I'm sitting here in shock as I am typing these words that I never thought I would say, telling a story that I never imagined that I would be telling. Trying more than anything to understand.

I was a freshman in high school when I first saw him. He was 3 years older than me. I had always thought that he was breathe taking. He would walk around the halls with this grin on his face that just drew you in and his laugh was so captivating. I was a girl with a silly little crush. I was 16 years old when he had sent me a message on Facebook one day and I remember the butterflies I felt when I saw it. He told me that there's no way he would ever forget seeing such a pretty girl like me. I remember the conversations we had. It was nothing but compliments and how nobody had ever made him feel like this before. He couldn't wait to hang out so he could finally see me laughing at all his corny jokes. 

I remember the first time we hung out together. He had brought me flowers and held doors open for me. He walked me to my door. That kind of thing doesn't happen anymore. He kissed me right in the middle of my sentence and I swear my heart stopped beating. It was an ordinary moment that was somehow turned magical. He was always bringing me flowers and telling me that I was it. I was the person he was going to spend the rest of his life with. At 16 years old, I was naive and there was nothing I wanted more than to believe that. Looking back now, there were so many things that just never added up. How fast our relationship was moving and some of the things he would say , I just felt like he was hiding something. I just shrugged it off and was convinced that it probably didn't mean anything. 

The first few months were great. I felt like a princess. He had built me up so high with compliments, promises, and all of these sweet things that he would do for me. I got teddy bears and love letter. He showed me his life and all of his dreams. I realized that I had fallen in love with him. He was my first real boyfriend. He was the first person I loved and the first person that I had slept with. I gave him everything and thought that he had done the same.

 Then I felt like the rug had been ripped out from underneath me. Things changed. At first, it was little comments. I would say something and he would tell me that I was dumb. I would wear a tank top and I was trying to get attention. I would hang out with a friend and he would ask why they would want to hang out with me. He slowly became someone that I didn't recognize. I was I think confused at first. I didn't understand why he would say things like that. I figured he just had a bad day at work that turned into a bad week which turned into a bad couple of weeks and so on.

He would get mad easily and irritated. I could just look at him and it would start a fight. I would tell him to have a good day at work and he would tell me that I was bothering him. He would go days just flat out ignoring me. He would reject my calls and if he saw me, he would pretend like he didn't. Then he would act like nothing happened and everything was fine again. 

One night he told me he had to work late. I went to dinner with one of my friends and her boyfriend and a few of her boyfriend's friends. I looked outside and saw him get out of his truck. He looked so angry, I had never seen anything like that before. I went out to say hi because I was so glad that I was gonig to be able to spend time with him that night. He grabbed my arm and shoved me into his truck. He told me it was time to go. He took me to his house and I never heard silence so loud. He wouldn't say a word.

That night he threw me on his bed and ripped my clothes from my body. He pulled my hair and slapped my face. He told me if I was going to go act like a whore, he was going to treat me like one. I still remember lying there wanting to be angry or scared but I couldn't feel anything. I knew that I should say something or do something and I should be feeling something. But I was numb. 

He started going through my cell phone to see who I was talking to. I wasn't allowed to speak to some of my friends anymore. He felt like they were a bad influence on me. He started telling me what I should wear. If I didn't listen, he would tell me that I was wanting attention from other guys, that I was a dirty slut, that I needed to learn respect. He started telling me how I should respond to him because he said  I was too sensitive and I was too argumentative. Sometimes I wasn't allowed to say anything at all. If we were out with his friends, I was just supposed to sit there and look pretty for him. 

I don't remember being afraid of him. I just remember trying so hard to be perfect and making sure that I was doing everything right. People had started asking questions and I would make excuses of why I couldn't hang out anymore. People would say how aweful he was and I would stick up for him. I would get offended if someone tried making him out to be the bad guy, because to me, he wasn't. He just liked things a certain way and he could be a little moody sometimes.

I was 17 and I remember watching two little lines appear in the bathroom at the fair grounds. I just wanted to pretend that it wasn't happening. I had no idea what to expect when I was going to tell him. I didn't know if he would be angry or excited or what he was going to do. He was always so unpredictable. I remember walking over to the barns and seeing him flirting with another girl. My heart just sank. 

I told him that I was sorry to interrupt but I needed to talk to him. He said Bitch, can't you see that I'm busy? I walked away and he followed. He grabbed my arm and told me I was never to do anything like that again. I just blurted it out. "I'm pregnant". He laughed in my face and said that it wasn't his. I was too busy being a whore and probably would never know who the father was. He threw me into the side of the building. I had a bruise on my hip for 3 weeks he threw me so hard. 

He got drunk and told me that I needed to take care of the problem and then he disapearred after that. It didn't matter what I did, he wanted nothing to do with me. I was alone and I didn't know how I would handle life without him. I was so used to being told what to do, I felt lost. But I had a little baby growing in my belly and I was going to love him or her so much. I was going to make sure that they never missed having a father around. 

I was only 2 months along. I still hadn't heard from him. I started bleeding, really heavily. I was in so much pain. I remember being at the doctor's office and hearing them say "I'm sorry but there is no heartbeat. You had a miscarriage." I sat in the parking lot with my hands on my belly just begging my baby to come back. I wanted to see the little fingers and toes, I wanted to feel the kicks, and I wanted to see that beautiful little face. 

When I told him that I wasn't pregnant anymore, he came back. It was like the begining all over again. He was so sweet and apologetic, saying that things wouldn't be like that anymore. He missed me so much. I fell right back in because it felt good. He made me happy when I was so miserable without him and without the baby. Things were good for awhile, until they weren't anymore. 

I caught him cheating and lying. When I would call him out on it, it was always my fault. He would get angry at me. He would call me names and all kinds of horrible things. He started telling his friends things about me and they would always joke and make me feel uncomfortable and humiliated. He kept saying that I wasn't good enough, that I didn't turn him on anymore, that I was a failure. 

Then he left. He started seeing someone else and I was just a piece of trash that he tossed aside without second guessing. The switch just flipped. I didn't feel anything. I blocked it all out. When he would come up in conversations, I would avoid it. I spent my time not thinking or feeling anything about him. 

There were so many countless times that he kept coming back. Out of the blue, I would get a phone call in the middle of the night or one random afternoon I would get a picture of him. At that point, it was easy for me to ignore him. It's been 5 years of him popping back in. I still don't know what it is that he wants from me but this last time was different.

He started sending me flowers at work. I don't know how he even knew where I worked at. I hadn't spoken to him in over a year. He would call me and I had gotten my number changed. He knew where my new house was. It had started scaring me, then just like that, he sucked me back in. I couldn't go more than a few minutes without checking my phone. I was constantly thinking about him. 

He made me all these promises. He had bought me a ring and he was going to ask me to marry him. He wanted me to have his kids. He wanted a baby with me and he wanted it now. He bought a house and he wanted me to move in with him. It was intense and a flood of emotions that I hadn't allowed myself to feel in a long time. I went and saw him and things felt so good. They felt different. Then he started acting the same all over again. I was a terrible person because I had one relationship since we had broken up. I was supposed to wait for him. I was a whore and a bitch and a tease. 

It shook me up so badly. I started having nightmares and I would always see him. I went to a counselor and she told me that I had PTSD. I had been under so much emotional and mental stress at an age that I didn't have the ability to handle it all so I just blocked it out. Something had triggered my memories and they kept flooding in and its overwhelming.

I understand now why I am so hard on myself. I understand why it's hard for me to trust people and when I'm walking by myself, I'm always terrified. I was so blind. I didn't think that there was a problem. I spent so much of my time trying to make him happy and when he started telling me to do things, I didn't think twice and it got so far out of control. I'm ashamed for allowing myself to be treated like that. I feel like it's my fault and I could have done so many things differently. I'm afraid because I know how easy it is for him to suck me back in and I keep catching myself even now, making excuses for things that he's done. I'm afraid of what all of this is going to make me feel. I don't know if I can handle it, being broken. 

What comes next? What do you do when you realize that you've been lying to yourself and you finally remember that missing piece of your past? What do you do when he keeps coming back and it's so tempting? How can you love someone that only hurts you?