Just a couple hours before writing this, I melted down over past traumas. I was able to eventually voice what I felt like to my husband of 6 months (an amazingly gentle and kind Godly man). After enduring traumas from 30 years of marriage to a covert narcissist, functioning alcoholic, and porn addict who chronically lied, emotionally and verbally abused me, this is how I was able to put words to my pain to my new love that makes me feel safe…
(Below are my heart and emotions, representative of but not actually real life events.)
I am still trying to break free from the woman who I had become. I felt like I was sold at a young age to a smooth talker who told me that I had to wait on a street corner for him.
Whenever he wanted to have sex with me, he would pick me up, buy me fancy things and treat me like a princess. But he soon would grow tired or bored of me, and then he would rip away everything he had just given me and return me to the street corner to wait. Sometimes he would push me out as he sped away, sometimes he would make me walk a block or two, and sometimes he would convincingly reassure me that he would be right back.
But I always felt like I was waiting for him to return. He had a way of making my life stand still while I waited for him.
On that imaginary street corner, I felt unwanted, dirty, undesirable, and unsure of when or how he would act when he would return. We were married, so I watched sadly as all the other cars would drive by, and if anyone asked, I would tell them, “I’m fine,” and force a small smile. But there I waited, and the longer I waited, the more fearful I would feel. Anticipation mixed with panic when his car would come near. I never knew what kind of mood he would be in, or whether he would even want me at all.
People would tell me to pray for him, so I prayed. People would tell me that marriage was hard, so I pressed on. People would tell me that all men looked at porn, so I tried harder to be better for him, to be enough to fulfill all his desires. As time went by, though, I forgot who I was. I no longer believed anything he said, and I doubted myself. I doubted that I had ever known what love really was.
I no longer looked for a way to get off that street corner, because I thought it was the life that I deserved. This was the life I had to endure because I chose to marry him… “until death do us part.”
Death was the only way out, I thought, and he didn’t care that I wanted to die. He didn’t even believe that I felt like that, so he mocked me and blamed me for making his life harder when I tearfully told him that I wanted to die. “Show me how to use the gun so that I can do it right,” I pleaded. “Stop being manipulative,” he said. I stood there and cried.
ALONE. WORTHLESS. ASHAMED.
I laid it all down at the cross… angrily, I forfeited my life to the God who I had wanted to please my whole life, but as much as I strived for perfection, I always fell short. I had nothing and was nothing, and everything around me appeared gray and dirty. I didn’t want any of it, and I knew that no one wanted me, because even the man who said he loved me didn’t want me.
THE WORD LOVE MEANT NOTHING TO ME… until Jesus stepped in.
A NEW CAR AT MY STREET CORNER… A soft and kind voice said, “Get in. Let me take you away from here.”
JESUS RESCUED ME. I need his help even now to stop feeling like the discarded woman on the street corner. I need his help to heal, and for him to finish his good work in me. He provided me with a good man with arms to hold me and dry my tears, which will help the process, but I rely on Jesus to do the heavy lifting in my life now, because I laid myself down for him, and he was the one to pick me up and gather me in his hands when I was dust.
I LOVE YOU, LORD JESUS. Thank you for continuing to heal my heart.