That’s what the enemy had me convinced of—he’s a good liar. I was a lost soul and I believed his lies. I had become someone I swore for years that I would never become. I became weak, needy, and dependant. I thought I needed a man in my life bad enough, that I was willing to look past being treated so poorly. Now, he never raised a hand to me, but he sure knew how to mess with my mind. He had such control over me. I pretended it was okay to be treated that way, but deep inside I knew it wasn’t. I just wasn’t strong enough to break away.

I was getting older and the thought of being old and alone started to bother me, so I allowed myself to be in this unhealthy relationship. I had zero self-esteem. I put up with things I never should have, but the depression was getting worse and I didn’t think enough of myself to try to stop it. I thought I was too far gone for change. I didn’t care about myself at all, so I did the only thing I knew—I kept drinking more and more so that I could get through it. It’s how I learned to get through every area of my life.

Jesus was not in my heart at that time. I’m sure this never would have happened if He had been. But I just kept getting deeper and deeper into the enemy’s pit. The worst incident that happened took place about a year into the relationship. We were at a family party (his family). It was an extremely hot summer day, somewhere over 100 degrees. Normally I would have had tons of alcohol to drink, but I knew I couldn’t because of the heat. I had learned the hard way in the past that heat and alcohol just didn’t go well with me. It would make me very ill, so I never drank in extreme heat again. I drank water all day at this party. Since I was driving, he drank as much as he wanted. I don’t know how much he consumed, but everything was okay until there started to be some tension among some of the people. It’s always a bad idea to have alcohol around people who don’t get along. Toward the end of the party a fight broke out. It was one of the scariest moments of my life. I honestly thought someone was going to get seriously injured or die that night. The police were called out and they calmed everybody down and asked us all questions. Nobody went to jail that night. I convinced the officers that I was okay to drive, so they had me take him home.

It was dark, it was getting late and I was driving in an unfamiliar area trying to get an angry intoxicated man home. He started saying cruel things to me. He said we were through and not to call him ever again. It didn’t even really register at first because I think I was still in shock and numb from what I had just witnessed. After he was done telling me we were over, he started saying some pretty hateful words. He was so angry toward the people he was fighting with. I won’t repeat his words, but I can tell you that they were evil and criminal. It was pretty scary thinking what if he had acted on what he was saying he wanted to do, but he didn’t. He was just beyond angry.

Now you’d think after all that, I would have had enough of the mental abuse. But no, that wasn’t the case. He called me the next day and did some sweet talking. What did I do?  Yep, I caved. I truly became the woman I said I would never become and I put up with it for another couple of years. This is very hard to admit.

But once again, I see now how God was there for me. He had started working behind the scenes in this relationship. It slowly became a long distance relationship because he got a job quite far from me. Long distance relationships rarely work for a long period of time.  I continued to endure mental abuse for a while—I think it was even worse long distance. But little by little, we really started to drift apart. I have no doubt in my heart that God made everything happen the way it did so I could finally break free. My miracles of sobriety and deliverance from depression all happened while we were apart. God was really reaching me while I was on my own again. He wouldn’t have been able to reach me otherwise…I can see that now.

The Lord gave me the strength and courage to break it off. It took a while to get him to hear that we were truly over. The Lord had completely changed my heart and I no longer had feelings for him. The Lord had opened my eyes so wide that I saw everything that he had done. I forgave him with God’s help.  I thought at first maybe we could be friends still, but the Lord made it clear to me that it was not to be. I needed a clear break with no looking back. I don’t hate him. I find myself feeling kind of sorry for him. I even pray for him.

The sad thing is that he seems to only remember the good times we had together. We did have some nice times, but not many. I think he knows how good I was to him. But for me, all I can really recall are all the times he made me cry. Every time he said something to bring me down was just another hole being ripped into my heart. I remember having a knot in my stomach for just about the entire relationship. I had that horrible feeling of turmoil for as long as I can remember. But as soon as it was over, the knot and turmoil went away. It would have never worked and I am thankful to God for helping me to see the light.

Now that I have given the Lord complete control over every area of my life, I will never worry about that happening again. I am free. I am strong once again. I have hope. I am grateful. I no longer think badly of myself. I believe I deserve to be treated well. Perhaps some day a strong man of God will cross my path—if it’s God’s will. It’s whatever He wants for my life. I will just continue to serve the Lord and see where He leads me.

I wish I would have heard the words “Jesus loves you” or “There’s hope in Jesus” or anything that would have motivated me to reach out to God more during those dark days. I don’t know what might have happened, but I’d like to think it would have helped me sooner. That’s why I’m sharing this, maybe someone in a similar circumstance will see it and realize that they do not deserve to be treated badly. I pray it will encourage someone to take action sooner than later to do what’s necessary to get out of an unhealthy and/or abusive relationship.

It brings me such comfort knowing that I belong to God and that He is all I really need—He is all any of us really need. He will never bring us harm and nobody can ever love us like He does. ♥