I don't deserve anything good in my life.

At least that is what I feel like. I realized this in the last few months. It has come gradually. I couldn't understand that I felt like I had no value until I was treated like I had value. My husband to be treats me with value. He tells me all the time that he doesn't love me because I do the wash, iron or make meals. He's happy I do it. Or said he was. But his love was also dependant on my ability to perform. I got sickened in again. It was just a bit more subtle. I wasn't accepting half that he was offering me because I felt that I didn't deserve it. I have felt like I didn't deserve anything for years. I think that it has its' roots in christianity. That "I'm a worm, god only loves me because he can see me through his son. I deserve nothing but death but christ gave me life because he is so good to me." This has tarnished my view of myself since I was little. Of course, if I would have had a less intense, less performance-related personality, none of it would have meant anything. Unfortunately, my personality meant that I took all the god-shit very seriously. God loved me while I was yet a sinner and worthless. Note the "worthless". Meaning without god I am nothing. Meaning that with god I am something but still only a poor, sad, worthless being who has value only because god came to save me. Some would protest (as I once did myself) that that was the point! It showed that I had value because christ was willing to die for me. Unfortunately, deep down under that dogma is the fact that even though you are "saved", you are still worth nothing because it is only christ that covers all your worthlessness so you can somehow squeak into heaven. Anything good that I do is because christ enables me and anything bad that I do is because I, deep down, have a sinful fallen nature.

So how does that relate to the here and now? It means that I accepted to be treated like a less than nothing and worse than a slave for twenty years because I didn't deserve any better. It means that when my new boyfriend tells me he doesn't care if I go out and have coffee, I feel that I don't deserve it. I feel I have to somehow pay for that coffee. In reality, I had attracted another man who felt I was not worth the cup of coffee HE paid for. I was once again being taught that I did not deserve anything but disdain. So am I somehow worth less? Worthless? Am I somehow undeserving? It means that I have a hard time synthesizing the fact that I am allowed to be in a good place.  Why me? Like somehow I should still be in an abusive relationship where I am badly treated. That's horrible. My abusive ex knew and felt that. Abusers zero in on the victims, the ones that feel they should be mistreated. Christianity is the perfect front for abusive men. The bible gives them all the ammunition they need to make sure their wives tow the line. I'm glad I am seeing it now before it is too late.

What am I doing to change my thinking? Well, first, I dumped christianity and the bible. That was a good start. Next, I am trying to take the time to meditate. Meditate on the future I want to create for myself. When my thoughts go around and around I try to turn them around to the life I want. I imagine myself living the good things that I want. Travelling, having a nice car, being able to pay for my own coffees at Starbucks. Making more money than my fiancé (ah, those also were empty promises) Being able to see my kids and family when I want because I have the money to do it. Being free from the cancer that almost took me. Being at peace and accepting that I have worth, that I deserve better than what I have accepted up until not long ago. I have also started doing tapping (EFT). It sounds weird, but it is in a tapping session that I finally realized that I myself could sabotage any chance I had at happiness if I believed I had no worth.

Now is when I choose to live. I choose to be treated well. I choose the people who surround me and I won't accept people who trod on my self-worth and make me into their slaves. I have lost everything in this process. First I had to lose my health because of the mistreatment. Now, in my refusal to be treated like a dog, I have lost my kids, my house, my life savings and my reputation.  Abusers make sure that happens when they are clutching, struggling and screaming to get back the slave, the victim into their house. But you know what? I'm free. And I do deserve good things in my life.

The Evolution of a Good Girl

We were in the evangelical christian church. I wanted to please my husband and god. I had been taught since  I was little that god would not reward me if I didn't please him. And here on earth, I would be rewarded with health if I turned the other cheek, submitted myself like Sara did to Abram and called him lord, etc.

After I begged and pleaded to come back (and gave him amazing sex before being allowed to see the kids) we decided to move so that we would be closer to my parents. I wanted the kids to see their grandparents, and I wanted to have a bit of community around me so that I wouldn't get so depressed any more. Remember, in my mind, I was still the problem. Not my marriage, not my abusive husband, ME. So we moved. I packed the whole house by myself, with four kids under five in tow. My ex was so stressed out about moving that his spare time was spent sleeping or watching movies. I was so excited about being closer to my family that I didn't mind. Once moved, my ex began a campaign to alienate me from my family. My mom would buy me something, or do something special for me and my ex would use it. He would yell at me after my mom left, telling me what a bitch she was for buying cheese for me. I was underweight and never ate very well because I was taking care of my kids. So my mom was trying to take care of me how she could. My ex would eat all the cheese or whatever it was that my mom had bought for me. We couldn't afford to buy more so I would once again do without. Eventually the fighting with my parents was too much for me to bear. The conflict wasn't worth being close to them. It is so sad for me to see now that this would have been my way out! I was just so determined to make my marriage work. This time I wouldn't give up, my kids would have a happy mom and a happy life and I would make their dad happy too.

We moved back to my ex's home province in the hopes of starting over again. We lived in a little two bedroom apartment so we could pay off our debts from moving. My husband had to work nights as he had lost his seniority. He would leave for work at 15:00 and arrive at 24:00 then he would sleep all day until it was time to work again. His job was not physical, he sat around all day, even telling me that he had to pretend to have work as there was nothing to do. It was not like he was working super hard. I had to keep the kids quiet. When he was up he would be constantly yelling at me. I was trying to express my needs a bit but once again, I ended up trying desperately to appease him. I tried to make food he liked, I tried to keep the kids quiet, I tried to give him good sex. All this with four kids under six.

I started getting sick, but this time physically. I would shake terribly before meals, I was not able to sleep at night. I had horrible night sweats. I ended up on antibiotics three or four times for sinus infections. My hypoglycemia got ten times worse and I was having a hard time getting through the afternoons. I had a huge food allergy and almost stopped breathing. Then I reacted to the penicillin I was prescribed for an infection and ended up in the hospital again. My body was shutting down. I couldn't keep up what I was doing. I still didn't get it. I once again decided everything was my fault. I started memorising the bible and putting verses all over the apartment to remind myself to be thankful. I journalled my frustrations and thanked god for them knowing that these "brief and momentary troubles" were "attaining for me a glory that far outweighed them all". I memorised the verse that said I could do anything "through Christ who strengthens me". Then I pushed myself to go over and above the physical signs that my body was giving to me. I held onto the bible verses that promised a better afterlife. I began to live for my death. I had hope that all the mistreatment I was getting would be paid back in heaven when I died. So I pushed aside all the suicidal thoughts (that constantly came back because my life was hell), held each thought "captive to the obedience of Christ". And pushed through.

After a year we found a house a little further north of where we were. I was happy and thankful, like I should be, to be in a bigger place. There was forest all around and the kids were thrilled to have a place to play. By this time the Internet had gotten big so my ex now settled into the routine that would be his for the almost the whole of the next twelve years. Go to work in the morning, get home at 16:00 o'clock, sit at the computer until supper was ready, scarf down his supper, go in the bath and yell at me to bring the two littlest so he could wash them. I would try to start cleaning up the kitchen and he would yell at me to come get them, three and a half minutes later when he had semi-washed them. After, he would lay in the bath until I had brushed everyone's teeth and got them to bed. He would listen and when he was sure everyone was in bed, he would dry himself off and sit at the computer again until he went to bed. Every second night the routine was a little different. He would sit in front of the computer, tell me to get in the bath because he wanted sex (I hate sitting in scum so I had to wash it every time). I would wash the kids, play with them for awhile, then get out with them, dry them off, dress them, get everyone ready for bed, teeth brushed, then he would get in the bath. He would stay there until the kids were in bed, get out, get dried off and tell me it was my lucky night. Oh my god, I was so lucky. Every second night an hour and a half of pleasuring monsieur. Do you know I counted up to 830 times of him pushing into me while I was on all fours until he came? I was so lucky. The dishes? I had to do them after, or in the morning if I was falling over from fatigue that night, which happened often. He would always joke and say, "Don't worry about the dishes, you can do them tomorrow." But it wasn't funny because it was true.

Now I'll be a good girl

Now began my campaign to be the most amazing wife and mother that the earth ever saw. I would be submitted. I would be so submitted that even my husband would be nice to me. I would be the best mother ever. My kids would "rise up and call me blessed" like the woman described in the bible as the perfect woman and wife. I could do it. Thus started my quest for perfection. Oh wait. Hadn't I already tried to be perfect the first five years? Oh, I guess I wasn't perfect enough, I would have to try again. I looked to my husband as my guide; was I being submitted enough? Was I being good enough? Was I a good fuck? Was I creative enough in bed? Did I walk the right way, wear the right lewd clothes, the right sexy things, bend over and get fingered in both holes the right way while he jacked off? I knew I could do it if I just tried enough. I also knew that I was desperately miserable. I wanted to be loved. I wanted to be cared for. But I couldn't think about that. So I disciplined my thought life. I stopped reading books that talked about women being loved, even biographies or autobiographies. I stopped watching all movies. I stopped even trying to talk to anyone about what I was living at home. I read only books about homeschooling and being a good christian wife. I preached to everyone about how bad movies were and how we needed to "purify" our minds of all the filth in "worldly" books, movies and music. In reality I was hiding my desperation, my incredibly deep disappointment with life. I was miserable. I threw myself into living. But every time I did something that helped me live, my ex attacked me incessantly. He wanted control over everything, my thoughts, my actions, who I saw, what I did, and how I talked.

I chose to do things around the house that needed doing in spite of his anger. He would be even more angry and throw fits, scream at me for days on end then pout for weeks on end. I wasn't allowed to silicone the entry where water was seeping into the house. I wasn't allowed to change the screen door. I wasn't allowed to mow the lawn. I was attacking his manhood and telling him what to do when I did those things. Well fuck. He just wouldn't do these things. The house was rotting out from under us. Someone had to take care of these things. Then he would finally do stuff and then put it under my nose for YEARS afterward as a lack of submission on my part. When I asked him what we should have done, he would just scream and tell me to shut up.

Damaged goods.

I decided that no matter anyone else said or did, my marriage would work. I would change enough that my marriage would work. I was with an asshole for the rest of my life, but I would do anything I needed to make sure that I stayed relatively sane and I stayed with him.

Why didn't I get a divorce when he stole the kids? For someone from the outside, even for me now, it would seem the logical thing to have done. The problem was that I had already been abused for five years. Abuse messes with your mind. It damages you. I had been bullied for years as a child, pushed around, treated like dirt. I had been told by my church and the bible that I had no worth other than as god's child. I was a dirty sinner. Then I went into a relationship with a man who treated my like a faulty piece of merchandise, throwing me against the wall when I didn't function correctly. Screaming at me when I said I was sad or cried. Calling me rude names. The bullying and demeaning that I had grown up with continued. When I had the chance to leave the abuse, I couldn't see a way out. He would take my kids, he would destroy my reputation, I had no job, no career, no education and more than that, my kids were my life. He was seen as a kind, loving, good man. He gave lots of money at church, he volunteered for the soup kitchen to feed the poor, he talked the talk of a good christian man. I could not see my way out. Everyone around me was blaming me for "cracking". My ex was blaming me. He had blamed me from day one, told everyone around him what a bitch I was and I had wanted to be a "good person" so I believed what he said and tried to change. I kept trying to change but it was never good enough. I didn't even know what it meant to treat myself with respect. I didn't know how to fight for it. Anyways, I was not worth it.