My Story of Abuse – How I Got Out, How I Recovered & How I Transformed it into a Positive Experience

Intro

Hi everyone! I’m Jojo Aquino and I’m a traveler, blogger and photographer and I write travel tips for female travelers at travelingpetitegirl.com. This month’s content is going to be a little different. I’m going to share about myself outside of being a travel blogger. Because I think it’s important for you to know who I am if I’m going to be sharing guides & tips with you.

So this week’s video is going to be based on a true story. I’m going to tell you my experience of being in an abusive relationship, how I got out, how I recovered and how I transformed it into a positive experience. So this is going to be a heavy video but I promise you, if you stick the end, there’s a happy ending. So get comfy with me because things are about to get very real, very raw and for some others, quite triggering. And I’ll let you know what parts that will be in case you want to skip it.

How We Met

I was 21, and had just moved to San Francisco to study photography and was really having the time of my life. You know how it is in your 20s, you’re young, ambitious, ready to take on the world and try new things. I’m 27 now and I still am.

So there I was, in my tiny studio apartment and I get this message on Facebook from a childhood friend I had back in Guam. He said he was driving to San Francisco from Las Vegas for a weekend trip and knowing that I lived there, he asked to meet up. I hadn’t seen him in 10 years and i thought it would’ve been nice to see a familiar face so I said yes.

Later that week, we met up and for the next few days, we went around the city to eat, see the sights, while talking to each other for hours. Right before he left, I realized I liked him. LIKE A LOT. And it was weird for me to be crazy about someone so fast but I thought it was exciting.

So I told him “I like you”. He seemed a little hesitant, but he said he liked me too. Then he went back to Vegas.

The Hook

For a whole month we kept in touch and talked on FaceTime hours a day, everyday. Then he offered to fly me over to Las Vegas to see him.

So I flew over during winter break and for the whole 2 weeks, he took me out to eat at the best local spots, watch Cirque Du Soleil, introduced me to his friends as his girlfriend which got me really excited. And re-introduced me to his family since they already knew me from before.

I thought things were moving fast but I was just really excited. I was also thinking, “well, I’m only here for a short time, I better make the most out of this trip. I don’t care if it goes fast.” I was completely infatuated with him but in a weird way. Because it seemed like he was a nice, down-to-earth guy but a few things were unsettling.

And they were red flags that I was too infatuated to notice.

The Red Flags

One of the red flags was what he told me about his relationship with his previous girlfriend. According to him, pretty much every bad thing that happened in their relationship was because of her. And after they broke up and she started a new relationship, she still saw him at the same time. Here I was thinking, wow she cheated on her boyfriend. But later on, I found out that it was probably traumatic bonding and I’ll get to that later. He even told me they got into a fight where she slapped him and he threatened to hit her if she did it again.

So their relationship was definitely unhealthy.

But from the way that he said it, it seemed like it was only unhealthy because of her. So I didn’t think much of it.

The Abuse (Trigger warning: Abuse & Sexual Assault)

The abuse started off very playful and very sneaky.

Like making jokes about me, poking fun at me, light-hearted things couples do. Except it was all one-sided. When I tried to make fun of him, he didn’t like it. Later on, it moved to playfully undermining the progress I made in school. Playing blocking the doorway. Playfully locking me in the bathroom. Next thing I knew, he was playfully locking me out of my phone so I couldn’t leave. And then playfully yet forcefully having his way with me in bed. I remember being pinned down, and I couldn’t move my arms and my body. I never felt so weak and helpless in my life.

And I didn’t leave after that.

Mind you, in between his outbursts of abuse, he was for the most part, attentive & caring. Just like the person he was when we met in San Francisco. And I didn’t know abuse worked in cycles. First the tension builds, second comes the explosion, third comes the honeymoon phase and then it repeats. And the scary thing was sometimes I knew tension was building, but I didn’t know when the outburst would come so it left me paranoid. I even thought of provoking him just to get it over it.

And the more these cycles happened, the more I became attached to him and the more he held me emotionally captive. This is called traumatic bonding. And this is the reason why it’s so hard for people to leave abusive relationships.

Long Distance Aspect

In other long distance relationships I’ve been in, I’d always long for my partner. Always feel excited about the next time I’m going to see them. That was not the case in this relationship. Though I’d get a break from his physical abuse, he’d still find ways to get into my head when we talked. He’d manipulate me into buying things for him and tell me what to do because apparently, I was doing everything wrong in my life.

And when I didn’t want to talk to him, he’d call and call until I answered. I didn’t want him to know I was intentionally ignoring his calls so I left my phone to ring and it would go off for what seemed like forever. One time he even called me 50x straight. So even with long distance, I never got away from his abuse.

The Last Straw

When I thought things couldn’t get worse, it did.

After 7 months of dating, I found out he had been talking to another girl during the whole time we were together. He told me how much he liked her. I asked him “Does she know you have a girlfriend?” He answered, “you’re not my girlfriend.” “So in all the 7 months of me flying back and forth between SF & Vegas, going out with you, holding hands with you, kissing, all that stuff and I was never your girlfriend?” I thought.

You introduced me as your girlfriend to your friends when I first arrived. And suddenly it was my fault again because he said it was my choice to fly to Vegas and stay with him and he wasn’t going to say no. WELL I THOUGHT WE WERE IN A RELATIONSHIP. In that conversation, he took no responsibility. Later one, he confessed how he originally went to San Francisco to see her. She was visiting and so he drove the 14 hours from Vegas to San Francisco to see her. Apparently they didn’t see each other as much. And he didn’t expect things to turn out the way it did with me.

So during the entire relationship or what I thought was a relationship, he always had feelings for someone else, talking to them behind my back, while at the same time abusing me.

That’s when I started to leave. Or at least tried to.

How I Left

Leaving that relationship was the harding thing I’ve ever done. Because of traumatic bonding, it took 6 exhausting months. I was so torn down from the abuse that I didn’t have much strength to leave. I had already been so isolated from my friends and family that I didn’t know what support I could get if or when I left.  And my self-opinion had been so broken down, I thought I’d be worse if I left. But I was suffering and I couldn’t take it anymore.

And the more I tried to leave, the more he sensed it, and the more he pulled all the stops to make sure I didn’t. He started apologizing. He started promising to take me out more and treat me better.  And I knew that all was inauthentic because he was still unwilling for me to talk about my feelings and the things he did to me.

He just wanted me back under his control.

When I last saw him, I didn’t tell him I was ending it. There was no way for me to predict how he would react and I knew it would bring up another outburst. So when he dropped me off at the airport, I stayed quiet and told him “I’ll see you next month.” I got on the plane and got back home safely. That was the last I saw him in person.

But the bond was still strong and we still talked after but slowly I replied to him less and less.

After Effects of the Abuse

After the relationship, I found myself very angry and only towards men. I hated them. Never felt safe around them. I always thought they had an agenda.

I later realized through therapy that the reason why I was angry at men was because I never had the opportunity to express how I felt when I was with him. Because whenever I confronted him, he either shut me down, told me it was my fault or just didn’t say anything. And those conversations always left me feeling overly sensitive. And maybe it was my fault. Maybe I was just overthinking it.

And I found out this was his way to manipulate me. And it’s called gaslighting. It’s where the abuser deflects any blame back to you. And as a result, you feel overly sensitive, paranoid, dumb, anything else that causes you to doubt yourself.

And along with anger, I was also becoming depressed and anxious. Like I had this permanent state of exhaustion no matter how much rest I got. And even when I’d spend hours in bed doing nothing, my heart would beat really fast.

I remember my first panic attack. I was standing in the bus, with my head racing from the thought of him hurting me. And I started to choke up and cry but I held it back. And continued to hold it until I got home. And once I closed the door behind me, I started bawling and hyperventilating.  And I didn’t know how to stop it. I was curled up in the bathroom. My head was getting light, my fingers were tingling, and I felt like I lost control and I was going to die.

Unfortunately I had to go through this several more times.

How I Recovered

One day I was scrolling through Tumblr and saw a post about this book “Why Does He Do That: Inside the Minds of Angry and Controlling Men.”

I ended up buying it and OMG that’s when it clicked.

At this point, I never knew I was abused. I thought an abused woman had bruises all over her body and I didn’t have any. But this book made it clear that what happened to me was abuse.  And all the motions I went through in that relationship was normal. I wasn’t going crazy. I wasn’t overly sensitive. I wasn’t paranoid. I wasn’t dumb. I felt validated for the experience I went through. And I started to accept that everything that I thought was my fault, was never my fault to begin with.

After reading the book, it suggested that I create an environment of love and support so I wouldn’t find myself abused again. So I told my family and close friends what happened. And I was scared they wouldn’t believe me. But they did and they understood why I isolated myself from them and made sure to support me from then on.

They were also horrified to hear what happened to me. They always heard stories of these things happening others but they never thought it would happen to someone they know.

The book also suggested I see a therapist so I started seeing one and I was so happy I did.

Getting Therapy

My therapist was great. Every week for the next 10 months, she helped me take apart my relationship and put it back together in a way that left me so strong and so empowered to take my life back.

I was no longer a victim. I was a survivor.

And little by little, I started returning back to the person I was before, just much more wiser and much more stronger. One of the things she was really helpful in was teaching me how to manage my depression & anxiety, getting back into dating, and confronting my abuser.

How I Confronted Him

It had be a month into therapy and I told her my abuser still texted me and I still replied to him. So there was still some traumatic bonding going on. I told her the conversations always ended in him telling me what to do.

And she explained to me that’s how abusers are–Even after you’ve left them, they’ll still pop back into your life to control you.

And then she said, “Stop contacting him and then you’ll start to love yourself. If you don’t let go of him now, all aspects of your life will be affected.”

Like my school, career, dating life and my well-being.

She taught me how to go about confronting him. She said to write a letter to him. No filter. Write down everything he did to me. And then re-write a second version, removing emotion, cuss words, and keep it under a minute.  Then call him unannounced, read my letter and at the end say “So I don’t want you to contact me anymore okay?” And once he says “okay.” I’ll say “Okay. Bye.” Then hang up.

I remember being so scared and nervous but I knew I had to do it.

So I called him, asked if he was busy.

He said he with his friend and they just left the gym, so I said “Well it’ll only take a minute. Is that okay?”  He said “okay.”

So I started reading my letter and a few sentences in, he cut me off and started giving excuses about himself. I rolled my eyes.

He said was doing me a favor by texting me to make up for what he did.

And in my head I was like “Excuse you. Don’t try justify yourself and say you’re helping me.”

So I cut him off to continue my letter and he said “NO. Let me finish.”

So I let him finish and at the end I said “Alright. Well I don’t want you to contact me anymore okay?”

He said “Um.. okay.” I said, “Okay. Bye.” I hung up and that was the end.

He did text me later that night saying “Hey. I realized I was talking about myself again. Can we talk again later?” I knew this was another hook.

I never replied. One week later, I changed my number. And I never heard from him again.

Now all I had to do was express my anger in a healthy way and thankfully, I was already seeing a therapist for that. And the reason why my therapist wanted me to get his agreement to not contact me was, in case he did, I can file a restraining order.

Thankfully it never came to that.

Managing My Anger, Depression & Anxiety (Trigger warning: Depression & Anxiety)

Back in another therapy session, I was talking about the anger I had and my therapist said “So you’re grieving and right now you’re in the anger phase.”

I asked, “How long is the anger phase going to last?”

She answered, “Until you get it all out.”

It took 6 months.

When it came to my anger, I thought up different ways of getting revenge.  Things I would never actually do. But man, it felt so good to play out different revenge scenarios in my head.

Then my therapist said, “You can imagine all the horrific things you want to do to get back at him but the real revenge is to take your anger and direct it towards your photography.  Work hard on your skills so that you can be successful in your career.”

So I started directing my energy towards getting better as a photographer and registered myself into leadership programs. And when it came to my depression and anxiety, my therapist said I was spending too much time at home. Because I’d never leave for days at a time. I’d only leave to buy food.

So her advice was, “Immerse yourself in multi-sensory experiences. Do something you don’t just watch but get to hear, taste, smell, and feel too.”

So I started practicing self-care. Like drawing, breathing techniques, eating healthy, getting 8 hours of sleep, showering, being kind to myself, seeing beauty in simplicity, and being committed to self-growth. I also went out to museums, movies, restaurants, parks and then eventually getting into traveling more. Which later on turned into my travel blog.

She also said to exercise to feel strong again.

I’ve always wanted a strong, toned body. So I got really into weightlifting. Next thing I knew, I was lifting heavy weights from the ground. Lifting them over my head. On my shoulders. And now I have a body I’m really happy with. I feel great when I look in the mirror and more importantly, I’m now stronger.

Getting Back into Dating

One day, my therapist asked, “On a scale of 1-10, how angry are you at your ex?” I said “I don’t know 9?”

“Then I want you to go on 9 first dates with 9 quality men. Then see how angry you are at the end of that.”

So I started dating and that was another journey in itself.

She helped me with my dating profiles across different dating apps. How to present myself so I don’t attract the wrong kind of guys. Apparently I had a thing for domineering men. She said, not all domineering men are abusive. But all abusive men are domineering.

So for dates, she taught me how to psychologically read men. Look them straight in the eyes. Ask them questions. Watch their body language while they answer. Observe how they treat me. And I felt like this was where my charm as a petite girl was an advantage. Because here I was at the table, smiling, asking questions to get to know them. But little did they know, I was watching them really close. And they had no idea.

Actually as a solo traveler, this skill was really useful in reading people to I could figure out who to hang out with.

By the 5th date with the 5th guy, I was no longer angry at men. And by the 7th date with the 7th guy, I met the guy who would later become my boyfriend. And I feel like, if there was a guy to date after an abusive relationship, this was the guy. He was so sweet, so kind, so gentle, so generous, so warm. He knew what to say to me whenever I got triggered. He was like a big teddy bear and I always felt safe with him. We’re no longer together but he will always have a special place in my heart and I wish him the best.

A New Kind of Happiness

My last therapy session was 4 years ago and I’m 27 now. I still follow my therapist’s advice but not to recover and heal. I feel like I’m definitely past that point. After experiencing trauma like that, I became aware of how valuable it was be feel alive and be happy. So I spent more time doing what you loved with the people you loved, and less on material things.  I loved creating, I’ve always loved multi-sensory experiences so as a result, I travel blog.  Which allowed me to spend more time with my family. Because without them, I wouldn’t be where I am now.

And now I’ve found a new form of happiness. And that’s helping others. And doing it in a way that leaves them feeling inspired, alive and ready to take the steps to be their best self.

Conclusion

You know, right after the abuse, I remember crying in bed asking God why such a thing had to happen to me. I didn’t understand why but now I believe it’s to fulfill a bigger purpose. One that I would never be prepared for if I didn’t overcome what happened to me. And as horrible as it was, I’m glad God gave me these trials because I’m completely unrecognizable from the person I was before. So whatever that bigger purpose is, I’m ready for it.

Thank you for being here to listen to my story. If you liked it, please like and subscribe and let me know what you got out of my story in the comments. And don’t forget to check the description box for resources on abusive relationships.

I love you guys, I’m here for you, travel safe, and talk to you next week ?

Bye!