I AM A FIERCE WOMAN

I was thirty-two and a woman in one more co-dependent relationship with a narcissistic, violent man. He would be my last. He was the one that I stood up to and said, ‘no more’. 

There was a long trail of failed relationship breadcrumbs that led back to the powerlessness of being the daughter of my parents. Violence and chaos were a familiar friend. I drank the fine edge of stress as a daily tea to stimulate my frayed nerves. It was what I knew. 

How did I get here again? I thought I was done with guys like this. I can’t believe I’m getting belittled, accused, punished, choked, and ignored. I really hate myself. All I want is……...what?  

He came in with such a nice picture to make my life respectable and complete. Handsome, tall, sexy, masculine and so accomplished with his masters teaching degree and high school classroom. I thought I had hit the jackpot with this one. My daughter and I would finally have someone to take care of us and give us the good life. 

I wanted to be in that picture so bad that I chose to sweep all the early warning signs under the carpet and believe me, they were there. Mom showed me how do that. I was good at it. Keep the picture nice and pretty. Do whatever it takes to hide the truth from others so that I don’t look ugly and messy to those who will judge me. Or call me a loser. Again.

This guy could not tolerate peace and happiness. Especially mine. It made him angry. It made him drink. I reminded him of his mother. His rage made him powerful and in control. Ah, there’s that familiar companion that demanded the walking on eggshells.  

Would I get down and crawl across cut glass for him? Would my daughter?

It was four in the morning. Once again, he didn’t come home after work. Cold, untouched dinner. No call. No answering my messages of worry that turned into fear. Waiting, pacing, hour after hour of increasing stress wrenching my gut. Did something happen to him? Was he dead? Was I about to be left all alone again?  Abandoned? 

‘Oh, thank God, he’s home’. Shit, he’s really drunk. He was immediately angry with my confrontation of questions. How dare I be upset that he was with his woman friend Jules, who he refused to introduce me to or talk about. It was none of my business.

My daughter was awake now. Peeking through the crack in her bedroom door. Listening and scared. Refusing to go back to bed. Things are about to go bad again. She can see it in my shame.  

He shut me up with his large, heavy history book slamming into my face. I heard the loud snap as my nose broke and shifted towards my left cheek. A searing, blinding pain that stopped me in my tracks. 

In that instant, the spell he held over me broke with the nose. I felt the fiercest rage, one that I had never felt, rise within and ignite into a hot, burning flame of reclamation. I caught his look of surprise as my knee sank hard and deep into his balls and down he went.  

I could feel my daughter at my back, crying and trying to pull me away in fear of retaliating. I wasn’t running. Not this time. As I stood over him, the words “Get the fuck up and get out. You don’t live here anymore” spilled from my mouth. It was a final death blow to him, and anyone like him. I was done. No more. 

Well, look at this. I’ve scared him for the first time in our entire relationship. He got up and limped out the front door without a word. I spent the next few hours moving all his belongings into the garage and later that day, had the locks changed on the doors.  He never stepped foot in my house again. 

I saw him a few years later in the grocery store. He was a stranger to me as I looked him in the eye and kept on walking. Door closed.  

My now grown daughter recalls this memory with me from time to time. She tells the story with pride at the fierceness she witnessed in her mother and how after that, she knew she was safe with me and the two men that came after. 

The residual bump on my nose is worn as a badge of honor for taking my power back and knowing that no one will ever be allowed to abuse me again. 

I’m a fierce woman. 

Jerri Lynn Shelton