Nobody was labeled back when I married mine. What HE wanted was more important than what anybody else needed. He spent a minimum of an hour every morning styling his hair & then he used a whole can of hair spray to make sure it stayed looking perfect for the rest of the day. When he came home at night (always after the last bar closed) everything better look perfect or he was going to beat somebody’s ass…mine as I was the ONLY other person living there except for his 3 y/o daughter.
He treated me like a queen until about a week after we were married & suddenly I couldn’t do anything right. About 3 months after we were married, he started in with the girlfriends. He kept talking about bringing one of them home so he could watch the 2 of us having “fun”. Since there was NO way to stop him from going out, I was just thankful that he stayed out with them as I didn’t care to participate. My list of excuses for WHY I had a new bruise got so long that I couldn’t remember which one I had used last.
The girlfriends & the beatings went on for years. When they became more frequent & more severe, I went to the local sheriff’s office to see what alternative I had. The cop laughed at me & told me that since I had married him that I was now his property & there was nothing that they nor I could do unless he killed me & then they could arrest him for murder. That unnerved me. Next time I called home, I shared with my Mom what was going on. She told me that my family didn’t believe in divorce & she had told me to NOT marry him. Since I had chosen to NOT listen, she felt it was up to me to learn how to make him happy enough to leave me alone. Then she said “Make the best of it girl”. He wouldn’t allow me to have any friends, so I had absolutely NO one to turn to. At one point, he latched onto one girl that he liked & they became a full-time couple. I later learned that he met her the day before she was to get married & he talked her out of marrying the guy because he loved her & wanted her for himself. She didn’t show up for her wedding because he asked her not to. She learned on Christmas Eve that year that he had a wife & child much to her dismay.
Their affair became so blatant that it was impossible to ignore. He came home one night after being out for the weekend with her & beat me for having a boyfriend. A few days later I come home to find that he had thrown her a birthday party at our home & had screwed her in my bed. He went so far as to place her used panties under my pillow & expected me to clean up the trash from the birthday party. At that point, I decided that I could NOT stay any longer & I started looking for a place to live. After I found a decent place that I could afford, I told him I was leaving. He hugged me & told me how much he loved me & how much he wanted me to stay. When I didn’t back down on leaving, he grabbed me by the throat & told me that he’d kill me IF I tried to leave. Where the words came from I’ll NEVER know but I told him “You can’t kill me because I’m dead already…ending my life would be a blessing for me”. He said that he didn’t want me to move & that he’d move out. Then he did NOTHING toward finding a place to live, so I started circling in the newspaper good places he could afford. By week 3, he realized that I was serious & he found a place for himself & his girlfriend right across the street from where we were living.
Any time they came home around the same time that I was getting home, he made sure to give her a big old kiss…just so I could see it. He ALWAYS seemed to sense when I had a date because he’d show up to threaten me as to what would happen IF I went on my date. By then I was regaining some of my self confidence & I ignored him & still went out & had a good time. It was sooo nice to be with someone who treated me like a lady & NEVER once threatened to hit me!!!
Once out, I couldn’t consider ever going back. I saved up my money & filed for divorce. I didn’t want to complicate things so I asked for NOTHING except that I get my maiden name back as I NO longer wanted to be identified by his name!!! I got my divorce & I NEVER looked back!!!