Cry For Help: The Email I Can’t Send

Your abuse never left. I put makeup over the bruises, I pull my hair over the scars, but they're still there. The words you said that cut deep into me and made me question myself over and over again just won't go away.

"I hate you when you do that."

"That looks disgusting. If some guy took you home, they'd turn and run screaming the other direction."

"You're lucky I love you, because no one else would want you."

"All you are to me are those jugs on your chest."

They echo in my head, bouncing off the walls of my skull until my head is ready to burst. Even now, four years away from you, you still stand there like a demon, haunting me, possessing me. You send an email to remind me of the hold you still have.

You remind me of how you remember "everything about me," and somehow you don't realize that you've destroyed the happy girl I was and left me with a shell. I walk around with a mask of what I used to be after you hollowed me out like a crab leg and then tossed away the husk of a shell.

I remember more than your words. I remember your manipulation. I remember how you would take what I was saying and turn it around on me. I remember how you would point out my insecurities. I remember how you threatened to kill yourself if I left. I remember the days you told me you hated me and loved me. I remember the day you proposed to me and then later the same night told me that no one would ever love me.

You send emails that sound so innocent. Like you didn't wreck me on the rocks of your island.

All I had wanted to be was your one constant. I had wanted to help you through the pain of your life, and to help you fight your monsters and face your demons. Instead, you twisted my arm and abused me. You broke my spirit and spat in my face. You cheated on me, you broke my heart, and I let you because I didn't want you to be alone.

You scare me now. Your simple black and white letters terrify me and make me not want to leave the house. It feels as if you are a weight that will never go away: a looming, black presence. I am afraid that you will attack me in the street, even though I know you live miles away.

The worst part is that you say I changed your life. You say you just want to tell me that I made a difference. You say that I was the first person to let you be yourself and to be there for you. 

I realize this is more of your manipulation: if I changed your life I can't resent the fact that I ever met you. I can't hate you, and I can never tell you how much I'm crying as I write this. I don't get to tell you that I've never recovered. I don't get to tell you that I still hate myself, even after four men since you have told me that you were wrong. I don't get to press send.

I need help, I need my scars to not hurt anymore. I need my bruises to heal. I don't know how to undo what you've done to me.