I had asked myself these questions so many times. I thought it was my fault. I thought if only I didn't make him so mad. If I just kept my mouth shut he wouldn't hit me. Why couldn't I just keep my opinions to myself? I can't believe that I was stupid enough to let him hurt me and not do anything about it.

I had watched so many of my friends live this way and even protected them from their abusers but I couldn't do it for myself. We had a whirlwind relationship; we both had just come out of other relationships and were hurting emotionally.

I know now my self-esteem was at the lowest point it had ever been and it has been pretty low sometimes. I have since found out you attract what you are. I guess I was attracting pain and hurt.

We went out for lunch and dinner, we watched movies and hung out with his friends. We were inseparable. I pushed everything and everyone else out of my life. I had let him become my whole world. I couldn't see I was doing the same thing I had warned my friends not to do when they got into relationships.

Things started to change and he started to get mad at me for silly things. I should have seen the signs. I was so insecure and alone that I just wanted somebody who would love me.

The first time he hurt me he had been angry in traffic. He tried to throw me out of a moving car. I stayed with him though and we moved in together three months later. He threw our table and chairs down the stairs the day we moved in together, I should left then but I stayed. I thought it was the stress of moving.

After a couple of months of living together things started to get better. We started going out with friends and I thought he had changed.

We had been together six months and he asked me to marry him on New Years Eve, I said yes. I was sure it was love. I know now I was scared of being alone if I said no.

It wasn't long before I would regret making that decision. It took some time before I was well enough to get out of that abusive relationship. I had to see that I was a worthwhile person and that nobody deserves to be abused.

I had to hurt just long enough to want to change myself and my life. Today I can look back on it and realize that I have learned a lot for what I went through. I am a stronger person for surviving the experience. It has made me believe in my inner voice and now I listen to its warnings where before I wouldn't.

I am free now to love and be love and not be a hostage of my insecurities.