Welcome to February!! When you think of this month, you probably think of Valentine’s Day, but we’re going in a different direction. This month we’re breaking down friendships, starting with friendships while we’re in abusive relationships. There is A LOT to unpack here, but this week I want to tell you about the friendships I was in during my abusive relationship.
I was a freshman in college, which is already hard enough navigating friendships, but my ex forced his way into all of the relationships I had formed. My friends were also his friends. My time with them would always be his time with them. Anyone I wanted to support me, he also expected to support him. That is until my friendships started getting in his way; that's when he started telling me he hated who I was around them, they talked about me behind my back, I was a bitch whenever I was with them, and they weren’t good friends to me. It feels silly writing it out. It should have been so obvious. But he had us all fooled.
I had some friends telling me it wasn’t good how upset he made me, and they would talk among themselves about the way he “joked around” with me, but I think the reality was that none of us knew any better. We were in a new environment with all new people, and a lot of us were completely unaware of what a grown-up college relationship was supposed to look like. I wanted so badly to get closer to them, but it was impossible to spend time with them without him being around. When I got to spend time with them alone, he immediately punished me for ‘ignoring’ him. He would constantly tell me they were talking behind my back, but was hiding how much he was talking to them about me. I was too deep into my own problems at the time to see that he was the root of them. We were all so busy trying to find our footing for any of them to notice his tendencies. None of us knew the signs.
This week Mya asked me if I wished any of them knew differently, or could have warned me. My answer was no. I was okay to be the one to learn the lesson for all of us. I didn’t stay friends with those people, but they were the friends I needed at the time. I was so lucky in the ways they supported me when I finally got out; I had outlets to talk to and people to help me put the pieces together of what had actually happened to me. I feel forever grateful for the girls who lived through that year with me, let me cry in their beds, listened to my stories, and walked me to the bathroom when I was too afraid to leave my room. They showed me that sometimes people come to get you through your hardest moments, even though they don’t stick around forever.
Relationships are ever-evolving. People grow and change, whether it’s your partner, your friends, or yourself. I see no point in looking back and wondering what I could have done differently; instead, I feel grateful for those who have joined me on my journey. I send my love to all of the friends watching someone battle in a relationship that isn’t good for them, to all those friends feeling neglected, and to all those friends we haven’t been the kindest to for any number of reasons. And I thank all of my own friends, past and present, for reminding me why I share my story: to look out for, understand, and protect the ones we love.
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