Gear Adrift
Thinking about how to move forward with this story has me at a bit of a loss.
We are at a point where everything blurs together. Eventually, something in my brain clicked. I finally heard the things Jaime, my dad, and Becca had been telling me about how I changed, how I was being manipulated into my current set of beliefs. One night in Miami, I finally saw it.I got out before things could have been bad. I have no doubt in my mind that I would have been demolished to nothing more than a shell of myself if I had stayed with him.I loved this man with every cell in my body. It was impossible for me to stay mad at him. I was letting him win every argument: “I know, it’s my fault, I overreacted.” “I’m sorry. I should not have questioned you.” I was never physically harmed. My experience with this abuse wasn’t physical. I am thankful for that. Sometimes I find myself thinking about that over and over. He never hit me. He never locked me in a room. He never shattered my phone or took away my car keys so I wouldn’t be able to leave him. I find myself making excuses. I find myself cheapening my own experience. I think society is finally to a point, at least most of the time, where women who are being beaten can receive help and their experiences are validated. (Society as in “pop culture,” NOT the justice system) But what about the mental abuse aspects? Many times I can’t even wrap my head around my own experience.
It’s about time, in late 2016, that we can recognize emotional abuse for what it is: ABUSE.
I called him out on it. I told him he was being domineering and manipulative. I believe I even used the word abuse. That was a bad move. [I probably knew that was not going to end well.] We had a huge fight and the whole thing was flipped around, and, suddenly, it was my fault. [Wasn’t it always my fault? Certainly, he never did ANYTHING wrong.] I was irrational, I had “expectations” of him. Expectations, I guess I did have some COMPLETELY IRRATIONAL expectations of him. [Sarcasm, it’s my second language.] I expected to not hang up the phone and feel like a worthless piece of shit. I expected the man I was in love with to compromise with me. I expected him to not play the “victim card” when I was the one explaining my feelings to him. I expected him to care about me when I was upset.Here is an example of how he would speak to me about his opinions:
When I was stressing about not having enough time or energy to go to the gym or a mention of having pizza for lunch, he would say, “I don’t find overweight women attractive in the slightest. I like ‘fit women.’ If you gained weight, I would never be sexually attracted to you again.”
When talking about other women not noticing him or not wanting to date him, he would say, “Women who don’t like me yet just don’t know I have such a big dick.”#yesallmen, much? White upper-middle class male privilege, much?He would talk about his exes sometimes, always about how terrible they were. How one time, she just up and left him when he went on a deployment. I always thought she was the crazy one. How could she do that to him? Maybe she was the smartest one of us… To this day, I have our last conversation on my phone: The text messages I have only looked at one time since I sent them. That night, I was drinking and I ended up hysterical after reading them. Remember my history with this man. Remember he was my mentor, my best friend, and the man I fell madly in love with. This is the last time I ever talked to him, but I wasn’t allowed to talk to him even then. He was at work and I asked him to take five minutes and call me. I was going to explain that I was leaving him. He is the supervisor of his department; he could have easily shut the door to his office or walked outside to call me. Instead, he told me, once again, he was too busy. He didn’t set up a time where we could talk when he was less busy.The day I left, he didn’t kiss me goodbye as he left for work like he used to. That morning, he didn’t say good morning or goodbye to me at all. I knew. If I wasn’t 100 percent sure the restless night before, I knew at that moment. One of the last things we texted back and forth was this:Austin: Yea, what else am I supposed to do?Me: Respect that I have incredibly strong feelings for you. And tell people that I moved down for the actual reason I moved down. [He was telling people his “bestie” was moving in so I could go to college; he was providing me with somewhere to stay while I got my things in order. Nothing about he and I in the beginning stages of a relationship or that he and I were having sex] And respect that I was there to form a lasting relationship. Not instantly but that is the intent. Maybe tell people that. Maybe act that way just a little bit. You are not capable of that/ I’m your “BFF.” So, you can act however you want with whoever you want. So, I left. I don’t have the capacity to manage that.Him: You want it all, you want it now, [Never said that.] You’re not getting that so you left. Got it. [Nope, you still do not get it] Leave me your mailing address. [ I had sent him mail from my address before, why didn’t he still have it?] And, if you’re gone already please delete me from everything [Places he and I talked/ had contact: Facebook, Facebook messenger, Skype, Tinder, OkCupid, Instagram, our linked profiles on a BDSM website where he was listed as my Dom, my contact list, his saved email address in my history. He was EVERYWHERE in my life] and best of luck to you. I have no doubt you will eventually swipe right to some kind of happiness. [WHAT THE FUCK DOES THAT MEAN?]Me: I am driving north.Him: Good luck. [Yea, I am so sure you actually mean that]I have not spoken to him nor seen him since. In the service, we have a saying: “Gear Adrift.” As copied from a service manual,
- GEAR ADRIFT: Gear adrift is defined as any personal item not properly stowed within personal or communal spaces.
So, when something is no longer in the proper place, it can be dangerous. It can be stolen. If found, it will be confiscated. That sounds so negative. In the moment, when I became GIRLADRIFT, it was the most freeing, most terrifying thing I had ever felt. I was sobbing. I called my dad and told him. I waited to tell my mom (she was at work and I didn’t want to upset her). I told a few of my close friends. One of my friends who had moved to Seattle called me and listened. I want her to know she is a huge part of how I processed this whole thing. I have forgotten much of that conversation, and I think she is the only one who got the best version of my story. How can five years of my life just turn into a giant mess? How did I end up driving north as fast as I legally — well, maybe a bit faster than I should have — could on the Florida Turnpike? How did I let this man become such a compass for me? I stopped relying on my inner navigation. I fell from my place I so desperately wanted to fit into.
In this moment, I became the GIRLADRIFT.
This is when I finally realized how positive being “adrift” can be. I was liberated. I am my own person. I will not let some other person control where I fit and when I get to be put in that place.