I was in an abusive realtionship for a short amount of time. Five months. I was planning to wait until I was married to have sex but I fell in love with this man and he beacame my first, love and lover. This was a yeat ago during my last year of college. We talked about what would happened if I got pregnant, which I never did but I loved him so much, I wanted to have his baby. His moods were always changing and initially I left him because he made me feel conifned and wouldn't let me have any other guy friends and got jealous if I did anything other than see him, yet he could go out with his friends. One night he went out all dressed up to take his guy friend somewhere, we were living with eachother, but when I called him a half hour later, there was another girl in the background. When I asked him who it was he said, "looking you f^&** bitch, I'll be home when I'll be home." No one had ever spoke to me before and I thought he loved me I would have done anything for him. Long story short, I took all my stuff in his other car and left. When I called him to tell him to pick up his car, he threatened to punch my teeth out and to kill me. A week went by and he wanted to talk about things. I went over and he called me all kinds of names from slut to hoar, and pushed me around. Finally pushing me out the door. From then on threatening to kil me, if he couldn't be with me. This was first expierence in a sexual, deep, committed realtionship. I changed my number several times, but kept going back to him even when he moved in with someone else. I drank more and more to cover the pain, even went to counseling for six months. I finally moved back home, changed my number again yet still find myself missing him, and wondering why he didn't love me. What's wrong with me? I'm a smart girl, but why can't I get over it? He does drugs, manipulates people, has a violent temper, yet i think about him all the time. I've dated a lot of guys since him, but no one excites me like he did. I have to move on because I deserve better, but will I ever get over him? How do I get over him?

-- Anonymous, April 09, 2003

Answers

How you get over someone like that is, as you already know, a very difficult question. What you've got to already understand is that there are MANY MANY MANY little particulars about yourself and your history that may explain why you find youself attached to such an abusive person. Heck, listening to "LOVELINE" with Adam Corolla and Dr. Drew you get questions like these all the time and the first thing they look for is a history of abuse (physical/sexual), or neglect, or a short list of other warning flags.

You say you deserve better, but you can't get over the fact that he still excites you. I still fantasize about my highly abusive ex girlfriend for many reasons: She was beautiful, she was the first person to make it clear to me how much they loved me, she loved me so much that she beat the hell out of me all the time and threated to kill herself if I left her, she was wild in bed and made me do things no one has ever asked. That's basically it, yet despite how "exciting" those things are, I wouldn't dream of re-establishing contact with her since I am much happier with her out of my life forever.

He's threatened to "punch your teeth out" and kill you? He's pushed you around and called you a slut and a whore? If you ARE excited by this, excited enough to think getting back together is a good idea, maybe you have some sort of advanced masochistic cravings? That's not neccessarily a bad thing, and if acknowledged, I'm sure you can find some circles that you'd fit in with quite well and be very happy.

Since you seem to be asking advice from the general community of victims and survivors of DV, my advice would be to continue personal therapy if you can afford it. In this day and age where all sorts of people are cramped together in this country, individual therapy should be REQUIRED! And if you can't afford it, I'd really urge you to try and find some sort of youth group where you can meet all sorts of women (and men) with similar stories and find a group of friends that will give you support and love when you need it. All this sounds very easy, but I'm aware that real life needs often get in the way of unimportant personal needs, but you should agree that those options might help a lot.

Keep in mind, Amanda, how lucky you are that A) he hasn't killed you B) he hasn't impregnated you C) you have proven that when you want to, you can get away from him. Not everyone has it that way, and when you keep going back, it makes it harder to understand why.

You DO have to move on, you DO deserve better, and you WILL get over him. It's just going to take a little more work than splitting up and getting back together. You need to decide if you REALLY want him out of your life and make it happen. In my opinion, no matter how much he excites you, buy a vibrator and leave him OUT OF THE PICTURE!

-- Anonymous, April 14, 2003