I’m closing the email account I used during the time of my separation/divorce. Going through the emails, I found some that I’ll save. This one is a keeper. It reminds me how RAW I felt and will help me to remember how others may feel after the adrenaline of leaving and the self-satisfaction of having left wear away.

Sat, Jan 30, 2010 at 4:06 AM
To: [My Sister and My Mother]

Excuse me, but I’ve got to get some shit off of my chest. I’m writing to you two because I know beyond knowing that I can trust only you and that you will to keep my filthy mouth to yourselves, and forgive me for any ugliness in my heart. I cannot harbor it inside any longer or it is going to eat me from the inside. I’m going to curse, I can feel it coming.

That rat bastard child of a husband lied to me every day of our marriage. He SAID would protect me (when he acted to terrify me), he SAID the boys were his number one priority when they are only pawns for him to play, he SAID that his obligations as husband and father were his topmost priority, that everything he did he did for his family and the very first chance he got he attempted to pull the financial footing out from under me.

He denies he put his hands on me. He denies his promises and his words and his actions. He will not face the pain he’s caused (and I DO MEAN the pain HE has caused). I do blame him for the amount of discomfort and fear I’ve lived in for years and years and years without ever hearing a sincere word of thanks escape his lips. He bullies me, he bullies the kids. He bullies his stupid friends who are too blind to see. Maybe I didn’t know that he was ABUSING me until late last year, but I’ve always known he was WRONG.

I got pregnant with [our first son] to appease his insecurities, thinking that if I were a mother he would respect me. He certainly SAID he would.

I put off going to school because he pressured me into saying even to myself that a good mother wouldn’t leave her kids at such a young age. As if I were leaving them, as if I were doing something to harm them. Fact is, he wanted me in a prison cell to which he held the key, and I willingly gave my freedom to him thinking he would respect me, love me, be nice to me, treat me well, pay attention to me and my needs, and maybe, just maybe not blame me for all of life’s normal setbacks that any NORMAL man could accept.

I spent my time with him hoping that I could soften him, make him feel joy, peace and love. He says I’ve always wanted to change him, and he is right to an extent. I wanted to change him so he wouldn’t live in his self-imposed hell, so that he could one day step into the sunshine and enjoy its warmth instead of cursing its heat. I sought to give him a life of meaning, meaning NOT defined by who his grandfather was, or who his Uncle was, or who his father was. Meaning that didn’t involve a controlling manipulative mother who wore the angel’s halo because she volunteered with the PTA and went to church by day but attempted to define and control who he was and what limitations he had and how his faults would limit him.

I wanted to change him into a man who truly believed in himself because he was sure that even his mistakes served a purpose and that being human wasn’t so bad after all.

I think that’s why he wanted me. He wanted me because I had those beliefs and feelings about myself and he hoped to have them for himself. But instead of sharing my light, he wanted it for his very own. The problem was that he couldn’t TAKE it from me because it is meant to be SHARED. He’s spent our time together trying to steal the light, but only succeeded in dimming it within me. That seemed to make him happier, when my light is dimmest, because if he can’t have it, I shouldn’t be able to have it either.

He’s told me that I’m a shitty mother, that I purposefully twist our son’s heads, that I try to make my kids my “best friends” instead of allowing them to be children, and that my entire motive for talking to the kids like I do is to undermine and discredit him.

He’s constantly embarrassed by me and the boys. We are incapable of doing anything right and constantly make him look like a fool in front of his peers and friends. We cannot like things he doesn’t or not like things he does. Whenever we express a differing opinion, we’re subjected to lectures or yelling until fatigue or fear sets in and we feel forced to acquiesce or at least stop talking.

The night of January 22nd, I had cut a conversation short with him because he told me he couldn’t believe me unless I was angry. He doesn’t trust me to say the truth when I’m calm, which explains A LOT about why he digs and says hurtful things to me. I’ve always felt like he was trying to make me mad, but he’s always said to me, “Are you TRYING to piss me off?!”

He projects his thoughts, behaviors and feelings onto me, then gets mad when I show a sign of not agreeing with his assessment of me. I’m a traitor a whore and a thief, a twisted and evil woman who he cannot and has never been able to trust. I’ve been “plotting” and planning my escape for months, but HE is the one who left the message saying “this is what I’ve been waiting for.”

This fine, upstanding husband and father is trying to make it impossible for me to feed and care for our children because I “stole” money that wasn’t mine to take. It doesn’t matter that he thought he’d locked me out of the accounts – ALL of them – before I slid the piss ant $9600 out from under him. He actually thought that he could “get” me for abandoning my children because I left the house because I felt threatened by HIM. He actually THOUGHT that I would be prevented from coming back to this fucking house, prevented from reuniting with my children. He was so goddamn smug when I caught him picking up [our youngest son] from school that Friday. He actually thought he had WON something. He thought he could cancel my car insurance, and I’m sure he felt very angry when he couldn’t completely take that safety from me.

I thought he had come to his senses when he didn’t cancel the joint credit card, but I was wrong. He canceled it the day after we went to court, the day after I agreed to visitation with the boys. He’s pissed because the assault charges haven’t been dismissed (and feels entitled to having them dismissed). This stupid man is taking the actions of a fucking abuser; the attorneys will see it, the courts will see it, but he will not.

If I walk away from this marriage with more than a dollar he will say I got too much and be angry that this “fucked up world” granted me more than I deserve. After all, I haven’t worked a day in my life. I know nothing of the real world and he thinks the court is going to make me discover it. It doesn’t matter that my involvement in his crappy ill-conceived towing business lasted as long as it did because I was willing to drive our babies around with 2000 pound cars precariously bound to the back of that fucking home made tow truck. It doesn’t matter that he went out of his way to discourage me from forming my own businesses,(furniture refinishing, Bluelady, and web design), that he ALWAYS said he didn’t make enough money to support a start-up but expected me to stretch our money to afford his motorcycle, four-wheelers, four-wheel hobbies, career transitions, beer and booze. He told me it was my duty (in part because I had nothing better to do) to complete his Army correspondence courses and online college classes.

I didn’t need nice clothes or nice jewelry because I stayed at home and had no where to wear it, but then he berated me for staying at home, maintaining my interests and raising our kids.

This man is sick, twisted and abusive. He calls me everything he is, berates me for everything HE does. He thinks he knows me, but he doesn’t have a clue who I am.

He actually thinks that we should sit down together. He wants to give me his $1300 BAH (on his word he’ll pay it) and leave this house and all the benefits I’ve supported him in creating. He is angry that I spent his money on an attorney, angry that I took his money from our accounts. He feels justified in being a monster because if he couldn’t come up with some reason why I am a horrible person then he would have to face the fact that HE is the horrible, evil, cunning, manipulative horse’s ass that he wants everyone to believe I am.

I hate him. He’s a sick bastard, and I cannot WAIT until he faces facts and pays up. He’s going to hate it and bitch about it for the rest of his life, dying as the old miserable man that I wanted to prevent him from becoming. And it’s all going to be my fault.

Fuck him. I can live with the blame.

When I left my abuse-ridden marriage, I had no money, no job, and no insurance. By the grace of God, I found people to help me solve all three problems…eventually.

I want to form a charity that allows domestic abuse victims to leave their relationships
…without suffering from lack of proper therapeutic support
…without experiencing massive credit card debt and financial ruin.

Without therapy and money, many domestic abuse victims return to their abusive relationships. Victims who become survivors need a viable support network that includes one on one counseling to show family court that they are capable of holding primary custody of their children. Abusive partners often use the victim’s mental health issues of depression, anxiety, and post-traumatic stress disorder against them in court even though the partner’s abuse caused those disorders.

Survivors also need a place to live and care for their children as they look for work. Without proper housing, a victim of domestic abuse jeopardizes their ability to retain custody of their children.

Either situation, lack of therapy or money, negatively affects abuse victims without children too. Believe it or not, there are many people who do not have supportive families and who no longer have friends because their abuser effectively isolated them from anyone who would care to help.

The probably name of the charity will be “The Emergency Fund, Inc.” A possible trade name will be “Verbal Abuse Journal’s Emergency Fund, Inc.”

If you donate to me, Kellie Jo Holly, I vow that I will put every penny into paying LegalZoom.com to draw up the paperwork needed to create this charity. The “Wish List” breaks down LegalZoom.com’s fee so you can see where the money goes.

Please donate a bit of your hard-earned money to fund this beginning step toward a much-needed charitable organization that will serve the United States in particular, but not exclusively.

Donate today!

The Internet provides when we searching for info about verbal abuse and all the other kinds of domestic violence. I agree with the experts (usually) – everyone is different and what works for me may not work for you blah blah blah. But videos like this one piss me off to no end because there is no ANGER. The woman in the video looks merely sad and abused or strong and able to take it. Where’s the freaking anger?

When married to my ex, I felt so damn angry! Every little thing he did or said, abusive or not, reminded me of a time he hurt me. Continue reading →

During my marriage, my then-husband complained about my parenting constantly. He felt embarrassed every time our boys acted up. One day, after a get-together at his friend’s house, he verbally and emotionally abused our oldest son and me all the way home because our son told the hostess, “No, I don’t like that,” when she offered him a second helping of potato salad. Marc had politely eaten his first helping.

My then-husband said that if I had only “whipped their asses” when they were younger or hadn’t been so “soft” then our boys could be great men like him. Instead, I chose to “twist their minds” and “turn them against him”. One time, before a deployment, my then-husband told me that I should act like him first and “go kiss and love on them” like a mother after being him. Continue reading →

I drank some tequila tonight thinking it would calm my nerves. Should have known better. Alcohol only makes me feel more of what I felt when I started drinking. I feel a deep unsettling undercurrent of a fear that’s existed since I left my husband. It brought me back to reality. Perhaps frightened isn’t the right word. Reminded is the right word.

My ex’s friend said that that my ex-husband plans to do “disgusting” things and then kill me when our youngest son is 18. I guess that makes sense in that asshole’s feeble mind. He always told the boys that when they were 18 he’d give them a suitcase for their birthdays. Since he will be done being their father when they reach 18, in his mind I will be done being their mother and there’s no reason for him to put up with me any longer. Continue reading →