Forever Trapped

When freedom comes too late

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Content Warning / Author’s Note

This story depicts domestic abuse, violence, and trauma. Some passages may be distressing for survivors or sensitive readers. It aims to share the emotional truth of surviving it, not to sensationalize it.

I was married to him for almost fifty years.

In the beginning, it was good. Or at least, that is how it feels now.

We laughed, we talked, and there were moments that felt safe. There was a time before fear. It was so long ago that I can no longer remember when it changed.

People think time makes pain fade. It does not. Time only teaches you how to survive it.

At first, I trusted him. When things began to change, he said I was difficult. Weak. Unlovable. He said it so often that his voice became mine.

I learned how to live quietly. Quiet enough not to upset him. Quiet enough not to be seen. Quiet enough to stay alive. I watched every word I spoke, every step I took. I learned how to disappear inside my own home.

Sometimes I did everything right, and he hurt me anyway. Not because I failed, but because he wanted to. Because he could.

Bruises became normal. Broken fingers. Cuts and wounds I learned to hide.

When people asked, he said I was drunk. That I fell. That it was my own fault. He said it so often that others believed him. Sometimes, even I did.

He called me ugly. Disgusting. A whore. He repeated the words until they lived inside me. Until shame felt normal. Until I forgot what respect was supposed to feel like.

I stopped defending myself. There was no point. Truth does not survive in a house where one person decides what is real.

Women came and went. I saw hope in their eyes when they arrived, and fear in their bodies when they left. Some stayed for weeks. Some stayed months. And some stayed longer than they should have.

But they left. And I stayed.

I was his wife. I had no door I could walk through, no place he could not reach. No life outside the one he controlled.

He decided where I went, who I spoke to, and what I did. He controlled everything. The phone, the car, the smallest movements of my day. Fear became routine, and routine became my world.

People ask why I did not leave. They do not understand what fear does to the body. Fear makes your world very small. Fear tells you that leaving is more dangerous than staying. Fear whispers that tomorrow will be worse if you try.

I told myself I was strong. That endurance was enough. That surviving was the same as living. It was not.

He gave me alcohol, even when I did not want it. He forced me to drink until I was weak. Then he hit me. Kicked me. And broke my shoulder.

After his first attempt to kill me, he struck my head with something and pushed me through a glass window. I fell to the floor and could not move. I lay there all night on the cold floor, in my own blood.

He left so he could say he was elsewhere. I waited. Unable to call for help. Afraid to die alone.

In the morning, the cleaning lady found me and called an ambulance. That was the last time I saw him. At least, this is the story the doctors told me. I cannot remember.

The last three years are gone. Taken by the damage to my brain. Or by the trauma. Maybe both. The blow to my head caused a brain bleed. The damage was severe. Permanent.

One side of my body no longer works. Inside my head, I still speak. I form full sentences. I know what I want to say, but the words do not come out right. Sometimes they come out broken. Sometimes they do not come out at all. People hear sounds, not sentences. Not the woman I still am.

Because of the damage to my brain, my mind is slowly slipping away. Memories fade, and eventually disappear. Days collapse into each other. Time no longer moves forward - it circles. The doctors say my mind is trying to protect me. Too much pain. Too much fear.

I now live permanently in a care facility. Others help me wash, help me eat, help me speak. Others help me remember.

Every day, someone tells me he is dead.

Every day, I feel relief - for a moment. And every day, I forget again. In my world, he is still alive. In my world, I am still waiting. Listening. Watching. Preparing. Even now, I am careful. Even now, I am afraid. Even now, my body remembers what my mind cannot keep.

People say death brings freedom. For some, maybe it does. For me, it came too late. I never got to be free, never got to travel. Never got to rest, or to live without fear.

He is gone. But I am still trapped. Trapped in a body that no longer works. Trapped in a mind that is slowly disappearing. Trapped in a life shaped by his violence.

This is what abuse leaves behind. Not only bruises, not only broken bones, but a prison that can last a lifetime.

And sometimes, even longer.