This is going to be the most rewarding, scary, difficult, lonely, and sad experience you will feel. When you truly leave and get out and no one has anything they can say to you anymore, you will wonder if you made the right decision. You will question yourself, you will feel sad, rejected, betrayed, forgotten, hurt and absolutely exhausted.

But you won’t hear this from most of those that have left abusive situations. WHY? Because most of the stories of those that have been abused are kept just as quiet as when someone was in that horrible situation. Because when people reach freedom, they don’t want to go through making statements and talking anymore about the past, they don’t want to bring up those memories. Who would? It’s understandable, but these are the VOICES whose stories need to be heard. We see celebrities who have been through trauma like we have, and we never knew, we see movies of people who go through the same situations as us, but people around never knew. The ones hurting try to appear to be doing as well as ever. It’s an illusion that some of us have been taught to portray. It’s also an illusion that some of us have been taught to believe. And we go days thinking, “was it my fault?” “If I didn’t…this wouldn’t have happened”, and when the days come when you have break downs and you think, “maybe I am really crazy and I deserved it all”, or even, “none of this ever really happened, I just made it up because I feel out of control”. You will have melt downs, just remember that when this happens, you are with someone who you trust enough to hold you while you cry.