NOT Defeated

I want to start this off by saying that some of these details may not be 100% accurate, but this is how I felt, this is what I remember, and I pray that this guy has changed. I pray that this is not the person he really is. This may be scattered and not perfectly put together. This was hard. I've been working on gathering my thoughts for several weeks. But this is my story, and I hope that it can help people who might feel the way I did.

Abuse.

I didn’t realize that that was what it was until over a year after it happened.

Abuse.

A difficult label for me to place when I still struggle with blaming myself. Second guessing everything that went wrong. I didn’t want to be labeled as that girl who cried “abuse”.

“But you didn’t have any bruises or physical damage.”

Abuse is not just physical- it is not just bruises and broken bones. Abuse is to “treat with cruelty or violence, especially regularly or repeatedly.” Sometimes abuse is just control. Sometimes it’s just emotional/verbal.

Emotional and verbal abuse is an interesting cycle. It’s different from criticism and playful banter. It doesn’t start off as abuse.

This story starts after I was saved. I wanted nothing but Jesus. I was healed of anxiety and depression; I was living a whole new life. I didn’t want a relationship to distract me from my spiritual growth. I didn’t want to be distracted by any love interests; I didn’t want the pressure of a relationship. I wanted to work on myself and if a Godly man came along in the future then I would see what God had planned for me at that time. I was giving myself at least a year. A year to learn more discipline in my relationship with Jesus, a year to be fully dedicated to school, worship leading, and youth leading.

I wasn’t far into my first semester in college when I met someone over social media. We had several things in common so we became friends quickly. After being friends for a few weeks there were some feelings. I stressed that I did not want a relationship. I stressed that I wanted to grow spiritually and that I just wanted to be friends for the time being, we would see what would happen in the future.

He didn’t live in the same state as me, but he happened to have family that lived near my area. Because of him living in a different state, we would spend time on video calls. I was happy to be building a friendship. He had developed my trust, but ever so slowly the trust that he had gained had been used as power over me.

I have always been the girl that got along better with guys. I’ve always had more guy friends than girl friends, it was always easier for me to talk to guys.

There was one guy (let’s call him Frank) that I had two of my classes with. The classes were back to back. If I missed a class he would get me the notes, if he missed a class I would get him the notes. He usually missed more classes than I did, so one day he came up to me when I was on the way to our second class together. He was asking what he had missed, I told him about all the notes we took and our upcoming quiz while we walked to our next class together. Frank thanked me for always helping him out and offered to buy me a snack from one of the machines since he was stopping to grab a quick snack before our next class. I told him that I didn’t mind helping him and that he didn’t owe me anything for it. It was a nice gesture. And since I am a person that just really loves people, I told the guy about how nice it was of Frank to do that for me. But the guy didn’t think it was nice at all. He responded out of jealousy, saying that the guy liked me and that I should be careful. I didn’t really think much of it. But it started to become a regular occurrence. And after some time he started to twist it and make me seem like a girl that wanted a bunch of attention from guys, like I was cheating on him when we weren’t even dating.

But this was just the beginning. Throughout the next few months there were a variety of things done to manipulate me, but the reason I stayed for the time I did was this: he started to chip away at my feelings, self-worth, and independence. It was almost as if he rewired my brain.

If you’ve read my other journals, you know that confidence was a big thing for me. It took me a long time to get to my level of confidence. And within just a few months of talking to this guy, it had all crumbled. Jokes were made at my expense, he would call me out on things in front of other people when he came to visit instead of waiting to talk to me when it was just the two of us, he minimized my accomplishments and things that I was a part of and proud of, and more.

But I didn’t think much of these things. I thought that it was normal for there to be jealousy and teasing. I didn’t know what a Godly man looked like, and so because I knew that he went to church and believed in God, I thought that he was one. And every time something was done to hurt me or target me, he would say something nice, or say something that made me seem like I must have been the luckiest girl in the world to have a guy like him give me attention.

But he captured me with other things. When his controlling tendencies would take over he would make it seem like it was caring instead of controlling. I would tell him about things that were upsetting me, things that were close to my heart (law enforcement stuff for example), and instead of him being there and listening, he would want me to stop talking about it and cut me down for reading about it. He would tell me to delete all of my friends on Facebook that would share related information (that was also because he didn’t really like me talking to one of the friends that I had made through my Law Enforcement United trips that I talked to regularly). I would share my interests with him and he would knock them down and give reasons as to why there were wrong and why I needed to change my viewpoint on them. I was not educated enough. He was always right. He was just ‘helping me out’.

There was a youth event that I had committed to the same weekend that he was coming to meet me in PA, so we went together. It was just the two of us in the car, and when we were almost there he reached his hand out to me. He wanted me to hold his hand. We were just friends, so I got nervous.

“We’re just friends.” I told him.

“I know,” he said as he tried to laugh it off, but still kept his hand stretched out to me. “But, if something happened to me on my way home at the end of the weekend…wouldn’t you feel bad for not holding my hand?” And that was it. Though I didn’t want to, I held his hand.

That same weekend he told me of his past relationships, relationships that he had rushed through, but I didn’t realize then that rushing was a tendency with emotional abuse. I thought that he was just a man who was so excited for his future and to start a family. Then he told me that he loved me as we sat on my living room floor. I was not wanting to say it back. He meant it in a romantic way and I still only wanted a friendship, he knew this, and so he let it go for the time being.

But that same night we sat across from each other just a few minutes before he had to head back home. He kept trying to kiss me, and just like the hand holding, I was not wanting to do it. Friends don’t kiss each other. I kept dodging it; he would laugh it off, and then try it again. I had tried to dodge it again when he grabbed my hips and pulled me into him, getting me to kiss him. I liked him, but that wasn’t what I wanted. So when he got home I clarified that to him. He said that he understood.

Life went back to how it was before he came to PA. One night we had a deep conversation, just talking about what we wanted our individual futures to look like. Some things were similar. We both wanted to do ministry, which was really awesome to me. But, within this conversation there were also things that we didn’t see eye to eye on. Like, if we were to have to make a decision on something, we would talk about it and if we still didn’t agree then he would make the final decision. We disagreed on things like if he were to cheat on me that it would be wrong for me to eventually leave. He told me what opinions I would need to change if we were ever to do ministry together. That his opinions were the correct ones. That our future would be based on him. These things all concerned me, but they were things that we could work on, right? As we talked about other things, talked about things that the other could work on, he would blame things on his past and on his family instead of taking responsibility for what he needed to work on.

We would have deep conversations about our past. I told him secrets that other people didn’t know, I trusted him with stuff that I was struggling with. I had been living in shame for years, and to tell him about my past was a big deal to me. I didn’t want to just tell everyone about it. We were building a friendship, and if this friendship was to turn into anything else in the future I would want him to know the big stuff. But I soon realized that he was not going to help me get rid of my bondage and shame, instead more bondage was created and he didn’t value what I trusted him with.

The next time that he was in PA, the thing that I had reminded him about friendship totally went out the window.

“We’re already basically dating. We kiss, we talk about the future, you just don’t want to commit and call it a relationship.”

He still kept trying to pressure me into saying I love you. He didn’t understand why I wouldn’t say it back. He would keep trying to cross boundaries, I kept trying to push him away or tell him no. And then came a response that scared the crap out of me…

“I have a hard time listening to the word ‘no’.”

He kept trying and I just gave up on trying to fight him. I was drained. I trusted him with all of my secrets and he took advantage of them. He was creating more bondage and shame than what I had started with. This occurred for the rest of that visit.

I felt trapped, hurt, confused, broken, and more. Who was going to accept me after all of this? I blamed myself for what he did. I blamed myself for talking to other people. I started to push away the things that I loved. He had me under his control.

When he went back home we would spend almost every single moment on the phone. We had to work around his schedule. I wasn’t allowed to watch videos on my computer or listen to music or anything, I had to wait on him, even if he was doing other things as we were on the phone. He treated me like I was his possession. He didn’t want me around my other friends, even the girls. I was to make a decision between him and my best guy friend who was basically a brother to me.

He would continuously do things to hurt me, like send me stuff on social media that he knew would make me upset to the point that I would cry. And I didn’t think that I could just hang up or log out, I was scared of him, but I also couldn’t leave him because I wanted a future and he was the only way I could have one…no one else would want me after everything that I had done. No one would want a girl with a past like mine.

This continued for months, and then came Passion 2017. He didn’t like the people I was going down with, he didn’t like who I sat with on the way down. He had been given the opportunity to go, but he denied it because he “would go crazy if he knew I was in the same arena but not be able to see me”.

So when I saw Jack on the very first night of Passion 2017, I felt like the cheater that the guy had claimed I was. It was wrong of me to think that Jack was attractive when there was a guy that I was lucky even liked me. That night I told the guy that I wouldn’t be talking to him for the rest of the trip, I needed to focus on Jesus while I was there. I had been filled with so much guilt and anger that I just didn’t want to face the guy, I needed Jesus to bring me through it.

After I talked to Jack on day 2 I went into the arena and cried my eyes out because I felt like a monster for having an interest in him.

“Kendall, you guys aren’t even dating.” My friend would keep saying. But my friend didn’t know. He didn’t know about my bondage, about everything that had happened. I kept praying that God would put Jack in my path if there was something better for me, and that something better for me was Jack.

On the way home I told the guy that I couldn’t do it anymore. The way that God had strengthened me during Passion was the only reason that I was able to get out.

The guy apologized, told me he would back off this time, and then asked me if it was because I had met someone else. I didn’t know what to say. I wasn’t just leaving because I met Jack, but I still felt guilt that I was interested in Jack. I was afraid of what he would do, or what he would say.

When I got home I told my mom everything. I told her about how angry the guy had made me, everything he had done, and I thought that that was it. I thought it was over.

Once Jack and I started dating he asked me why I still had the guy as a friend on Facebook. I didn’t have a good reason at the time, but I soon realized that it was because I was afraid of him. I didn’t want him to say stuff to Jack to make me look like I did stuff. What had happened was not what I wanted, but there was still guilt and shame that I was carrying around, even after I thought that I had been over it.

I didn’t realize that I wasn’t over it until almost a year and a half after I had gotten out. There are things that Jack will do that just trigger me. He won’t even do anything wrong, but it takes me back to that guy. And one night when something happened that triggered me, I told Jack that it triggered me because it was something that the guy used to do. And right after I told him about why it triggered me, I felt the need to look into abusive relationships. That was when I really realized that I had been in one. So many things that I had been struggling with, questions that I was asking myself about what had happened, so much of it was answered as I read through articles about signs of abuse. I had been so hard on myself. I didn’t want to label him as an abuser. I didn’t want to be labeled as that girl. But, looking at all of the signs in the articles, relating to almost every single one, I realized that I was not labeling him as something that he was not. I was scared of him. I’m still kind of scared of him. I’m scared and shaking as I write this, and that’s why I kept him on my social media for so long. That’s why I hesitated when Jack asked me about removing him. I was genuinely scared that he would do something or say something about me…when really the whole thing was me being trapped. I liked him, but I didn’t want to kiss him. I liked him, but I didn’t want him to touch me. I liked him, but I didn’t want him to control me. He made me feel like someone that I am not. He tried to get me to choose between him and people that had been solid people in my life. I carried this shame around for over a year and a half. It took me that long to finally come to just a realization that I had been abused.

It still leaves an ache in my chest. The thing is, you can read this and call me stupid, claim that I’m just being over dramatic, and maybe some of it is, but that doesn’t change the fact that this was a real thing that I went through. Emotional abuse is just as damaging as physical abuse. It’s something that I still struggle with.

I can go days without even thinking about it, without even being triggered by it…but there are some days that I can’t help but just curl up into a ball and cry for long periods of time. Those things are normal. I was abused. But what I choose to do every day determines if it’s healthy or not. I can choose to live every day as the victim, or I can choose to pick my head up every morning and focus on the fact that whatever Satan tries to put in my path to stop me, God is going to open a door to more relationships and even more potential than what I would have had if Satan hadn’t tried to hurt me. What Satan intends to harm you with, God will use as a blessing.

You must drop the victim mentality to pick up the responsibility of freedom. Choose to not be the victim. You may have been abused, but you are NOT defeated. And because of that I am sharing my story. I hope that if you’re going through this type of situation or have someone in your life that isn’t treating you right that you would come to the realization that you deserve better and that there is better out there.

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If you or someone you know might be in an abusive relationship then get help!

Here’s a link to signs of abusive relationships, along with resources and contacts if you’re in need of help:

https://www.thehotline.org/is-this-abuse/abuse-defined/

1 Corinthians 13:4-7

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.