Love After Abuse

Domestic violence has always been a part of my story. Impossible for it not to be, as it was a lifelong experience that shaped the way I see and interact with the world around me. There was a time when I claimed that part of my life unabashedly. I worked so hard to reclaim that portion of my identity that I once would have done anything in my power to change. But somehow, at some point, as time went on, it pains me to say that my feelings started to shift. As I got older, I felt like I was playing catch up. My perspective started to change & my internal dialogue went from giving myself grace to, ‘I’m in my 30s. I should know how to do this by now.’

For as long as I could remember, the experiences of getting dragged down the hallway, curling up under a dining table at 6 years old with a newborn baby while a solid wooden ottoman was hurled at me, or hiding under the seat of a minivan in a pitch black garage while my mother was 7,000 miles away showed up in every single thing that I did. I wish this weren’t the case. Because for so long, I looked internally for justifications for his actions. I ruminated. I thought, ‘If I could have been smarter, more accomplished…’ ‘If I….’ ‘If I….’ ‘If I….’ I spent my entire life carrying the weight of the idea that maybe a change in me would illicit a change in him. That way of thinking bled into every bit of my life. You could give me a gold medal for the mental gymnastics I did to justify cruelty.

See, I did everything in my power to humanize the man who wanted absolutely nothing to do with me. I bent over backward and put on a performance in exchange for acceptance. I felt like if I could just understand what it was about me or his life that made him so deeply unhappy, I could help him. I could fix it. If he gave me the chance, I was so confident I could fix it. I internalized his discontent, which was so deeply buried that it materialized in a rage so immense it was impossible to contain. 

When I look back, I feel like it should have been so easy to disconnect from someone whose presence only brought me pain. But I identified with the deep sadness he always seemed to have. And I was angry. I thought, maybe if someone in the generations before him could have just helped him, we wouldn’t be here. I wish I could tell you how badly I wanted someone to show up for him in the way I needed someone to show up for me. Sometimes I think that’s the mechanism of depression, you know?

I don’t really remember a life without depression. Depression becomes a part of who you are. And while we are able to find a way to manage the experience, it no longer becomes an illness to you. It becomes a part of your thought process, your ability to interpret and process information. It reorganizes your priorities. And it propels you to cling ever so tightly to the things that bring you even the slightest bit of joy. But at some point, depression becomes an asset. It provides you with empathy and a certain level of understanding... a certain level of humanity. You become more generous, more empathetic. You learn to give others the things you need, the things you have actively searched for. The sadness in me identified the sadness in him. I thought, ‘I know how heavy that is. Let me help you carry it.’ 

I wish I could tell you that I learned my lesson early on and had some acute awareness of how to spot the red flags in the early stages. I’m not proud of how I put my feelings and needs aside and empathized my way into painful patterns, experiences, and partnerships. I spent my entire life trying to put myself back together, piece by piece. But I found that I was so willing to abandon myself and drop everything to show up for someone who I believed might need it more than I do. 

I often worried that my experiences would make it impossible for me to know how to love. But I know now that is not the case. I never once looked at someone’s pain and determined they were not worthy of love. I continuously and gratuitously poured into others’ cups like I was some sort of waitress grating cheese onto your plate, waiting for you to just say when. They always tell you that you accept the love you think you deserve. But the reality is that I never knew what it was supposed to look like or feel like. The familiarity of the endlessly giving dynamic was a cycle I didn’t know how to break. I accepted breadcrumbs and indifference because I had convinced myself somehow that love and consideration were meant to be earned. How easy it is to fall into a cycle that treats love as a meritocracy.

But if there’s anything I’ve learned over the past few years, it’s that it’s not that I’m incapable of love. I used to cling so tightly onto this bitterness based on the belief that love simply did not exist. But that could not be further from the truth. I know that love exists because I am full of it. I’ve fought my entire life to stay alive. And while my experiences have been more painful than anything, and healing has felt like an upheaval, my capacity to love is boundless. I have chosen time and time again to give love despite my painful experiences. I will not allow life to rob me of the belief that there are people in this world whose goal is to meet you with the same warmth, patience, consideration, and kindness. While my past has conditioned me to assess for safety, I deserve healthy, loving, and reciprocal relationships. While there is a deep fear I have of repeating painful cycles, I move with intention, I hold myself accountable, and I am capable of building safe relationships where vulnerability is valued, and space is heldfor wherever I am in my journey. 

Open Letter to the Man Who Didn't Know How to Love Me

In 2015, after 22 years, my abuser silently packed his things and moved out of my home while I lived out of a hotel across the street. On January 1st of 2016, I burst into tears because all I could think about was, "I wonder what he had for dinner." It was at this moment, when I was reminded of my abuser & reminded of his humanity. It was at this moment that I began my healing process. I wrote this letter at 2am & let it go. 

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I now know that my self-worth is not dependent on the love I receive from others. 

Dear Dad, 

The past 22 years have been difficult. But I remember telling myself that the most difficult of obstacles that I would ever have to encounter were long gone. When I’d write letters or speeches to help inspire people to continue on when things got difficult, I’d always refer to my early teenage years as ‘rock bottom.’ But I guess rock bottom can always be redefined as we go along. Dad, I remember always being so terrified of relapsing and experiencing the debilitating depression I felt when I was 12 years old. But I found that perhaps 2015 was the year that I’d learn how to face my fears. And although this was the most difficult year I have encountered thus far, I discovered a resilience within myself that I thought I never had.

Dad, if you ever knew me well enough, you’d remember that I was probably your most difficult child. Perhaps that’s because I grew up to be just like the mother of your children - strong-willed, opinionated, and unable to accept mediocrity. And while I think that these were some of the most wonderful things that I’ve developed, I found that perhaps they were also the most difficult to contain. It was this combination of characteristics that kept me grasping ever so tightly onto an unattainable image or idea of what our family should have or could have been. And perhaps that unwavering sense of determination was what ultimately led me to experience disappointment in its cruelest form. 

Dad, if there’s anything that I have learned through all of this, it is that I am beyond capable. Do you remember that time when I was 5 years old and learning to ride a bike? I wanted to take those training wheels off so badly. But you said, “No, San. You’ll hurt yourself.” So I stole your screwdriver and took the training wheels off myself. I fell off my bike and scraped my hands and knees, but I dusted myself off and eventually rode my bike all around the house. Just to prove to you that I did it, even when you said I couldn’t. Do you remember when you told me I wouldn’t be able to get into a good school? And that I wouldn’t be smart or successful enough? You have no idea how many times I wanted to quit just in 2015. But I did it Dad. I’m graduating in the spring. Even when you said I couldn’t. 

Dad, when I was younger, I was so quick to tell myself that I hated you. And I’m ashamed to admit that at times, you made my blood boil. I’d lie awake at night asking myself why I never seemed to be good enough, why I couldn’t be ‘daddy’s girl,’ or why you let me sit by myself and watch all my friends lovingly hold their fathers during a daddy/daughter dance in the 8th grade. I was so young, asking myself, ‘what do they have that I don’t?’ And I found that perhaps that was a question I would not be able to answer until 2015. 

Dad, I finally answered that question when you packed your bags and moved out this year. And I discovered that the question was not about what they had that I didn’t, but rather what I have that they do not. And it’s a deeper and more robust understanding of how not to love my children. Dad, I spent the last 22 years thinking to myself, ‘If I weren’t such a burden...” “If I were smarter...” “If I were prettier…” etc. I kept thinking, “If I…..” hoping that perhaps a change in me would elicit a change in you. But I now realize that this was not at all the case. And it had nothing to do with whether or not I was smart enough, pretty enough, or less burdensome. But all to do with what I believed about myself. Dad, I learned that my self-worth is not dependent on the love I receive from others, but on the love that I give to myself. 

Dad, one of the most difficult but beautiful things that I had to learn how to tell myself throughout this entire process was, ‘I love my dad.’ Because I found that in being able to tell myself that, I was also able to love that part of me that I hated so much for such a long time. 

Dad, if there is anything that I want for you this year, it is for you to learn to love yourself in the way that I have learned to love myself. And I hope that you find that sense of peace that I hope to bring with me into 2016. Because Dad, you deserve it. You deserve all of it. And maybe you didn’t know how to love me, but I wish that you be able to learn how to love yourself. Because Dad, you are worthy of happiness just as much as anybody else is. You are worthy of the happiness that you never seemed to have. And Dad, I hope that you discover the single most important lesson that you taught me….that your self-worth is not dependent on the love you receive from others, but rather the love that you are able to give yourself. 

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If you or a loved one are experiencing domestic violence, please contact the domestic violence hotline at 1 (800) 799 - SAFE. You are not alone. 

The Mechanism of Depression

It's easy to give the "it gets better" speech. It's easy to look at someone that is suffering & utter those words simply because it's, what I believe, the easy way out. Because no one cares to explain to those who are suffering that the road to recovery is equal parts dim, bright, and hopeful. What no one cares to explain to those suffering from depression is that it consists of a series of recoveries and relapses. While I have experienced depression, I nonetheless recovered, relapsed, recovered, and relapsed... However, it was during this tumultuous portion of my life that I began to ask myself the question, "Am I going to feel this way forever? Is it a matter of chemical imbalances or is it a psychological matter? And if it is a matter of chemical imbalances, would I have to be placed on medication forever? But if not, would it require a philosophical cure? And if it does, how would I go about obtaining this change in perspective?" But through this process, I discovered that this internal tug-o-war between causes did not help the slightest bit. It only seemed to further complicate the issue at hand that was deeply embedded within my own personal identity. Depression becomes a part of who you are. And while we are able to find a means of recovering, it no longer becomes an illness to you. It becomes a part of your thought process, your intellectual ability to interpret and process information. It reorganizes your priorities. And for those who are recovering, it propels you to cling ever so tightly to the things that bring you even the slightest bit of joy. People often came to me and said, "just stick it out for a while. I think you can get through this." To which I respond, after experiencing periods of great turbulence, you start to believe and understand that to a certain extent, life is finite. There is a beginning and an end to human life. And once you begin to grasp that concept, you don't want to waste your time on depression, nullity, or mediocrity. It's a strange poverty of the english language, and many other languages that we use the word depression to describe how we feel when we're having a terrible day as well as the experience of the feeling of infinite internal nullity. And we then expect the word to hold its weight when expressing our concerns of great gravity. People then ask, "Isn't depression continuous with sadness?" And to a certain extent, there is a level of continuity. But there is a difference between feeling sad because you didn't have a fantastic day and waking up with that sadness as your default. And that sadness ultimately becomes a part of your reality. 

And upon discovering the discrepancies between sadness and depression, I stumbled upon the topic of resilience. We have all of these fantastic medical explanations for mental illness, some of which consist of chemical imbalances.... But there has yet to be an explanation for human resilience. And ultimately, I came to the conclusion that those who refuse to openly speak about or confront their issue of depression... those who refuse to look back and examine the root of their depression... are the ones that are more easily made slaves to their mental state. And those people who are able to confront the issue of their depression... those who are able to tolerate the notion of their depression... are the ones that ultimately achieve the coveted resilience. 

And when I discovered this, I also stumbled upon the idea that depression becomes an asset. Depression provides you with empathy and a certain level of understanding... a certain level of humanity. And once you begin to understand and come to terms with this, you become more generous, more empathetic. As you learn to give to others the things that you need, the things that you have actively searched for, & the things that you have yearned for. And it was through this realization that I discovered that perhaps depression serves a purpose within the world such that it provides us with a sense of empathy and generosity and forces one to ever so tightly grasp onto the things that bring us joy. And that, I think, is the greatest mechanism of depression.  #MentalHealthAwareness

Remembering My Why

It’s #WorldSuicidePreventionDay. In 2005, at 11 years old, I survived an attempted suicide… after spending my entire life in a home littered with domestic violence of almost every kind. 

In 2014, I decided to turn my instagram into a page dedicated to spreading awareness about mental health. I didn’t think anything of it. I just thought that I would take the opportunity to impart some wisdom, provide some insight, and maybe share with someone the words I wanted to hear when I was younger. 

One day, I was scrolling on instagram and I received a DM from a stranger. She had just tried to jump out of a moving vehicle with her children in the car. A police officer pulled her over for speeding. Her unsuccessful attempt at jumping out led her to come home and try to overdose on some pills. She opened up her phone, scrolled on her instagram and found me on the discover page. It was an image of me holding up a sign with resources listed down below. It was this image.

She immediately messaged me. I’ll let her tell the rest of the story. 

She messaged me in 2014. This year, for the very first time, she stepped in front of an audience and told her story.

I found her again recently. She disappeared for a couple of years. I got his message this year. I cried. Like, ugly cried.

Whenever people ask me why I talk about my experience so much, I remember why I started it all. In 2006, after surviving my own attempted suicide, I thought, I needed to go to school and learn to help people just like me. I think there was a bit of me what wanted some peace of mind.. and a bit of me that wanted to save the world. But I later found that the weight of someone else’s life was far too heavy for me to carry. But I decided I’d try another way. And I found that way was through sharing my experience. 

Every time I post, I remember this woman, her children, and the future of the people who sometimes feel hopeless. 

If you or a loved one are experiencing domestic violence, please contact the domestic violence hotline at 1 (800) 799 - SAFE.

If you are experiencing thoughts of suicide, please call the suicide prevention lifeline at 1 (800) - 273 - TALK

A Second Shot at Life: Breaking the Cycle of Domestic Violence

22 years. I gave him 22 years. 

When people ask me about the hardest part of recovering from 22 consecutive years of any and every kind of domestic violence, I tell them, that it’s not the slap to the face or getting dragged down the hallway. It’s convincing yourself that you are worthy of love. Even if it’s the love that you give to yourself. 

In 2005, at 11 years old, I laid in bed with a letter in hand, ready to take the life that I had no real understanding of. 11 years old. I had it all planned out. From the letter, to the outfit I was going to wear. Some people will tell you that suicide is selfish and that life is always far better than death. But for some of us, death seems far better than life.  But I survived the attempted suicide. I wasn’t supposed to be here. But I guess I still had some things to do. 

In 2015, right as I was entering into my final year of college, the man that abused me for 22 whole years silently moved out of our home, while I waited quietly at a hotel across the street. I thought that this would be it. Life was going to get better. And it was going to get better as soon as I walked through the door of my newly emptied home. But it wasn’t better. And it wasn’t going to get better. At least not yet. I quickly found myself on my bedroom floor, sobbing & nursing my wounds, looking to make amends with my past, confront my future, and restore hope and dignity to a woman whose ego was beaten for 22 consecutive years. And while my first instinct was to attempt in every possible way to desperately scrub every memory that was seared into my brain… the countless nights when I spent hours hiding on the floor of a parked car in our garage, or those days when I’d barricade my bedroom door, shaking from fear. The memory of a six year old Anna, holding her baby brother while a solid wooden ottoman was hurled in my direction. And those nights when I would cry on the bathroom floor because I felt something real and thinking and fearing that a man that I care about would look me in the eyes, and see beyond what, from all outward appearances, was a woman who seemed to have it all together… But I later discovered that it wasn’t about erasing the memories. I was once told that "we don't seek the painful experiences that hew our identities, but we seek our identities in the wake of our painful experiences." I was awakened to the idea that adversity breeds the power to oppose it, and this ultimately brought me to think that it was this that forged my own personal identity. It took the adversity, understanding the adversity, and applying it to the way by which it has affected my internal dialogue that I began to understand the mechanism of trials. It took understanding for me to eliminate the sadness, anger, and negative emotions I was experiencing as a byproduct of my experiences. And it was this that ultimately expanded my ideas and brought me to have a deeper and more robust understanding of the human condition.  

For 25 years, I found myself desperately trying to put myself back together, piece by piece, reminding myself that it is a process with a trajectory, but no real end. As I find that there is never an end, or a completion to a journey of achieving happiness or fulfillment. For 25 years, I wasted so much time begging. Begging my mother to leave. Begging for even a semblance of what love looked or felt like. I grew tired of living my life like I was begging, waiting for an expectation to come to fruition, and anticipating this revolutionary thought or wisdom that would occur as byproduct of adversity. So I stopped begging.

If there is a piece of advice that I can offer to a young woman, it is to find comfort, solace, and peace in solitude. You can't buy, achieve or date serenity and peace of mind. It’s an inside job. And it’s not a 9-5. It’s a job that runs 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and 365 days a year. You have to face your own fears, answer your own questions, and supply your own love. From the moment I opened my eyes, my only understanding and exposure to companionship were toxic power struggles and justification processes. The thought that, ‘he says that he loves me… but his actions prove otherwise.’ I looked at every shitty situation, every toxic person I brought into my life. I justified shit behavior because my default thought was, ‘surely, this isn’t what he really means.’ And I allowed myself to be pulled into a vicious cycle of forgiving transgressions.. failing to understand that forgiveness isn’t always about forgiving another person. Sometimes, it’s about forgiving yourself. Because I believed it. Every hurtful word, every action, and every misstep. I believed it. Every single time. 

Children of domestic violence are three times more likely to repeat the cycle of abuse. And growing up in an abusive household is the most significant predictor of whether or not someone will be engaged in domestic violence later in his or her life. After 3 generations and 25 years, I said no more. With black eyes and broken bodies, 3 generations of battered women and children turned our experiences into personal narratives of strength, courage, wisdom, and triumph.

In August of 2015, I was given a second shot at life. And if there is a promise that I have made, it is to love myself enough and to know that I am always going to be enough. Because sometimes the hardest part about the recovery is convincing yourself that you are worthy of love. Even if it’s the love that you give to yourself. 

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If you or a loved one are survivors of domestic violence, realize that you are not a statistic. You are worth the recovery. DOMESTIC VIOLENCE INCLUDES BUT IS NOT LIMITED TO PHYSICAL, SEXUAL, VERBAL, AND EMOTIONAL ABUSE. 

24 HR DOMESTIC VIOLENCE HOTLINE: (800) 978-3600
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