My Happy Ending

by Nicole McDonald
(California )

I had met him when I was only 13 he was my boyfriends best friend as bad as that sounds. But a year later our paths crossed and there was a strange connection between us. He was a bad boy and six years older than me. Now that I'm 27, I know how wrong it was me being 14 and him being 20, so bad.

Not long after I met him, I started to get into drugs and sneaking out at night to see him. Within six months, I had run away and moved in with him. Life was a blast we would get drunk and high and not have to worry about anything. But then he changed almost overnight. He became overly possessive, and I couldn't leave the room we rented without him. I couldn't go to the bathroom without him. I couldn't even go to the kitchen without him. And we lived in a house with a gay male couple. Not long after he started acting that way our relationship became all about his needs. It was no longer my choice if I wanted to have sex. If I were sick or not in the mood or even on my period and didn't want to, he would force himself on me, and if I fought, then I would get beaten until I stopped resisting. It didn't take long before I became pregnant with a beautiful baby girl when I was only 15. During my pregnancy he still never stopped I just let him do his thing in fear for the baby inside me.

After I had her when I was 16, he became more aggressive and rough when it came to sex, choking and hitting me through the whole time. He would drink so much, and blackout and beat me some more. When he would wake up, he would apologize and cry every time. But of course drinking even more and beating and raping me over and over again in front of my baby girl who was still under a year old of course led me to become pregnant again at age 17. And of course, because of his drug and alcohol use, he accused me of cheating on him with his 13-year-old brother who I hated by the way.

That's when things got crazy, so here we go. My abusive partner had his older sisters watch my daughter and told me we were going out right! Well wrong, he kidnapped me and forced me into an empty apartment tied me up and tortured me for two days. He then forced me to take pills and forced them down by placing a towel drenched in bleach over my face and pouring more bleach on me forcing me to drink bleach! Then he would beat me even more. Let me remind everyone I was pregnant, and he was trying to kill my baby. After hours of this abuse, I was woken up by him kicking me in the stomach over and over again. Somehow I managed to get free and hit him in the face trying to save my baby, well that just pissed him off even more. He dragged me into the bathroom by my hair and tried to drown me by holding my face under the bathtub faucet. When he realized that wasn't working, he then tried to break my neck. Lucky for me he only cracked it, but my instincts kicked in and that was my chance. I played dead. I had held my breath and went limp. I guess my acting had worked because he freaked out and ran out the door. I then hurried and ran down the street towards the hospital, which was 2 miles away. Then it dawned on me that my daughter was half a mile away with his sisters, so I turned around and ran to see if she was okay. His mother and sisters were heartbroken when they saw me and rushed me to the hospital. I had broken ribs, internal bleeding, my eyes were completely red and bloodshot, and my whole face and stomach covered in bruises.

But remember, I was 17, and I thought I was in love. So, of course, a few days later I did go back to him to fix our relationship and left my daughter again with his sisters. Well, child protective services (CPS) came and took her from them. His sisters called two days later to let us know that she was in state custody. Well, I found out the court date, and the night before the hearing the police came and arrested him for hurting me. It took me from age 14 -18 to realize how bad of a relationship I was really in. But long story short my kids meant everything to me, I fought for over a year and finally got my little girl back. I had a beautiful baby boy by myself. He was premature caused my stress. And raised them by myself, it was difficult. I worked four jobs and went to school, but I did it. My children's father spent five years in federal prison. Authorities revoked his green card revoked and deported him. I haven't heard a word from him in the past nine years.

My daughter is now ten, my son is now 9, and I've moved on. Since then I've met the love of my life who doesn't hit me or rape me, and he doesn't talk down to me. He is the best loving, caring man I've ever met and I'm lucky to have him in my life. We have another son who is now four, and my love and I hope to be married soon. But I guess I wanted to share my story because it is possible to survive something like this, it just takes time. Honestly, if it wasn't for CPS taking my daughter, I don't think I would have had the courage to leave him, and I would probably be dead. But my kids are what kept me going every day. Without me, they would be in the system, so I do everything in my power to keep them safe out of harm's way. And I'm alive, my kids are safe, and I did it.