It Was His Job to Break Me": The Three Lies That Kept Me Trapped

⚠️ TRIGGER WARNING: This post contains candid discussions of domestic violence, physical abuse, severe emotional manipulation, and threats of homicide/suicide. Please read with care.

There are entire years of my life that I simply cannot remember.

Trauma does that to your brain. But while vast stretches of time are completely blurred out, I can still remember the exact first time my ex-husband hit me—and the last.

I can also vividly remember three recurring threats he drilled into my head during almost every single fight. Looking back, I know those three statements are the core reason I stayed as long as I did.

People love to spout the cliché that women choose toxic men because they want to "save" or "fix" them. That was never the case for me. I knew hitting me was wrong, and I never once believed I could change him. Before we got married, he lied to and deceived me about who he truly was. The moment the ring went on, the mask fell off. From there, it became a desperate cycle of trying to see if things would improve or if this was just my new reality.

Unfortunately, that reality came with psychological threats so calculated that they kept me trapped for years.

The Three Lies That Kept Me Trapped

I don't honestly remember how often we fought, how frequently he was physically violent, what triggered the arguments, or who started them. But I do know these three statements were repeated with such relentless accuracy that I eventually swallowed them as truth:

1. "No one will ever believe you."

His logic was simple: every woman claims she’s being abused, no one ever has proof, and if I spoke up, everyone would think I was making it up. A few times, I tried to record what was happening to have proof. He would find out, break whatever device I used to record him, and then break me.

His favorite phrase to recite was that it was his job as my husband to break me down so he could rebuild me into the "right" form of a wife. I wasn't allowed to have independent thoughts. My only job was to obey. If he hit me, it was because I had stepped out of line, and he "had to break it out of me" so I wouldn't do it again.

Initially, I fought back to protect myself and my daughter. But eventually, he wore me down. I spent all my energy controlling every single word, movement, and breath—for both myself and my child—just to avoid setting him off. I was broken, living in constant terror, exactly as he intended.

2. "If you try to leave, I will kill you and then myself."

He loved reminding me that we had nearly twenty weapons in the house. He made sure I knew he could use one of them to end my life, cover it up by claiming he feared for his own, or just turn the gun on himself.

He had it mapped out down to the smallest detail:

"If we’re both dead, who raises your daughter? Not your parents—they still have your sisters at home. My mother has always wanted a daughter, so she'll finally get to raise one."

Knowing his mother as well as I did, that was a horrifying thought. I also knew he was completely unstable, didn't fear death or consequences, and lacked any moral compass. He was fully capable of doing it. That fear kept me completely in line. I felt I had to stay alive simply so my daughter would never have to face this world—and his family—alone.

3. "No one would ever want you. You’ll be broken and lonely forever."

As the abuse continued, I sank into a deep depression and began gaining weight. Right after my daughter was born, I had fit back into my regular clothes easily. But within the first year of marriage, that changed. As the weight built up, his new favorite insult was telling me no one would ever want a "fat, unattractive woman with no job, no education, an ex-husband, and a child."

He asked me what the upside of leaving would even be. That constant degradation fueled my depression even more. I avoided scales, mirrors, and cameras. On the rare occasions I look at photos from that era today, I look at myself and think, “Wow, how did I let it get that bad?”

The Reality of Compliance

When someone repeats these horrors to you daily, pairing them with physical violence, you eventually adapt just to survive.

People on the outside look in and ask, "Why didn't you just leave? It's so easy—look at all these resources and family." But those words mean nothing when your mind has been systematically rewired by fear. When you know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that the person making those threats is dangerous enough to execute them, compliance becomes a rational survival strategy.

You rationalize it: Maybe I said something wrong today. At least if his anger is directed at me, it isn't directed at my child.

Remaining quiet and compliant isn't weakness. In an impossible situation, it becomes the only way to keep yourself and your child alive.

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It takes immense energy to survive being systematically broken down—and even more to rebuild yourself on the other side. To my fellow survivors: what was the first sign that you were beginning to find your voice again?