Reality Check (article)

I found an old entry that I wrote back when I was still together with my Ex.  I'm just including it here to show how far we've come. I had almost forgotten how unpredictable day-to-day life was living with him, how afraid we all were . . . almost . . . and as I read this, my hair stands on end and all of the old feelings of fear come back up into my throat . . .
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I hear  him coming up the stairs. A chill runs up and down my spine. I never know what to expect. Sometimes he's in a really good mood. Other times he just walks in the door and starts screaming at everyone in sight.

The kids and I walk on eggshells constantly.

I switch away from my email that I had been reading on my computer screen. It was just more reminders from creditors that I cannot pay, but I don't need to give him a reason to accuse me of cheating on him yet again. Every time he catches me online, he says I must be chatting with someone, or looking for a replacement for him. I'm so sick of the endless accusations.

The door to the living room opens. He's been drinking again. I can smell it on his breath.

Immediately upon coming through the door, my husband starts yelling and screaming at me:
"You fucking lazy bitch. How can you just SIT there and let them do this? You worthless fucking whore. And I suppose you're online again flirting with all your boyfriends. Here's a fucking idea -- why don't you get your fat ass up and clean around here? This place is a fucking pigsty! It doesn't even look like human beings live here."

[He stomps into the kitchen, still ranting and raving. The racket wakes up my daughter, so he starts in yelling at her. ]
"Why don't you tell your mother to get up off her lazy ass and do something fucking productive for a change? Oh, but no, that would be too NICE. I spend the money to send her to school and does she get a job? No, she just sits there on her FAT ASS and wastes time all day long. She's a pathetic excuse for a mother. . . . .

[some more mumbling and cursing]

Fucking Pigsty!"

He continues to go on a tirade about how if we would all do thus and such we wouldn't "make" him get so upset; and how HE wanted his life to be, and how we're all "ruining it for him."

I so wish I had a million dollars so I could just pack up and leave him. I want to have a cozy house with a picket fence.

I'm so tired of holding my children while they cry, and hearing them say "Why did you pick HIM to be our Daddy?" and trying to explain to them why life isn't always fair . . . and that I love them so much . . . and that someday things will be different.

I don't know if things will be different . . . or at least I don't know HOW I can change things.

I am so tired of seeing all the "happy families" that seem like they're so perfect and have everything together.

I'm sure they have their secret struggles too, but what I wouldn't give to feel secure and loved . . . to not constantly wonder what he'll say or do NEXT . . .

I feel like I'm drowning . . .

. . . like I'm trapped . . .

. . . and living in a world that nobody else can see . . .

. . . I feel so alone . . .

Sometimes I wonder if I would have had so many prgnancy losses if things would have been different. I cry sometimes at night when nobody's looking. Yet in a way, I'm relieved . . . I feel guilty enough for bringing 3 children into this mess . . . I can't imagine having 6 more precious children live through this hell. Maybe God in his providence took them from me for a reason. But that doesn't fill the aching void or silence the questions . . .

I don't know how . . . I don't know when . . . but I WILL make a better like for us . . . I will NOT raise my children to think that this is how a father treats his family. This ends with me. One way or another.

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(the above entry was written 3 months before the kids and I escaped to a domestic violence shelter)