire lives.

I was there through every meal, every illness, every injury. I was there late at night when they couldn’t sleep, they would have a nightmare, and sometimes it wasn’t one but all four that would be going through the same things.

I never minded taking care of my children I homeschooled them for 6 years, managed my household, and still managed to attend all of my college courses until I was beaten.

It broke my soul to have to leave them there knowing I wouldn’t be able to do what I could with them. I was made to feel like a bad mother and I felt it too.

I still feel that way sometimes even now I know what I have accomplished in a short time and it helps me see their happiness. Something I never really thought I would see again.

I want them to have an amazing Christmas this year and I have a tree that I can’t wait to put up, in my first apartment ever as a 33-year-old mother of four.

They will only see me at my best from now on. I can not have them believe I wasn’t there for them.

Over the last year, I have done everything I can to heal and continue healing to get away from my abuser. He manipulated me, controlled what I did, and when I did it, said he changed just for me to go back again.

I was not myself anymore. I was constantly thinking I was in the wrong for doing anything. Some beliefs I felt I could not get past even if I started going to therapy no one would listen they would start to believe I was insane.

Some Changes I Started To Make

My husband told me that I was not allowed to come back to him until I checked myself into Deaconess-Cross-Pointe. So I did. I went believing there was something wrong with me. I remember thinking “If I could change myself maybe he would love me again.”

When I got there after about two weeks into my treatment they gave me information to call Albion and I stayed and waited for them to come to me. They have seen me at some of the worst moments in my life.

I went to partial treatment every day thinking about how fun the classes were and how they were so encouraging. I took it as something I could learn to help other people as well as myself.

However, I didn’t understand how much of an impact that program had on my life until recently. I still kept doing it and feeling like my life was “never” going to get better. I didn’t understand what they were preparing me to handle but I am sure they did.

It wasn’t perfect I made mistakes, ruined family connections, and lost all sense of myself after being beaten, sodomized, and strangled repeatedly for over an hour. My setbacks just taught me what I didn’t need in my life anymore.

I am now ready for the future though things aren’t perfect. Still, I have bills to pay, and though I feel like I do not deserve to be helped some days, I still wake up every morning to WALK into work.

I have a job that gives me purpose now with people I feel have taught me more than things I never knew.

I have helped build a community that deserves more than what they are going through right now. We came from a shelter and we all have places to live now. I know we are all struggling to do better and pay bills, it will get better because we know it will.

Without them, I feel as if things would have been twice as hard to accomplish. They have been so incredibly supportive of me and my goals. I can’t wait to pay them back in the future for everything they have done for me.

They have become family to me and accept me for me without judgment. They give guidance in the stories they tell from their pasts and believe in me more than anyone ever has. I owe them more than I can give them and try to help them in every way I can.

In 2025, I will become the person I value because of the family we have created. Without them I would not have gotten this far, I look forward to the future we can build together and the past we can learn to build from not live in.

Click the links to see some things I have accomplished over this year to give you a better idea of how hard I have worked toward our future.

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