Supplemental Post: Feeling It

Warning: I am posting about my experiences of domestic abuse in the hope that it will help others to a greater understanding of what goes through a victim's mind when these things happen. And in the hopes that, by describing my experiences, I can help shift the stigma and provide support to those still in abusive situations to know that others have been through this and survived, that they are not alone, and that it is not about them - it is about an abusive situation that hopefully they can move away from when they are ready to do so. 

THIS POST CONTAINS DISTURBING SCENES - PLEASE BE PREPARED FOR THAT IF YOU WISH TO READ ON. THANK YOU.

***

So now I’ve built it up to be something awful. When I tell you, maybe you’ll wonder what all the fuss is about.

The time between me tipping the drink over his head and what happens next drags in my mind, distorting, like an old-style video-tape on slow forward. I’m taking in the look on his face, searching for his reaction, but it doesn’t come. Not from his expression.

He leaps across the sofa, pulling me down and off, into the middle of the floor. He’s straddling me, pinning me down, his full weight on my chest.

“No,” he says. “All this shit. You don’t just get away with this shit. You f*cking take responsibility for what you do.”

“Get off me,” I squeal as the tears well up in my eyes.

“No, you f*cking deal with this now. You started this and now I’m going to finish it.”

I’m crying properly now and I feel the tears running down my cheek and I turn my head to the side. I can’t look at him, his eyes wild, full of rage. I’m trying to wriggle free, but somehow he’s got me locked down. I can’t move an inch. Only my legs can thrash about uselessly.

“All this crap, this stuff about her, this is not about her. This is about you and Josh,” he says. “That’s what’s going on here.”

“Me and Josh,” I sob. “There is no me and Josh. There never has been.”

“Well, I don’t believe you,” he spits. “And so you’re going to convince me.”

“I told you,” I say. “There was never anything. Never.”

“But he wanted to,” he spits at me.

“No, he didn’t,” I plead. “He might have joked about it, but that’s all it was. A joke.”

“He did,” he says. “You don’t know guys. He did, otherwise he wouldn’t have suggested anything at all. He thinks the same of you, just like the others do, that it’s all you’re good for.”

“He doesn’t. He didn’t.”

“You will f*cking admit this, you lying sl*t,” he says, calmly like he’s under control, but his eyes are telling a different story.

“But there’s nothing to admit,” I whisper.

“There’s you lying, that’s what there is to admit,” he says.

I remain motionless, silent, confused, scared.

“Don’t just look at me with those pathetic eyes, Kitty, don’t do that,” he says. “You know how much I hate that.”

But I don’t know what to say so I just lie there with the tears rolling down my cheeks. A voice in my head is screaming, telling me that I need to react, to fight back. But somehow I am paralysed inside and out.

I feel him move, lean forward. I see him grab a cushion from the sofa, a heavy one covered in red corduroy. He brings it down onto my head before my brain clocks what is happening. It’s not so much the cushion but the hardness of the floor that hurts.

“F*cking admit it, Kitty,” he shouts.

But then the cushion’s down on my head again before I can speak. It makes a dull thud, the force of my skull pushed hard against the floor, my neck twisted, cheek pressed down, the thin rough carpet scratching against my skin. He does it again, and again. I can feel it getting stronger, quicker. My head feels like it’s going to burst open, my eyes screwed shut, something inside me trying to hold on as I am being pulled towards a spinning black vortex.

“Stop,” I scream, in between the blows. “Stop.”

He pauses, and a bizarre sensation spreads through my head like space dust crackling and popping. As I turn my head and blink, all I see are his eyes, black, glaring at me, filled with hatred. 

“I’ll stop when you admit it,” he says. “Are you ready to admit it?”

“Admit what?” I say.

And so it starts again, harder and harder. I can feel the zip from the cushion start to cut into my head, hear his breathing getting heavier, out of control. It doesn’t seem like it’s about this stupid issue anymore, this ridiculous allegation that isn’t even true. It’s about something else, something that is making him hate me, want to hurt me.

“OK, OK,” I sob. “I admit it. I admit it, you’re right, I’m sorry.”

He stops, his eyes shining, piercing.

“Admit what, I want to hear you say it Kitty.”

“I admit it, Josh, he wanted to, you’re right I’m wrong.”

“Is that it?” he asks.

“I don’t know what you want me to say,” I shout. “Tell me what you want.”

“It’s not about what I want, it’s about the truth,” he spits.

And so the words tumble from my mouth like I’m vomiting all over myself.

“Whatever it is, it’s true,” I say. “I’m a liar and everything you say is right. Everything, what you say, you’re right about it all.”

He pauses, breathing heavily, and a whoosh of icy cold sweeps over my body from my feet to my scalp, as coolly, crisply as if I had stepped into a bath of ice cold vodka, coating me, freezing my head solid, metal clamped between two plates of a vice. There is nothing more I can say.

Then it’s gone, like an instant thaw, and I know he’s done.

“You f*cking sl*t,” he says, as he pushes himself up and off me. And the blood flows back through my veins, forcing its way, the pins and needles spreading through every limb.  

I wait for him to leave the room before I get up from the floor. I’m dizzy and groggy, ears ringing, eyes raw, blurred. I take my chance and tip-toe up the stairs. I grab my fleece, phone, keys, some cash.  I creep back down the hallway stairs and slip out through the front door like a whisper into the night.