It didn’t matter how many reasons I had to leave, as long as I had one reason why not to, that outweighed the rest.
It was easy to align reasons to stay, and reasons to go.
Trust, love, fidelity, hope, history, honor, etc. all easily pair, with abuse, grief, pain, etc. it was easy to reconcile that I “should” go because of that list. The negatives far outweighed the positives. Even though they were far fewer in number.
Why NOT to go? Was it’s own seperate list. And it was positively negative. Negatively positive. Whatever. Simply not neutral. And it took all the weight from the negative, and all the importance of the positive, and fused them. Which made the decision painfully easy. Literally. I stayed. Because I had someone to protect. In the face of that I didn’t give a damn about myself. I hated the decision, and I made the best of it. Another blending of good and bad. Because I was far, far, far too afraid of the consequences of leaving. They were outside of my control if I left.
It took losing that control, anyway, to force my hand.
He took away my reason NOT to leave.
I couldn’t protect my son if I was dead. The third time that year came too close to working. He pushed me into traffic, he pushed me down the stairs, and I got some minor-ish injuries from both...but it was an old fashioned door that nearly got me. Well... that and the floor. And the number of times he smashed my head into it. After he hit me with the door.
I’d known I was in an abusive relationship for years and years. This wasn’t news to me, I wasn’t surprised or devastated or in denial about it. I was angry about it. But? I knew it was abusive, and I made a choice to stay. My choice. Made many times over. Which like most oft repeated choices, and habit, becomes easier over time. I’d decided it was the right thing to do. Every time I chose to say, I confirmed to myself I was doing the right thing.
My only regret, is that I didn’t stay longer. Not the answer most people expect, I know. But it’s the truth. It’s the worst thing I’ve ever done in my life, bar none. And I’ve don’t a lot of truly terrible things. That one? Tops them all. It may have been rational, but it was wrong.
What will your regret be?
