I have no wish to continue living on survival mode

I'll start this from as earlier as I can remember. As honest as my memory allows me. As detailed as I can cope with.

I'll try to continue and not give up, or into fear. I'm here.

Nobody ever told me I needed a partner, I remember however, as a kid, thinking that the most beautiful human interaction was love. Being seen and entertained by someone other than yourself came across as the most outstanding exchange two beings could have or do for each other and themselves. I came to that conclusion myself, through my own eyes, as a very solitary child that truly watched and observed her surroundings.

I valued when, by putting some thought into which checker to move next on our checkers game, my grandfather gave me his time, thoughts, and attention. I have always understood when people truly wanted to  exchange therefore always struggled with shallow quick interactions. They never translated the magic I could see in people, how interesting and wonderful they could be. So never fully connected with those who shied away from their depths. I grew to be a very self-aware adult, maybe so much so that I passed straight through reality, walking a bit further to the other side - where I disregard myself to understand the unknown that others are.

When I was 21 years old, he invaded my life. It was the first time I completely disregarded my intuition. From the very beginning it was a very stressful and strange interaction. In a few weeks, it became out of control, and I was way too deep into the dive to be able to go back to the surface to catch air, there was one oxygen tank and it was his. He'd share as long as I kept quieting my inner voice. He never said that, the understanding was loudly subtle. There were too many distractions allied to alienate me just enough. I too had happened to forget that I had never entered the water. That I didn't even know how to swim properly let alone dive, and that there was oxygen all around us, it took me 5 years to remember that.

I was never comfortable around him, but there was some hope in the possibility that he offered that looked very sweet. It's very tormenting trying to justify or even to narrate the facts now because I can't remember the diving life, not now that I am fully aware of the actual picture. I guess I fell for the wish of the 4-year-old Amandinha, that quite early figured that love is the key.  Combined with a narcissistic man, obsessed with his needs and desperate for someone’s pedestal for him to climb in.

I had a month of what I believed to be a healthy relationship. Then he cheated and looked me in the eyes, weeping, and saying he'd never do that to me because I was different. I never kept track of how many times, but I know it was enough to make sure that my group of friends and I didn’t have enough fingers to count. Friends that I slowly saw fading from my life until there was nobody. It all sounds very dark and dramatic, and it was. I feel so sorry I couldn't be there for myself - nobody could.

Again, I can't add any beauty to these years because when I look at it all I see is a girl existing on survival mode. I'm not entirely sure that the thinking process was this, but I guess I got addicted to disregarding my gut feeling. (I believed that) I was worthless and useless, and that feeling was a perfect match with several life stories I’d seen. I gave my purest love, and myself to get the confirmation that my low self-esteem was the way it was as a reflection of reality, not the other way around. I had shaped my whole existence based on anything but myself - maybe it’s not that hard understanding people shying away from themselves after all.

I got my first punch because I was smiling. I was in awe when I found out that I was in love and I remember thinking "how nice to love someone this much" and feeling the big smile growing on my face, just to collapse with his knuckles, then several punches on my head, and all I could hear was that I was a whore. I was left alone in my car. He came back, I dropped him at his house, and went to mine. He called the next day and asked who had I told what happened. When I reassured him I wouldn’t tell anyone he then asked "do you want to break up? I don't.". I was so ashamed but moreover so incredulous that I couldn't associate what was happening. I had to make sense of that somehow and he was the only person I could share that secret with - I only now, 5 years later, realize that this might be what I was subconsciously thinking - I was just fragile and even more attached to him.

The next four years were a very slow process. I was becoming his shadow, slave, puppet, servant... I submitted myself to roles I have no idea how one can play. I wasn't trustworthy because I fully abandoned myself. I had him rapping me, opening a cut under my eye, punching me, kicking me, always pinching me as shown of affection, had he coming back home and saying that the shape of my vagina was slightly different and I had to prove I hadn’t cheated. Had things thrown at me. Had food thrown all over me just after my graduation in front of people. For over a year, I had my shins completely bruised and lumpy - he'd kick them for no reason other than his own entertainment and amusement.

I could, and maybe should keep describing every assault and aggression I can remember, but all the physical violence that occurred to me is gone and healed. Nothing compares to what happened to my mental capacity - then and now. I was psychologically tortured, constantly disregarded, ghosted, gaslighted, mansplained, and called out. I would never get it right, no matter what I'd do, and I did it all. I was his assistant, driver, spouse, cook, producer, filmmaker, video editor, help… everything, anything. I was once blamed for his phone being stolen from his pocket (needless to say by someone that wasn't me). I was left waiting at his parents while he was out with other girls despite a trip booked. I was slapped on the face because I didn't defend his honor when he had his toenails painted as a prank whilst we both slept on the couch. If I messaged I was needy, if I didn't I was, and I quote, "fucking someone". I had to come up with food ready, but any spending on ingredients was excessive. Anything that I'd do we should first call his mother to check on how to do - he'd mirror his lacks on me and assume I was as debilitated as him. He would shower once a week if much. He got an std once and tried to talk me into believing he got it by sharing towels with a friend after football (remember I said he didn’t shower? Not once he came home after football showered). There was no tone adequate or opening for any kind of conversation, no matter how sweet or softly I approached him, I’d always be I the unbearable shrew - often because he was lying and cheating, but also because there were no intention from him to care for me. I could keep writing atrocity after atrocity, but I just have no interest nor energy to keep reviewing these episodes for now.

I have never admired this man, not only once. And I can’t understand why I stayed more than a day, let alone 5 years. 

I can explain most of this monster's behavior - from being raised by a very problematic couple, in a violent environment, having always being told he was right no matter what, insecurities, and a complex of god, there are several reasons why he acts the way he does, but I will never accept nor understand acting on it by torturing another being. I went through all I did my entire life and I have never punished anyone for my encounters, past, or upbringing. I was, for almost 5 years, violated to depths I can't quite comprehend. It's been 4 years now since I got rid of him. All I want is to truly get ready of this tragedy. It's not fair I was punished for being naive, for being caught in the middle of my learning process, for believing in love, for wanting to share myself... It's not fair that my whole (new) life gets stuck and damaged because of someone that doesn't even exist anymore. 

I now have a life that doesn’t even linger on the past one. A life that I am building, started from scratch, all by myself, and I don't want to have an anchor from the past life here, trying to drag me away from the beauty I've found. Damaging and still torturing me to this day. I want peace, and to believe I deserve it as much as anybody else. I like the honesty I carried with my love beliefs when I was a child, and I want to feel like that again. Just like that.