June 28, 2024 • 22 mins
What if recognizing the subtle patterns of abuse could be the key to escaping a toxic relationship? Join me on a journey through the harrowing yet empowering stories of survivors of domestic abuse in our season finale of Dismissed True Stories. In "Survivors' Stories," I share my personal experience of transitioning from a professional broadcasting career to enduring an abusive relationship. These narratives reveal textbook patterns of abuse like significant age gaps and love bombing, offering recognition and validation to those still fighting their battles. Hear the profound emotional toll these survivors endured and the continuous journey of healing supported by therapy and community.
We dissect the initial warning signs and the devastating impacts of emotional manipulation and physical violence, including gaslighting and isolation tactics. The courage it takes to break free from such toxic relationships is nothing short of heroic. As we prepare for our summer hiatus in "Season Two Preparation and Thank You," I reflect on the transformative connections formed through this podcast and the deep gratitude I feel for our listeners. Stay connected via social media for updates, and remember, your value in this world is immeasurable.
We dissect the initial warning signs and the devastating impacts of emotional manipulation and physical violence, including gaslighting and isolation tactics. The courage it takes to break free from such toxic relationships is nothing short of heroic. As we prepare for our summer hiatus in "Season Two Preparation and Thank You," I reflect on the transformative connections formed through this podcast and the deep gratitude I feel for our listeners. Stay connected via social media for updates, and remember, your value in this world is immeasurable.
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National Domestic Violence Hotline: 800-799-7233 OR text begin to 88788
Come join our community of survivors who are looking to meet someone just like you! See the behind the scenes work that goes into the sisterhood non-profit business, discuss DTS episodes, and of course find your survivor sister.
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Ready to share your story? Send me an email with the main talking points of your experience and I'll reach out to book an interview.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
This episode of Dismissed True Stories is
brought to you by Persephoneai.
Persephoneai is an innovativeand disruptive discreet app
where you can more securelystash your evidence of abuse,
make static notes, uploadattachments, import audio-video
files and even requesttranscription and language
(00:21):
translation.
Transcription and languagetranslation.
Then export your full evidence,report on your timeline, sos
the police or even use it incourt after your safe exit.
You are not alone, andPersephone is here when you
don't know who to tell.
Find Persephoneai on GooglePlay or the App Store.
(00:42):
In this episode, we will behearing directly from a survivor
as they recount their personaljourney.
Dismissed True Storiesrecognizes that discussion of
abuse and trauma can evokestrong emotional responses and
it may be triggering for somelisteners.
Listener, discretion is advised.
Hey, I'm Elissa and this isDismiss True Stories the podcast
(01:05):
.
This podcast was born from theidea that when I was a little
girl, I wanted to be a warreporter in the sense that I
just really wanted to talk aboutthe things that matter in the
world.
And when I ended up walkingaway from my professional
broadcasting career and into anabusive relationship, I realized
that victims and survivorsreally do fight their own wars
(01:28):
at home.
I volunteer with a localdomestic violence shelter in my
city and as I was putting on avigil for the lives lost to
domestic violence last year, Istumbled upon a story that will
forever stick with me.
I did the research to find thisvictim's family, since she is
no longer with us, and onesentence kept rattling around in
(01:52):
my brain Let them tell theirstory.
And while I haven't worked upthe confidence to get in touch
with her family just yet, I wantthis podcast to not only be
about the survivors who livedand escaped, but the stories
from the family members ofvictims who, unfortunately, are
(02:14):
no longer with us.
I sat on this idea for almost ayear before I decided to
randomly make a TikTok videoasking for survivors to come
forward and share their storiesof survivorship, and what
happened next was completely andtotally unexpected.
(02:35):
Women came forward sending metheir stories of survival,
telling me that they were sosick and tired of being quiet,
because what happens so often isthat survivors are silenced,
people aren't ready or equippedto handle their truth or
sometimes simply they just don'twant to make the time.
(02:57):
But now, on Dismissed TrueStories, we're making the time.
I can't believe we're herealready the season finale of
season one.
That is absolutely insane to me.
So the reason why I started thispodcast was because I wanted
survivors to understand thatthey're not alone.
(03:19):
Healing happens in community.
You already know that.
That is like role number onefor me in survivorship and I was
hoping that this podcast wouldhelp survivors understand that
they're not alone.
But the other thing that Ireally wanted to come out of
this was to help people who haveeither experienced abuse and
(03:42):
never really called it what itwas, or for the victims who are
still in abusive relationshipsor marriages to be able to
identify that that's what ishappening to them.
Because a lot of the times ifyou're listening to this and
you're a survivor, then you knowit just doesn't quite click
(04:03):
sometimes because you could bein denial or you could be gaslit
, groomed, manipulated, and thatis exactly what has happened.
I have had numerous peoplereach out to me and say I
understand now that myrelationship is unhealthy and I
am going to take the steps torecover and to escape.
(04:26):
I never expected for some ofthose people to be extremely
close to me and for me to noteven know it.
It's insane.
So in editing these storiesthis season, I have come across
many similarities and so Ithought for the season finale I
(04:51):
would put them all together inone episode.
Identify their abuse.
Just by listening to thisepisode and listening to the
similarities, helping themunderstand that abuse is many
times textbook and you're notalone, so let's get into it.
Speaker 2 (05:20):
So it's been a long, long time since I left, but it
still affects me a lot.
I just started going to therapyin like August, to deal with it
.
I've been in a lot of therapy,a whole lot of therapy.
Speaker 3 (05:33):
I've worked through some of it.
Speaker 4 (05:34):
So, yeah, right now I've been seeing the same
therapist for a little over ayear now, and it's been the most
consistent therapy I've everhad, and so I'm in a really good
space in regards to all of that.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
I've seen a lot of survivors share their stories in
which there was a significantage gap between them and their
abuser.
A lot of the times it's becausebeing younger you're easier to
manipulate.
Speaker 3 (06:01):
Originally we met online on a dating website and
at that time I was 18, youngdumb, and he was 29.
Speaker 5 (06:13):
And I was like so I guess you have been my first red
flag right there he is in his40s and he is into you and I'm
like okay, young, me young, 21year old.
He was like, okay, never beenwith a guy that old.
But I'll see where it goes, I'mnot against anything.
And of course there's lovebombing.
Speaker 1 (06:31):
the whole point of it is to gain control over another
person and increase yourdependence on the abuser
Showering you with love, sellingyou a fairy tale, that kind of
thing.
Speaker 3 (06:47):
He was definitely saying all the right things.
Everything I wanted to hear ofthat.
Oh, you know what?
No matter what, I'll be there,whether we're just friends or
we're just in a relationship,but I'll be by your side.
You don't have to worry aboutit.
You don't have to go throughthis alone.
Speaker 4 (06:58):
Fell in love so quickly and that was just the
love bombing and the.
He had to be with me all thetime and I just thought that was
so romantic because nobody'swanted to spend that much time
with me.
Speaker 5 (07:07):
Em asked me.
I'll just use Em for him.
Em asked me if I needed to comeover to cry, have a shoulder to
cry on, talk things out, and Iwas so grateful for that.
So like, yes, I can really usethat.
Speaker 6 (07:20):
I started dating somebody and there was love
bombing.
In the beginning, as a teenager, I was completely perfect,
fairy tale, all of that funstuff.
Speaker 1 (07:27):
And then, once you've committed to a relationship,
because you've been love bombedand sold a fairy tale, they're
going to move into that nextstep, which is isolation.
Speaker 2 (07:37):
I had just felt so isolated from all of my family
and friends back home, fromeverything I knew, and I felt
like there was no way outbecause he had told me for so
long they don't love you, theydon't care about you, that I
believed him, and so I was likethis is this, is it?
Like this is how it ends for me.
(07:57):
So it was just him and I.
I was like this is it, this ishow it ends for me.
Speaker 5 (08:00):
So it was just him and I.
I was completely isolated.
I had no friends.
Speaker 6 (08:05):
Isolation, all of it.
It's not anything that you'resupposed to recognize.
You're not supposed to see itbecause you're not supposed to
have to be around it.
You're not supposed to bewitnessing it.
It's not normal around it.
Speaker 1 (08:19):
You're not supposed to be witnessing it, it's not
normal, and one of the ways theycan keep you isolated is
leaving you to take care of allof the responsibilities of life,
like deciding to not work andleave you to pay all of the
bills.
Speaker 2 (08:33):
I was like there's no way he's going to stay jobless,
Like he'll get another job.
There were tons of jobs wherewe were living and so I was like
it'll be easy, no problem,Never even tried.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
I was like you know what?
You don't help me, you don't donothing, I pay all the bills
too, and I'm going to school,and I was over it.
I was like you know what.
Speaker 1 (09:05):
At this point, I'm done.
I don't want to be in arelationship with you.
Speaker 3 (09:08):
We're married, but I'm a single mother.
Speaker 4 (09:08):
Every single story that I shared this season, the
survivor had mentioned power andcontrol, especially him being
very controlling of what I canand can't do, so one of his
tools to control the family wasto tell us that we were crazy
and put us in therapy.
Speaker 5 (09:19):
Looking back now, that was a total control move on
his part.
Speaker 6 (09:30):
And so I was like I am just taking control from one
person and giving it to anotherperson is what it felt like.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
I just can envision the control as he puts it on and
feels empowered every day, Justsome weird type of draw, and
one thing that we can tend to doas survivors and victims who
are in abuse is try torationalize why things are the
way that they are, by tellingourselves that other people
could have it worse, or tellingyourself that it's really not
(09:54):
that bad, so you don't have tomake the hard decision to walk
away.
Speaker 3 (10:00):
And then every time he would get upset with me, he
would raise his fist, but hewould never hit me.
So it's every somewhere fast.
That was shown throughout.
But you know, I just was likeoh, you know, he never did put
his hands on me.
It's okay, you know he gets mad, he might raise his fist, but
he never hit me yet.
Speaker 4 (10:14):
My line was if they put their hands on me, that's
when it's wrong.
Nothing else is wrong.
It's when they put their handson me in a violent way, and I
think that that's also important.
Speaker 1 (10:26):
A very manipulative way to regain power and control
and this can also be seen asnarcissistic hoovering would be
to threaten you when you do tryto walk away with things like
they're going to hurt themselvesor they're going to unalive
themselves.
Speaker 5 (10:47):
I'm done.
I'm going to go drinking andjump off a bridge.
I'm going to go do this.
I'm going to do very dangerousthings.
At first it was just texting.
No pictures were sent.
His favorite was to.
Speaker 6 (10:59):
If I left.
Speaker 1 (10:59):
He was going to kill himself in front of the kids, in
front of whoever however, Iwish I could tell you what this
was and why abusers choose tostrangle their victims over
hitting them, but one of themisconceptions is that they
choked you, and I am verypersistent on reminding a
(11:20):
survivor that they did not chokeyou.
Speaker 5 (11:22):
They strangled you, and that is actually an attempt
at unaliving somebody, and so,instead of hitting, me, he
decided to choke me up, and thatwas the first time that he
actually choked me, and hechoked me until I passed out and
he like kind of threw me upagainst the wall by my throat
and trying to choke me out, andso I started just clawing at him
(11:45):
, slapping him, just trying toget him off of me, and when he
finally does, I slink down to,like, the floorboard and I'm
rocking myself and just likefreaking out, in which his
response was get up, get get upnow, cause I was trying to
scream when he had his hand onmy throat originally, like I, he
was like why are you freakingout so much?
I was like you just choked meout.
(12:07):
He's like no, I didn't Like,you're not, that's not what
happened.
Like, and I was like then whathappened?
Speaker 6 (12:13):
So much gaslighting all the time that I don't think
I even really had a perceptionof reality.
Speaker 5 (12:18):
He, even after the incident, tried to gaslight me
into thinking it was my faultand that it didn't actually
happen.
So I gaslighting myself of,just like it's not that bad,
like a lot of women have itworse than me, and it's kind of
like I drove myself to staybecause of that.
I was like, well, it could be alot worse.
Speaker 1 (12:36):
Are we even surprised that another common theme is
cheating?
Speaker 2 (12:42):
And he had been talking to so many women and had
been getting photos of them andlike sending them so many
inappropriate things, I was justlike I was floored.
Speaker 4 (12:55):
I mean, it was probably 10 or 15 different
girls throughout ourrelationship, it somehow came
out that he cheated on me withhis ex-girlfriend and she was
pregnant.
Speaker 5 (13:08):
What I didn't know at the time was that he had made a
fake profile on Facebook topose, as his friend Turns out,
who he was dating at the sametime with me.
Speaker 1 (13:17):
I call this next part the love compass.
Speaker 4 (13:21):
And so I think it's important again being raised in
narcissism.
I obviously didn't have a goodcompass of what love is.
Speaker 6 (13:30):
I wasn't able to have healthy relationships modeled
to me.
I wasn't, honestly, notnecessarily super sure of the
wrong kind of relationships atthat point, but I wasn't sure
what the right one looked like.
I wasn't sure or taught how tolove yourself first, or how to
have grace with yourself, or howto not let people treat you
(13:50):
poorly.
Speaker 1 (13:51):
Sometimes our abuser will be honest with us about
their struggles and tell us thatthey've changed, even though
they know that that's a lie andin our gut or our intuition can
tell us that that may not betrue.
We will ignore that because wewant to see only the best in
(14:12):
them and we want to believe thatthey can change.
Speaker 4 (14:17):
But he told me he changed and I believed him
because he seemed to have hisanger under control, because he
never got physicallyintimidating.
Speaker 5 (14:29):
He told me he changed and I wanted to believe him
this next part just reallyfucking sucks.
Speaker 3 (14:36):
He hit me in the head .
He was behind me.
I was facing the sink and hewas behind me.
He hit me in the head likepunched me in the head.
Speaker 4 (14:43):
And he just unleashed on me.
He started punching me, kickingme um like grabbing me by, like
my shoulders and like justbanging my head against the
floor repeatedly and hitting meso hard in the head that he was
getting up and making sure I wasbreathing.
Speaker 3 (14:56):
When I went to sleep, so he's always playing it on me
being woken up by being used asa punching bag.
Speaker 1 (15:02):
I think most have a drug of choice, but alcohol was
a very common theme this seasonBlackout rage.
Speaker 2 (15:11):
Yes, it would be like blackout rage, yeah.
So he, when he drinks hardalcohol, he and he thinks it's
hilarious he gets an alter ego,he says where he's very mean and
vindictive and yells a lot,says horrible things.
Speaker 6 (15:34):
And he ended up drinking excessively, smashing
every crystal cup in my house.
Tried to drive drunk, tried tomake a scene.
Speaker 4 (15:43):
I did not know was in recovery or was supposed to be
in recovery and was drinkingagain.
Speaker 1 (15:48):
One thing from my own personal experience I did not
realize was abuse was when youare trapped or confined to a
certain area and your abuserwon't let you leave.
Speaker 6 (16:02):
Did you ever get trapped in like cars?
Did he trap you in like closedspaces to fight before you
either went somewhere or leftsomewhere?
Speaker 4 (16:08):
Um, like he would scream at me for six, seven,
eight hours straight, no break.
Um, just demeaning, um and kindof like trapping me.
Um, in, like the basement tokeep me there so he could just
keep going in.
Like the basement to keep methere, so he could just keep
going, and we have a momentwhere we realize that we're just
done.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
Yeah, you know how it is.
It's the.
He loves me.
He's a really nice guy, Ipromise.
Speaker 3 (16:42):
Yep, the protection of his reputation.
I was like, no more, I'm notgoing to do that for you.
That is the moment that I wokeme up and realized, like if this
week continues down the street,I may not make it to see
another day.
Like I won't get to see my kidsbe married, I won't get to see
my first days of school, I won'tget to see them go to prom, I
won't get to see them grow up.
And that's what I was thinkingthe whole entire time, that what
(17:06):
I was.
I was thinking that the wholeentire time.
Like I was, just like you know,how can I get out of this?
How can I get out of here?
How can I live for just rightnow?
Speaker 5 (17:10):
and then she said he did that to me too, though, so
you're not alone.
And when she said that likeyou're not alone, I just broke
down completely like I was.
That was the first time I waslike maybe I'm actually not
alone, maybe I'm not crazy.
I got his abuse the worst.
I got all the negative, theabuse.
(17:32):
It's the bouts of abuse thatwere horrific.
Like this is not okay, this isnot normal.
Speaker 6 (17:38):
It's like not okay and it's not okay.
It's not okay that I thought itwas okay.
Speaker 1 (17:42):
I want to leave you with the advice of these
incredible survivors.
Speaker 2 (17:49):
Make a plan and execute it and don't turn back
because it's so much brighter onthe other side.
It's amazing.
You just have to make the planand execute it.
Even if it's amazing, you justhave to make the plan and
execute it.
Even if it's just going tosomeone and saying you know it
could be someone you don't knowvery well it could be a
(18:10):
co-worker like me and justsaying this is happening to me
and I need help.
Can you help me?
And you would be surprised atthe number of people who are
willing to help I mean, don'tget me wrong couples argue like
they should never grow physical.
Speaker 3 (18:23):
You should never be calling one another out or each
other's name.
Stuff shouldn't be thrown.
You shouldn't fear for yourlife.
So the slightest sign of that,run, and don't be upset about
running.
There is going to be somebodyout there who loves you and
that's not going to make youfear for your life.
Speaker 5 (18:42):
You're not crazy, no matter how they make you think,
and the moments where you feelthe most like you, when you're
alone, if you get the chance tobe alone, or don't try to think
that it's nothing, because it issomething, no matter what it is
, even if it's just an unkindword, while that may not be a
(19:06):
punch to the face, it's still apunch to your mental health,
which is a punch nonetheless,and so don't let yourself think
that it's too little orinsignificant.
Nothing's too little orinsignificant.
I kind of referenced thisearlier insignificant.
Speaker 4 (19:29):
I kind of referenced this earlier the people, the
person that you're afraid toleave, that version of the
person that you're afraid toleave, that you don't want to
lose, is not the person you'releaving.
You're leaving, you want toleave that person, the person
you're hanging on for is justtheir mask.
You're not crazy?
Speaker 6 (19:46):
You're not crazy, You're not weak, You're not less
than Most of the time.
They sought you out and theypicked you because you were that
good of a person.
It wasn't your fault and you'reworth fighting for.
Other piece of advice I have isif anybody is ever in a
situation where someone'sdisclosing domestic violence to
you, I have not came across onesituation where it has not been
(20:10):
a case of if they're telling yousomething, multiply it by a
thousand.
If they're not telling you thefull story, it was worse.
And if they're speaking up,they have something to say.
Speaker 1 (20:21):
I can't believe.
That's it the end of season oneof Dismissed True Stories.
Like I really never evenpictured being here at the end
of a season.
I have learned so much.
I have grown in my healingjourney as an interviewer, as a
(20:41):
journalist, as a podcaster, as asister, a survivor sister Like
just thank you so much for beinghere.
I just can't find the words tosay Like I'm stuttering.
The feeling is incredible.
I love every single connectionthat I've made.
(21:04):
This podcast has truly changedmy life.
It has helped me connect withso many on such a deeper level,
which is something that I crave.
It's beautiful, it's incredible.
(21:25):
Wow, I promise I'm only going tobe gone for the summer.
I'm going to take a month ortwo off and really focus on
season two and getting ahead ofthe curve just a little bit.
I will be back in the fall, sogive me a follow on my social
media.
I've included my handles in thefooter of this episode so you
(21:49):
know when I am launching seasontwo.
Oh my, I can't believe I'm evensaying crazy.
And remember the world is trulya better place because you are
(22:13):
in it.
See you in season two, Thankyou.
This episode of Dismissed True Stories is
brought to you by Persephoneai.
Persephoneai is an innovativeand disruptive discreet app
where you can more securelystash your evidence of abuse,
make static notes, uploadattachments, import audio-video
files and even requesttranscription and language
(00:21):
translation.
Transcription and languagetranslation.
Then export your full evidence,report on your timeline, sos
the police or even use it incourt after your safe exit.
You are not alone, andPersephone is here when you
don't know who to tell.
Find Persephoneai on GooglePlay or the App Store.
(00:42):
In this episode, we will behearing directly from a survivor
as they recount their personaljourney.
Dismissed True Storiesrecognizes that discussion of
abuse and trauma can evokestrong emotional responses and
it may be triggering for somelisteners.
Listener, discretion is advised.
Hey, I'm Elissa and this isDismiss True Stories the podcast
(01:05):
.
This podcast was born from theidea that when I was a little
girl, I wanted to be a warreporter in the sense that I
just really wanted to talk aboutthe things that matter in the
world.
And when I ended up walkingaway from my professional
broadcasting career and into anabusive relationship, I realized
that victims and survivorsreally do fight their own wars
(01:28):
at home.
I volunteer with a localdomestic violence shelter in my
city and as I was putting on avigil for the lives lost to
domestic violence last year, Istumbled upon a story that will
forever stick with me.
I did the research to find thisvictim's family, since she is
no longer with us, and onesentence kept rattling around in
(01:52):
my brain Let them tell theirstory.
And while I haven't worked upthe confidence to get in touch
with her family just yet, I wantthis podcast to not only be
about the survivors who livedand escaped, but the stories
from the family members ofvictims who, unfortunately, are
(02:14):
no longer with us.
I sat on this idea for almost ayear before I decided to
randomly make a TikTok videoasking for survivors to come
forward and share their storiesof survivorship, and what
happened next was completely andtotally unexpected.
(02:35):
Women came forward sending metheir stories of survival,
telling me that they were sosick and tired of being quiet,
because what happens so often isthat survivors are silenced,
people aren't ready or equippedto handle their truth or
sometimes simply they just don'twant to make the time.
(02:57):
But now, on Dismissed TrueStories, we're making the time.
I can't believe we're herealready the season finale of
season one.
That is absolutely insane to me.
So the reason why I started thispodcast was because I wanted
survivors to understand thatthey're not alone.
(03:19):
Healing happens in community.
You already know that.
That is like role number onefor me in survivorship and I was
hoping that this podcast wouldhelp survivors understand that
they're not alone.
But the other thing that Ireally wanted to come out of
this was to help people who haveeither experienced abuse and
(03:42):
never really called it what itwas, or for the victims who are
still in abusive relationshipsor marriages to be able to
identify that that's what ishappening to them.
Because a lot of the times ifyou're listening to this and
you're a survivor, then you knowit just doesn't quite click
(04:03):
sometimes because you could bein denial or you could be gaslit
, groomed, manipulated, and thatis exactly what has happened.
I have had numerous peoplereach out to me and say I
understand now that myrelationship is unhealthy and I
am going to take the steps torecover and to escape.
(04:26):
I never expected for some ofthose people to be extremely
close to me and for me to noteven know it.
It's insane.
So in editing these storiesthis season, I have come across
many similarities and so Ithought for the season finale I
(04:51):
would put them all together inone episode.
Identify their abuse.
Just by listening to thisepisode and listening to the
similarities, helping themunderstand that abuse is many
times textbook and you're notalone, so let's get into it.
Speaker 2 (05:20):
So it's been a long, long time since I left, but it
still affects me a lot.
I just started going to therapyin like August, to deal with it
.
I've been in a lot of therapy,a whole lot of therapy.
Speaker 3 (05:33):
I've worked through some of it.
Speaker 4 (05:34):
So, yeah, right now I've been seeing the same
therapist for a little over ayear now, and it's been the most
consistent therapy I've everhad, and so I'm in a really good
space in regards to all of that.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
I've seen a lot of survivors share their stories in
which there was a significantage gap between them and their
abuser.
A lot of the times it's becausebeing younger you're easier to
manipulate.
Speaker 3 (06:01):
Originally we met online on a dating website and
at that time I was 18, youngdumb, and he was 29.
Speaker 5 (06:13):
And I was like so I guess you have been my first red
flag right there he is in his40s and he is into you and I'm
like okay, young, me young, 21year old.
He was like, okay, never beenwith a guy that old.
But I'll see where it goes, I'mnot against anything.
And of course there's lovebombing.
Speaker 1 (06:31):
the whole point of it is to gain control over another
person and increase yourdependence on the abuser
Showering you with love, sellingyou a fairy tale, that kind of
thing.
Speaker 3 (06:47):
He was definitely saying all the right things.
Everything I wanted to hear ofthat.
Oh, you know what?
No matter what, I'll be there,whether we're just friends or
we're just in a relationship,but I'll be by your side.
You don't have to worry aboutit.
You don't have to go throughthis alone.
Speaker 4 (06:58):
Fell in love so quickly and that was just the
love bombing and the.
He had to be with me all thetime and I just thought that was
so romantic because nobody'swanted to spend that much time
with me.
Speaker 5 (07:07):
Em asked me.
I'll just use Em for him.
Em asked me if I needed to comeover to cry, have a shoulder to
cry on, talk things out, and Iwas so grateful for that.
So like, yes, I can really usethat.
Speaker 6 (07:20):
I started dating somebody and there was love
bombing.
In the beginning, as a teenager, I was completely perfect,
fairy tale, all of that funstuff.
Speaker 1 (07:27):
And then, once you've committed to a relationship,
because you've been love bombedand sold a fairy tale, they're
going to move into that nextstep, which is isolation.
Speaker 2 (07:37):
I had just felt so isolated from all of my family
and friends back home, fromeverything I knew, and I felt
like there was no way outbecause he had told me for so
long they don't love you, theydon't care about you, that I
believed him, and so I was likethis is this, is it?
Like this is how it ends for me.
(07:57):
So it was just him and I.
I was like this is it, this ishow it ends for me.
Speaker 5 (08:00):
So it was just him and I.
I was completely isolated.
I had no friends.
Speaker 6 (08:05):
Isolation, all of it.
It's not anything that you'resupposed to recognize.
You're not supposed to see itbecause you're not supposed to
have to be around it.
You're not supposed to bewitnessing it.
It's not normal around it.
Speaker 1 (08:19):
You're not supposed to be witnessing it, it's not
normal, and one of the ways theycan keep you isolated is
leaving you to take care of allof the responsibilities of life,
like deciding to not work andleave you to pay all of the
bills.
Speaker 2 (08:33):
I was like there's no way he's going to stay jobless,
Like he'll get another job.
There were tons of jobs wherewe were living and so I was like
it'll be easy, no problem,Never even tried.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
I was like you know what?
You don't help me, you don't donothing, I pay all the bills
too, and I'm going to school,and I was over it.
I was like you know what.
Speaker 1 (09:05):
At this point, I'm done.
I don't want to be in arelationship with you.
Speaker 3 (09:08):
We're married, but I'm a single mother.
Speaker 4 (09:08):
Every single story that I shared this season, the
survivor had mentioned power andcontrol, especially him being
very controlling of what I canand can't do, so one of his
tools to control the family wasto tell us that we were crazy
and put us in therapy.
Speaker 5 (09:19):
Looking back now, that was a total control move on
his part.
Speaker 6 (09:30):
And so I was like I am just taking control from one
person and giving it to anotherperson is what it felt like.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
I just can envision the control as he puts it on and
feels empowered every day, Justsome weird type of draw, and
one thing that we can tend to doas survivors and victims who
are in abuse is try torationalize why things are the
way that they are, by tellingourselves that other people
could have it worse, or tellingyourself that it's really not
(09:54):
that bad, so you don't have tomake the hard decision to walk
away.
Speaker 3 (10:00):
And then every time he would get upset with me, he
would raise his fist, but hewould never hit me.
So it's every somewhere fast.
That was shown throughout.
But you know, I just was likeoh, you know, he never did put
his hands on me.
It's okay, you know he gets mad, he might raise his fist, but
he never hit me yet.
Speaker 4 (10:14):
My line was if they put their hands on me, that's
when it's wrong.
Nothing else is wrong.
It's when they put their handson me in a violent way, and I
think that that's also important.
Speaker 1 (10:26):
A very manipulative way to regain power and control
and this can also be seen asnarcissistic hoovering would be
to threaten you when you do tryto walk away with things like
they're going to hurt themselvesor they're going to unalive
themselves.
Speaker 5 (10:47):
I'm done.
I'm going to go drinking andjump off a bridge.
I'm going to go do this.
I'm going to do very dangerousthings.
At first it was just texting.
No pictures were sent.
His favorite was to.
Speaker 6 (10:59):
If I left.
Speaker 1 (10:59):
He was going to kill himself in front of the kids, in
front of whoever however, Iwish I could tell you what this
was and why abusers choose tostrangle their victims over
hitting them, but one of themisconceptions is that they
choked you, and I am verypersistent on reminding a
(11:20):
survivor that they did not chokeyou.
Speaker 5 (11:22):
They strangled you, and that is actually an attempt
at unaliving somebody, and so,instead of hitting, me, he
decided to choke me up, and thatwas the first time that he
actually choked me, and hechoked me until I passed out and
he like kind of threw me upagainst the wall by my throat
and trying to choke me out, andso I started just clawing at him
(11:45):
, slapping him, just trying toget him off of me, and when he
finally does, I slink down to,like, the floorboard and I'm
rocking myself and just likefreaking out, in which his
response was get up, get get upnow, cause I was trying to
scream when he had his hand onmy throat originally, like I, he
was like why are you freakingout so much?
I was like you just choked meout.
(12:07):
He's like no, I didn't Like,you're not, that's not what
happened.
Like, and I was like then whathappened?
Speaker 6 (12:13):
So much gaslighting all the time that I don't think
I even really had a perceptionof reality.
Speaker 5 (12:18):
He, even after the incident, tried to gaslight me
into thinking it was my faultand that it didn't actually
happen.
So I gaslighting myself of,just like it's not that bad,
like a lot of women have itworse than me, and it's kind of
like I drove myself to staybecause of that.
I was like, well, it could be alot worse.
Speaker 1 (12:36):
Are we even surprised that another common theme is
cheating?
Speaker 2 (12:42):
And he had been talking to so many women and had
been getting photos of them andlike sending them so many
inappropriate things, I was justlike I was floored.
Speaker 4 (12:55):
I mean, it was probably 10 or 15 different
girls throughout ourrelationship, it somehow came
out that he cheated on me withhis ex-girlfriend and she was
pregnant.
Speaker 5 (13:08):
What I didn't know at the time was that he had made a
fake profile on Facebook topose, as his friend Turns out,
who he was dating at the sametime with me.
Speaker 1 (13:17):
I call this next part the love compass.
Speaker 4 (13:21):
And so I think it's important again being raised in
narcissism.
I obviously didn't have a goodcompass of what love is.
Speaker 6 (13:30):
I wasn't able to have healthy relationships modeled
to me.
I wasn't, honestly, notnecessarily super sure of the
wrong kind of relationships atthat point, but I wasn't sure
what the right one looked like.
I wasn't sure or taught how tolove yourself first, or how to
have grace with yourself, or howto not let people treat you
(13:50):
poorly.
Speaker 1 (13:51):
Sometimes our abuser will be honest with us about
their struggles and tell us thatthey've changed, even though
they know that that's a lie andin our gut or our intuition can
tell us that that may not betrue.
We will ignore that because wewant to see only the best in
(14:12):
them and we want to believe thatthey can change.
Speaker 4 (14:17):
But he told me he changed and I believed him
because he seemed to have hisanger under control, because he
never got physicallyintimidating.
Speaker 5 (14:29):
He told me he changed and I wanted to believe him
this next part just reallyfucking sucks.
Speaker 3 (14:36):
He hit me in the head .
He was behind me.
I was facing the sink and hewas behind me.
He hit me in the head likepunched me in the head.
Speaker 4 (14:43):
And he just unleashed on me.
He started punching me, kickingme um like grabbing me by, like
my shoulders and like justbanging my head against the
floor repeatedly and hitting meso hard in the head that he was
getting up and making sure I wasbreathing.
Speaker 3 (14:56):
When I went to sleep, so he's always playing it on me
being woken up by being used asa punching bag.
Speaker 1 (15:02):
I think most have a drug of choice, but alcohol was
a very common theme this seasonBlackout rage.
Speaker 2 (15:11):
Yes, it would be like blackout rage, yeah.
So he, when he drinks hardalcohol, he and he thinks it's
hilarious he gets an alter ego,he says where he's very mean and
vindictive and yells a lot,says horrible things.
Speaker 6 (15:34):
And he ended up drinking excessively, smashing
every crystal cup in my house.
Tried to drive drunk, tried tomake a scene.
Speaker 4 (15:43):
I did not know was in recovery or was supposed to be
in recovery and was drinkingagain.
Speaker 1 (15:48):
One thing from my own personal experience I did not
realize was abuse was when youare trapped or confined to a
certain area and your abuserwon't let you leave.
Speaker 6 (16:02):
Did you ever get trapped in like cars?
Did he trap you in like closedspaces to fight before you
either went somewhere or leftsomewhere?
Speaker 4 (16:08):
Um, like he would scream at me for six, seven,
eight hours straight, no break.
Um, just demeaning, um and kindof like trapping me.
Um, in, like the basement tokeep me there so he could just
keep going in.
Like the basement to keep methere, so he could just keep
going, and we have a momentwhere we realize that we're just
done.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
Yeah, you know how it is.
It's the.
He loves me.
He's a really nice guy, Ipromise.
Speaker 3 (16:42):
Yep, the protection of his reputation.
I was like, no more, I'm notgoing to do that for you.
That is the moment that I wokeme up and realized, like if this
week continues down the street,I may not make it to see
another day.
Like I won't get to see my kidsbe married, I won't get to see
my first days of school, I won'tget to see them go to prom, I
won't get to see them grow up.
And that's what I was thinkingthe whole entire time, that what
(17:06):
I was.
I was thinking that the wholeentire time.
Like I was, just like you know,how can I get out of this?
How can I get out of here?
How can I live for just rightnow?
Speaker 5 (17:10):
and then she said he did that to me too, though, so
you're not alone.
And when she said that likeyou're not alone, I just broke
down completely like I was.
That was the first time I waslike maybe I'm actually not
alone, maybe I'm not crazy.
I got his abuse the worst.
I got all the negative, theabuse.
(17:32):
It's the bouts of abuse thatwere horrific.
Like this is not okay, this isnot normal.
Speaker 6 (17:38):
It's like not okay and it's not okay.
It's not okay that I thought itwas okay.
Speaker 1 (17:42):
I want to leave you with the advice of these
incredible survivors.
Speaker 2 (17:49):
Make a plan and execute it and don't turn back
because it's so much brighter onthe other side.
It's amazing.
You just have to make the planand execute it.
Even if it's amazing, you justhave to make the plan and
execute it.
Even if it's just going tosomeone and saying you know it
could be someone you don't knowvery well it could be a
(18:10):
co-worker like me and justsaying this is happening to me
and I need help.
Can you help me?
And you would be surprised atthe number of people who are
willing to help I mean, don'tget me wrong couples argue like
they should never grow physical.
Speaker 3 (18:23):
You should never be calling one another out or each
other's name.
Stuff shouldn't be thrown.
You shouldn't fear for yourlife.
So the slightest sign of that,run, and don't be upset about
running.
There is going to be somebodyout there who loves you and
that's not going to make youfear for your life.
Speaker 5 (18:42):
You're not crazy, no matter how they make you think,
and the moments where you feelthe most like you, when you're
alone, if you get the chance tobe alone, or don't try to think
that it's nothing, because it issomething, no matter what it is
, even if it's just an unkindword, while that may not be a
(19:06):
punch to the face, it's still apunch to your mental health,
which is a punch nonetheless,and so don't let yourself think
that it's too little orinsignificant.
Nothing's too little orinsignificant.
I kind of referenced thisearlier insignificant.
Speaker 4 (19:29):
I kind of referenced this earlier the people, the
person that you're afraid toleave, that version of the
person that you're afraid toleave, that you don't want to
lose, is not the person you'releaving.
You're leaving, you want toleave that person, the person
you're hanging on for is justtheir mask.
You're not crazy?
Speaker 6 (19:46):
You're not crazy, You're not weak, You're not less
than Most of the time.
They sought you out and theypicked you because you were that
good of a person.
It wasn't your fault and you'reworth fighting for.
Other piece of advice I have isif anybody is ever in a
situation where someone'sdisclosing domestic violence to
you, I have not came across onesituation where it has not been
(20:10):
a case of if they're telling yousomething, multiply it by a
thousand.
If they're not telling you thefull story, it was worse.
And if they're speaking up,they have something to say.
Speaker 1 (20:21):
I can't believe.
That's it the end of season oneof Dismissed True Stories.
Like I really never evenpictured being here at the end
of a season.
I have learned so much.
I have grown in my healingjourney as an interviewer, as a
(20:41):
journalist, as a podcaster, as asister, a survivor sister Like
just thank you so much for beinghere.
I just can't find the words tosay Like I'm stuttering.
The feeling is incredible.
I love every single connectionthat I've made.
(21:04):
This podcast has truly changedmy life.
It has helped me connect withso many on such a deeper level,
which is something that I crave.
It's beautiful, it's incredible.
(21:25):
Wow, I promise I'm only going tobe gone for the summer.
I'm going to take a month ortwo off and really focus on
season two and getting ahead ofthe curve just a little bit.
I will be back in the fall, sogive me a follow on my social
media.
I've included my handles in thefooter of this episode so you
(21:49):
know when I am launching seasontwo.
Oh my, I can't believe I'm evensaying crazy.
And remember the world is trulya better place because you are
(22:13):
in it.
See you in season two, Thankyou.
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