Sometime during almost every young girl's life, they fall in love for the first time. Unfortunately, what should be a sweet, special experience often turns ugly when the object of the young lady's affections turns out to be an utter bastard. When you've never fallen for anyone before, and you don't know what to expect from a partner, it can be difficult to realize when your beloved is bad news. Couple this with the desire many young girls have to be loved no matter what the cost (and to love their boyfriends no matter what the cost), and you have the makings of a potential lifetime of stupid, destructive behavior, as regards relationships.
I must admit, the first time I fell in love, it was with the wrong guy. I mean, the really wrong guy. The guy was so wrong, he was beyond wrong: he was nothing but trouble to the very core.
His name was Ken; I fell for him my freshman year of highschool. Initially, I believe I fell for him because of the lack of love I felt at home -- on a gut level, I no longer felt loved and valued, but I felt driven to be loved by someone, because I knew I needed to be. Every human being needs love to thrive. My attachment to Ken arose, I believe, out of my own immature attempts to find the love and nurturing I needed. Being a kid, of course, I did a bad job -- most 14-year-olds are no damn good at raising themselves, and I was no exception. But at least I was trying to meet my own needs in good faith, no matter how imperfectly.
He was not abusive to me when the relationship first began. Generally, he was nice, had a sense of humor, called me every day, was a little possessive; but hey, I'd never been in love before, and I was flattered. (And naive.) Nowadays, his possessiveness would be a HUGE red flag. But ten years ago, I hadn't the slightest idea what he was doing.
Over time, he became more and more abusive. At first, it was little things, like when I said something "the wrong way", or when I didn't know what I was talking about. I had an interest in the subject of History; Ken was concerned that I was "obsessed with the past." He didn't like my friends, either, he complained about them whenever I brought them up, even going so far as to call one of my girlfriends "evil". "I don't like J------," he'd say. "She's bad news." "But she's my friend..." I'd protest. He'd grow more annoyed: "Why do you hang out with her? I don't like her! She's a bad influence!" And that was just for female friends -- male friends were absolutely forbidden. Every time I had a project or interest I wanted to share, he would discount it. "Well, I don't think you can do that. It'd be too hard for you," he'd say.
Later, Ken's violence escalated. He became angrier, more frequently. He became more jealous. If a boy's name came up in conversation, Ken would immediately leap on me accusingly: "Who's that?! Do you like him or something?!" He interrupted or ignored me continuously. He also began to accuse me of hurting him; although he never told me exactly how, just that I did, and that I was a terrible person to do it. On one occasion, I was wearing a sweatshirt that had something written on the back of it with silver glitter. One of my classmates, a flamboyant young actor, thought my shirt was really cool, and on the way out the door, he spontaneously rubbed his head on the back of my shirt so that some of the glitter would stick in his hair. I wasn't offended by this -- I'm not sure if it was because I basically had no personal boundaries, or if I just realized that this guy wasn't really trying to make me uncomfortable, he was just really a silly guy -- but I immediately felt afraid at what Ken would think. And when Ken found out, he threw a fit. He became furiously angry that I would do such a thing to him, he accused me of liking it, he accused me of liking this guy (who actually turned out to be gay, for Pete's sake), and when I tried to explain what had really happened, he only grew angrier. Eventually, he wrote me a threatening letter, asking me whether or not I tried to stop the guy, telling me I was a bitch if I hadn't, and demanding that I stop hurting him and be a "good girl" or it would all "land on" me. I was so afraid that I apologized as soon as could -- and he begrudgingly accepted.
On another occasion, he reamed me out for wanting to go get some lunch instead of spending the time making out in the practice room with him; telling me that I was selfish to be hungry, and exclaiming with disbelief that he couldn't understand how I could be so awful to him. And I always believed him, because I truly didn't know any better. No one had ever taught me that this kind of treatment was abuse, and that I didn't deserve it. I thought I did. He was particularly good at "proving" that I was a bad person, and thus justifying his abuse of me.
And there were a million things which made me a bad person: the way I thought, the way I felt, the things I said, the things I did, the things I believed. I was bad for things I never did at all, as when he accused me of liking other boys or of cheating on him; or for things that weren't bad at all, like being tired or hungry or upset.
Eventually, we slipped into a pattern. It was always the same, always: Ken would abuse me, out of the blue; I would feel fear. Ken would lecture me (or yell, sometimes) on how terrible and at fault I was for his feelings; I would apologize profusely. Ken would punish me by withdrawing his attentions; I would continue to apologize. Finally, Ken would accept my apology, and shower me with attention once again; I would feel loved once again.
What I didn't know was that love isn't supposed to hurt. People who are in love do have conflicts sometimes, and even act abusively towards one another sometimes -- but there is a far cry between an occasional heated argument, for instance, and a daily pattern of cruelty, abuse, and pain. Moreover, partners who love each other don't just apologize and then expect everything to return to normal -- they acknowledge their own feelings and behaviors, and accept responsibility for any injury they may have done in the heat of conflict. And then they do their darnedest to make sure it doesn't happen again.
Ken gave a great deal of lip service to the concept of "working on the relationship"; but though it was couched in terms of what "we" could do together, somehow the person who was never trying hard enough was always me, at least according to Ken. I heard a lot about how "we" could make things so much better if only I would try harder, if only I would stop "hurting" him, and if only I would change my "hurtful" behavior. But the truth of the matter is, I never did a single thing to purposefully hurt Ken's feelings (with one exception, which is outlined elsewhere). Most of the time, when he told me I'd hurt him, I couldn't figure out for the life of me what I'd said or done to make him angry. I did everything I could think of to please him: I left my friends behind, I changed my behavior, I chose my words carefully, I didn't complain to him about my feelings, I stopped even mentioning the names of other boys, I was faithful to him, I was kind, I was as loving as I could possibly be -- and none of it was enough.
I didn't learn until years later that nothing would have been enough. There was literally nothing I could have done to have pleased him, because he could not be pleased. He was an abuser. There was nothing in his heart except the desire to control, and nothing in his mind except plans to achieve that end. His displeasure had nothing to do with me, and everything to do with him.
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