When I first realized a switch had flipped was after my friend’s wedding. I was a bridesmaid along with my best friend at the time. We drove up early for wedding party duties. So he and my other friend’s boyfriend drove up together for the wedding. As a bridesmaid, part of our job should be to have fun alongside the bride. Yet, I soon realized I had to stop drinking because he demanded that he should be able to have the fun and that I have to drive us all home.
So a couple hours before we left, I stopped drinking. It was around midnight when it was time to go, I still didn’t feel 100% sober and I was incredibly tired. But, it was my given job to drive apparently. So I politely asked for my friend to sit in the front seat with me because I didn’t need his drunken, obnoxious, distractions while I already don’t feel super comfortable driving 2 hours home. Apparently that was my first mistake. I should’ve known better than to ask for her to sit in the front seat instead of him.
He’s blaring music, singing, dancing, etc. I try turning the music down because all of this nonsense is making it hard for me to concentrate. He gets annoyed and mad that I do that. So, I let it be. I keep my mouth shut and my eyes on the road. About halfway home he falls asleep, along with my friend and her boyfriend in the backseat. I’m finding it very hard to keep focused and myself awake. Before I know it I swerve a bit and realize I fell asleep for a second. Luckily I woke myself up.
I finally make it back to town and drop them off at their house. As soon as they get out of the car, he wakes up. He’s pissed. He starts screaming at me, cussing me out, calling me a “dyke” all because I asked for my friend to sit in the front seat. Apparently that had “embarrassed him” and I must be a dyke because I wanted her up front with me. Not because it would’ve helped me drive us all home, but because I am apparently swinging a different way. Like what?
He screams at me the entire 15 minutes it takes us to get home. Continues to keep screaming and cussing at me in the house. I’m exhausted, he won’t let me lay down or even sit down. He is getting quite riled up. I don’t even know what to do, how to calm him down, or what really is even going on. I’m genuinely so confused.
It escalates. He rips my phone out of my hand and throws it against the wall. He went to pick it up and couldn’t find it. He then starts screaming at me even more because I apparently must’ve picked it up and hid it when he walked out of the room for a minute. If I didn’t freeze up when he did that, maybe I would have thought to find it, but I was too stunned to even move. Awhile later, he finds it. My phone is broken. There’s an imprint of my phone on the wall. He eventually deescalates and falls asleep.
We wake up in the morning. He remembers everything, doesn’t apologize, and tells me I need to go to Best Buy to get a new phone. But, he won’t be coming with me because he’s going to watch the UFC fights at his friend’s house. Mind you, we are supposed to be meeting up with my family for my mom’s birthday. He doesn’t come to that either. He is completely unfazed by his temper and actions last night. I went and celebrated my mom and hangout with my family like nothing happened. I still didn’t have a phone because they didn’t have any in stock so it was getting ordered. The only bright side of this situation was that not having a phone meant I got a few hours of not having to hear from him.
After this, I should’ve known that this would turn into a cycle. Yet, I ignored it and kept trying to work through my feelings of doubt. This was just the beginning.
