In 2019, after repeatedly assaulting me physically and sexually, my abuser went to Batterer’s Intervention at A No Abuse.

Abusers abuse for power and control. The desire for more power and control comes when victims assert their own right to autonomy and freedom.

In this audio clip from 2013, my abuser admits to abusing me for 10 years to maintain power and control over me. 10 more years followed.

You can also hear the PTSD tic I developed of clearing my throat. Four years later, it would completely take my voice and require surgery. It was in recovery from that surgery that I was thrown into a desk by my abuser and badly injured.

I regret not telling anyone what was happening to me at that time. I felt I couldn’t. I feared he would do more to harm me and my children. As I’ve come out to the world about how we were abused by this man, he has followed through on threats to harm me. The difference today is that I’m not a victim in silence anymore. I’m a survivor fighting for freedom from abuse and another’s power and control over me and my children.

This is not about winning or harming him. This is about stopping abuse and protecting myself and my children — as it has always been.

10 years ago, after my husband isolated me from my children by blocking them from calling me while I was away for work for two weeks in Spain, I moved out. I had been working with a therapist who encouraged me to get support outside the relationship. She was also our marital therapist.

When I moved, this man forced his way into my home. This is one recording from that time. His crazymaking is like this – going from talking about filing for divorce to accusations about me sleeping with colleagues and his right to harass me and publicly humiliate me at our children’s little league games by accusing me in front of two teams of parents. The point was to isolate me and demand that we were married and that he was not going to let me go.

This is how I handled myself for twenty years in abuse until my fear grew too great and I started to insist harder on my freedom. Now he does this to me in court and to our children in his home.

It may not seem like much but when you cannot escape the abuse and this is how control over you is maintained, it’s significant. It has caused me and my children to suffer from extreme anxiety and PTSD. Part of our healing is raising awareness of what is happening to us until it’s not happening anymore.

This man threatened our lives if i ever told on him. I have lived in fear of that threat for many years. I refuse to be afraid anymore. The threat is still very real to me, but I will not suffer in silence as doing so means that this will continue indefinitely.

I am a disabled woman experiencing disabling abuse and financial and legal exploitation. I am standing up for me and my children.