🔥 WEEK 6 — The Marriage That Broke Me & The Strength That Freed Me (1995–2007)

Healing Journey Series — From Darkness to Light

Becoming a mother at 19 gave me my first real taste of hope —

but hope doesn’t erase the wounds of childhood.

And when trauma goes unhealed, it follows you into every corner of adulthood, even the places where you think you’re starting over.

By the time Zack was a year old, I was trying to rebuild my life piece by piece.

I worked, I took care of my son, and I fought every day to be the mother I never had the chance to grow up with.

But deep inside, I was still that girl who had been taught to accept pain as normal…

and that made me vulnerable to men who recognized that softness and took advantage of it.

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🌑 The Relationship That Became a Mirror

In 1995, when Zack was still a baby, I met the man who would become my husband.

We were married in 1997.

I was young, hopeful, and still carrying wounds so deep that I didn’t recognize the red flags staring back at me.

At 22, in 1996, I had my youngest son —

a child who brought even more love and light into my life.

But love isn’t always enough to protect you when the person beside you carries their own darkness.

What started as a relationship I hoped would bring stability slowly became a repeat of everything I had grown up around —

the emotional abuse, the mental manipulation, the physical harm.

Trauma has a way of choosing familiar patterns until you learn to break them.

I thought:

“If I fight back, it’s not abuse.”

“If I’m strong, I can fix it.”

“If I try harder, he’ll change.”

But that’s not how abuse works.

And deep down, I always knew it.

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💔 The Cycle I Didn’t Deserve

Those twelve years were filled with:

• emotional abuse

• verbal attacks

• threats

• isolation

• fear

• manipulation

• and moments that made me question my worth as a woman and a mother

He made me believe everything was my fault.

He turned situations around so well that even the police often sided with him.

And every year I stayed, I lost a little more of myself.

I defended myself, fought back, tried to be strong —

but strength doesn’t protect you from someone who enjoys hurting you.

The final breaking point came on New Year’s Eve 2006.

He shot me multiple times with a BB gun.

Not by accident.

Not in a moment of play.

He sat next to me and shot me —

because I liked taking pictures of things that made me happy.

When Zack tried to protect me, he turned on him too.

In that moment, something inside me broke…

and something else awakened.

I saw my sons watching.

I saw their fear.

I saw the cycle repeating.

And I knew:

If I stayed, they would learn that this was love.

And I couldn’t let that be their inheritance.

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🌙 The Escape

It took me three attempts to leave —

because abusers are experts at promising change.

Experts at making you believe your pain is temporary.

Experts at twisting your heart with hope and guilt.

But the final time, I didn’t look back.

I planned my escape quietly…

carefully…

for my sons…

and for myself.

And when I finally walked out that door, I walked out with the strength of every version of me that had ever been silenced.

I didn’t know where life would take me next.

But I knew I deserved to breathe freely again.

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🌤 What I Learned Through the Pain

Leaving wasn’t the end of the struggle —

it was the beginning of understanding myself.

I learned:

✨ That fighting back doesn’t make abuse your fault

✨ That strength doesn’t mean staying

✨ That leaving is an act of love, not betrayal

✨ That trauma teaches you to confuse chaos with love

✨ That children learn from what they see — not what you say

And I promised myself something I kept for the rest of my life:

My sons would never grow up believing that violence was normal.

They would grow up seeing me fight for peace.

They would grow up seeing me choose myself.

This chapter was painful —

but it was also the foundation for the healing work that would come later.

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💫 Takeaway:

Leaving an abusive relationship isn’t weakness —

it’s the moment you decide your life is worth saving.

Breaking the cycle doesn’t mean you failed.

It means you finally saw your own worth.