The Day the Light Came Back

He rips the Airfryer from the plug outlet, and I watch frozen as he smashes it into the kitchen floor. Metal shards fly everywhere, along with the Brussel sprouts I had prepared for him inside it.

He looks at me with venom in his eyes.

“This shit is for lazy people who can’t cook. Learn to be a better fucking wife.”

Our daughter lets out a cry from her bedroom. I feel like I can’t breathe. She heard all that, I think.

Unfortunately, this is not our first fight to result from me being a shitty wife. It’s been several years of scalding words. There's been comments on my body, accusations of being unfaithful, insults to my beliefs and my character. And, of course, my cooking.

I stare at the pieces of wire and machinery on the floor, and hot tears seethe in my eyes.

I never thought I would be this girl. I’d been verbally abused, sexually assaulted, and emotionally manipulated before. I had promised myself never again; and yet, here I was.

Suddenly, boiling anger replaces my fear.

I feel the rage of years worth of torment bubble over inside me. I want to hurt him so badly.

Instead, the words I’ve been dancing around for so long come easy now:

“We’re leaving.”

•••

“I tried everything, I tried so hard.”

I’m driving now. Tears pour down my face while I’m on the phone with my mother. I choke and sputter, and I feel like a child.

“He said he would burn our house down.”

Suddenly, his name buzzes on my phone.

I slam my thumb on Ignore. Not three seconds later, it’s buzzing again.

And again.

I can’t count the number of times he’s stormed off and rejected my calls.

The shoe’s on the other foot now, motherfucker.

More calls flood in, but not just him now. My dad. My best friend.

The alarms have been sounded, and everyone is calling out of concern; I feel so burdensome. All I’ve ever wanted is to make everyone happy.

I feel like such a failure.

I imagine he’s not far behind in his truck. I didn’t say where I was going, but it was an easy guess, I’m sure.

When I pull up to my mom’s house, there are cars I don’t immediately recognize already peppering the driveway.

Fantastic.

Unsuspecting witnesses to my life collapsing. I feel ripped wide open for the whole world to see.

I park on the street and dart inside, my one-year-old in tow. When I get inside, I see a couple of my mother’s friends sitting on the couch with her.

Turns out, she’d asked them over to pray for me.

I’ve struggled with belief my whole life, but that day, it seemed, someone was listening. Courage to change the things I can...

My daughter toddles off to her playroom with an adult accompanying her, and I gently lay myself on the couch.

I pull a blanket over my head like I’m a little girl again, hiding from whatever looms in my closet.

I will the world to disappear. Full stop. System failure. Control-Z.

DING.

The dog starts barking at the doorbell; adding to the symphony of clamor already ringing through the house. My mother’s friends tell her not to answer the door. My lungs feel filled with concrete.

Why did he have to pick me?

Why does he have to ‘love’ ME?

I just want a love that isn’t painful.

My mother- radiating a calm fury- pays no heed, and goes outside to defend my honor. Soon I hear their voices, bickering back and forth.

I’d normally not let her fight my battles, but I can’t stand to look at his face right now. Nor say any more words that are doomed to fall on deaf ears.

I picture his bedraggled clothes, his stench of drugs, and the alligator tears welled up in his eyes.

Every vile word he's said swirls in my head on repeat, but they all circle back to one phrase.

“I’ll blow my brains out if you leave!”

I shut my eyes as tightly as I can. I can’t do this anymore.

•••

I let the hot water run over my body for a solid hour. Scrub the mothball scent of our old decaying house from my skin. I wash his fingerprints down the drain.

After some intervention, he had finally left the doorstep. And I finally had my solitude.

Before my shower, I turned my phone off, to avoid the barrage of calls coming from any number of people. I just needed to be, for a moment. The shower gives me some time to think.

Though still rattled, a sort of victorious feeling starts emerging in my chest. Picturing the future without him used to be painful and bleary. Now, it feels like something else.

It feels like dying my hair purple again. (He thought it was trashy)

It feels like wearing smoky, blown-out eye liner to go buy avocados. (I was fake and cared about what everyone thought)

It’s sliding into a form-fitting dress. (That I was wearing to go see another man)

The future now feels like seeing old friends I’d neglected out of fear of jealousy. Like spending the time I’m not with my daughter investing in my passions; not just washing clothes or making dinner.

It feels like a sunrise after a long, painful night.

I step out of the shower and gingerly wrap myself in a towel. I mop a circle with my hand in the center of the mirror, revealing my reflection. I want to gasp when I do.

For the first time, in a very long time, I notice light.

My hazel eyes, once dull and glossy, seem more alive than earlier that day.

The constant tension in my jaw relents. My breath is even, not bated.

As I start to pull on clothes, it clicks in my brain— I’m ME again.

Not the person I was shaped into after him, arm-twisted into submission by fear of what came next.

No, I’m the firecracker that I came out of the womb as. The girl who took no shit, who could walk into any room and make a friend, who valued self-expression over nearly everything.

For the first time in many years, it occurs to me that that girl can live again.

I always knew I could change everything I hated about my life, but finally finding the courage to draw the line in the sand invigorated a whole new side of myself I hadn't previously known.

The thing about trauma is that it strips everything about you away. Over time, the hate speech and bruises seem to meld into you. Your personality, your hopes, your spirit: it all becomes drenched in thick black tar. Many days, you don’t even feel like a real person.

Instead, you feel like a puppet to your emotions; a constant state of fear and dread permeates everything you once loved about life.

However, I’m here to tell you that the choice to reclaim your power is very real, very hard, and above all, very, very rewarding.

When you really separate from the source of your pain, one foot in front of the other, your reality slowly starts to fall back into place.

I still wear scars of my abuse- as you may too- but each day that rolls in promises more healing than the last. Now, I do things like wear red lipstick and earrings for no reason. I hold my head up. I don’t immediately try to veer out of the way when I see someone walking in my path.

I’ll let them bump me. Let them be surprised I’m not quietly retreating.

It’s not a linear process, though. I still have nightmares. Nightmares of nooses and hands closed around my throat. Of gaslighting words and losing my voice when I try to scream. Of being back in that place.

Some days, I rely on medication and meditation to make it through. But I’ve learned the power of gentleness towards myself.

It’s truly remarkable how quickly our minds and bodies heal, when we’ve decided we’ve had enough, and take our power back.

One day, the true you starts to shine through all the cracks, illuminating the darkest of nights.

And that’s who I am now, in the wake of my pain.

The girl in charge of my fate.

I’m more than just who I was before the abuse…I’m something far, far greater.