I fell for a guy in high school after getting out of a toxic relationship. We hung out at the movies a lot. We would text each other and talk on the phone. I made it clear that I wanted to be together and he told me he wasn’t ready for a relationship. I cut him off and moved on.
I went to college. He stayed in contact with my friends. He asked about me often. He ended up being at a party I went to over Christmas break. We were inseparable after that. He had a fiancé. He told me she was his girlfriend, but they were actually engaged. She was overseas. I told him that I wanted to be together and that he needed to break up with his girlfriend if we were going to be together.
He broke up with her and we became a couple.
He was still sleeping with other people. We had our first fight and that night he let a woman friend come over and he let her give him oral sex. He cheated on me. He lied saying he stopped her advances, but he hadn’t. He kept her in his life.
I became pregnant. Which was at the same time his previous fiancé was pregnant. She came back from being overseas and he was so happy to see her he left our bed to see her in the parking lot. We all day down and talked and he told me he loved her more than me. I told him that we couldn’t be together.
He went with her and her family to North Carolina and ended up not coming back. I was dumb and told him I wanted him back. I didn’t want a broken family. I wanted dearly to be a happy family. I wanted it for myself and for my unborn daughter. He was sleeping with his ex-fiancé. He was sleeping with the woman he cheated on me with.
He came back from North Carolina to visit. I was still pregnant with our daughter. We slept together. He was staying with the woman he cheated on me with. He had been sleeping with her too while he was here. I found all this out after the fact. I cut him off for a while.
He came back for good from North Carolina. We tried to make things work. They did for a while. We broke up a couple times and each time he would tell me that he wanted me back even though he was sleeping with everyone on God’s green earth.
During one of our break ups that we slept together I got pregnant again. I told him and asked him if he would be helping me and he said he didn’t know. He wouldn’t change his answer. I was devastated. I ended up getting an abortion. It was so much more emotional than I thought it would be. They put you to sleep. I woke up crying and I couldn’t stop. I felt so empty inside. I felt miserable. I had a lot of physical pain after that too.
Nothing went on between us for a while. We eventually got back together. We lived with my mom for a while. He was still talking to women he used to sleep with. He was spending nights out even though we had a daughter. We had our problems, but we kept trying to make it work. We moved into our own apartment together. We broke often there too. Again, he would sleep with everyone. I got pregnant again. This pregnancy sucked too. I never got to take maternity photos. I never got to be happy. I had my son.
We broke up again. He was again sleeping with the woman he cheated on me with. I asked him if he was seeing her and he lied to me about it. I started talking to a guy who was giving me attention. He was married. My children’s father found out and he cleaned up his act for a little while. We moved into a house together. We still had problems. But there was that force pushing me, saying you need this family to work. You can’t have a broken family. You can’t be a single parent. So, I forced marriage. I was tired of not having my children’s last name. I was tired of just being a girlfriend. I had such conflicting feelings but the love I had for him prevailed and we got married. Things didn’t get better though. He would still talk to women from his past. He told me later on that he has a sex addiction. This doesn’t help. He says he isn’t cheating, but I don’t believe him.
I’m sad all the time walking around with all the negative burdens. I’m sad being with someone who has hurt me time and time again. I can’t be happy with him and I don’t feel like I can leave. He’s ruined me and he’s still one of the people I’m closest too. I’m stuck. I’m tired. I’m unhappy. I just want to walk away but I don’t know how. I want to tell him I need a divorce, but I can’t seem to find my voice. My daughter thinks I’m sad all the time and it breaks my heart that she sees this. I need to change it and I don’t know how. I should have never gotten married to him. I should have never taken him back. I should never have moved in with him. I should have been stronger. I should have been smarter. I wasn’t, and this is my life now. How do I make the pain stop? How do I become free? How do I end the hurt? How do I begin again?