One Woman’s Amazing Story Of Surviving Domestic Violence

My freshman year at college, I slipped quietly and discreetly into a middle seat inside a packed classroom. I looked down at my notebook paper. I began scribbling notes about rocks and a science I obviously failed to retain as I can’t tell you what course it was.

Hiding my greasy, unkempt ponytail was a dirty white ball cap with bright red embroidered letters displaying an Ole Miss logo. I wasn’t sitting in a University of Mississippi classroom. Instead, my seat was at a college in West Virginia. There were almost 10 hours between Mississippi and me.

The night before, my then husband was angry. He was always pissed off, fired up and ready to ram a fist into any unprotected part of my body. I remember the first time he impaled hurt upon my face. He threw a remote, and it crashed against my forehead. I cried instantly, but not from the pain. I cried from the betrayal.

My earliest memory of being belted was at the age of 5. I thought I had escaped those days. I hadn’t—my insecurity and need to have a home led me right into another kind of hell. After the remote incident, a cycle began. Hitting, making up and a few quiet days followed by another so-called injustice done to him. A repetitive pattern played out the same way every time. Each penetrating hurt came with apologies: I didn’t mean to. It won’t happen again. I love you. You make me so fucking angry. If you wouldn’t make me upset, I wouldn’t lose control. You make me this way.

When my first fall semester started, he was angry over economics—not our personal finances but my economics class. He didn’t like that it was a large auditorium-style class and screamed about how I sat next to other men. He ranted that I was a whore, a slut. I dropped the class.

I continued working full time to support us. I hung onto my university classes because an education was the way to achieve a better life; I would get a good job and things would be better. We were married on New Year’s Eve of 1999. Our honeymoon suite had left us instructions in case Y2K actually happened. They said not to use the fireplace to cook food.

Our honeymoon lasted two days. And, for those two days, I was OK. When we returned, rage unpacked itself back into our two-story, century-old farmhouse. My spring semester began allowing me to escape back to campus life.

You can read the rest of this absolutely amazing story on Scary Mommy. And remember, there's always a way out. If you're currently in a dangerous situation, get help before it's too late.