A Need To Understand Myself

How do I explain who I am without explaining to you who I was?

I used to be strong, brave, fearless and stubbornly headstrong. Completely independent and sure of who I was and what I wanted. I went where I wanted with whom I wanted, I loved having fun and being around people who loved me. I had a job, my own car, paid my bills. I didn't have to ask anyone for permission for anything.

In the beginning he was sweet, kind and loving. He was romantic and thoughtful to my needs for tenderness. In the beginning, I thought he was the perfect man for me. He would surprise me at work on my lunch breaks with a flower and ask me to lunch with him. We would go parking at the lake just to kiss and cuddle n front of an amazing view. On Valentine's Day he brought me a huge heart shaped balloon and a dozen roses to take me on a picnic. For my birthday he would surprise me with gifts and take me to the nicest restaurants to eat, we would go home and make love all night. And then I got married.....and things slowly began to change.

He kept constant tabs on me, questioned me about my whereabouts, who I was with and why I was there so long. He watched the phone bill to see who I called. Questioned me about the length of each conversation and what was discussed. He started telling me when I could and couldn't do things, and the way he went about it, I thought it was because he was concerned about my safety, so I didn't question it. He chose the cars I drove, the places we went, who we were with when we went out. He slowly weeded out my friends and replaced them with his, and he tried to weed out my family after he weeded out his from our lives.

Things changed even more when I wouldn't stay away from my family. He got a job out of state, and moved me 356 miles away from my family. He made it harder for me to contact them, wouldn't allow me to make new friends, and started throwing things at me when I disagreed or argued with him over it. He would tell me my family didn't really care about me because I wasn't there to help them and that was all they wanted me for and that the people I wanted to befriend were not good people and were only interested in using me for what they could get. He changed my phone number constantly without telling me so I couldn't give them the new number for them to contact me only finding out when i called them it was a different number. When questioned, he would say that the phone company must have done it, but it was ok because now we knew the new number.

He told me he would die without me in his life. He loved me so much he just wanted me to himself and that I needed to let go of my past to be with him. He took away all my control over my life. I no longer had access to the bank, was not allowed to make any decisions without asking him first what I should do, and what I wanted to do was ignored for what he wanted. Things changed so drastically, I didn't recognize who I was anymore. I was miserable, my husband saw to that. He cut me off completely from my family and friends. He dictated who I saw and when I saw them. There were few places I was allowed to go, and fewer alone. I was told how to clean the house, cook our food, and it had to be perfect. He controlled every aspect of my life down to when I went to the bathroom and whether or not he was there to supervise. Soft whispered declarations of love turned to insults about what I looked like, how I behaved, what I wore and reprimands for each. Making love turned into torture literally.

He started to hurt me during sex. He would bite or pinch me, bruising my skin and making me scream or cry in pain . He would tell me it was my fault that he couldn't orgasm without hurting me and calling me names, telling me that I disgusted him. It got even worse, with me being chained to a bed, pinched, slapped, beaten with belt leaving blood red whelps and bruises, binder clips placed on my nipples with him twisting the binders on my nipples until they bled and outer lips to hold me open for him to enter me with the clips still attached to my lips. They would pinch so painfully, they cut into my skin leaving painful sores behind. Excruciating pain from cigarette burns on the inside of my thighs, and steel handcuffs tightened enough to bruise from their grip on my skin added to his pleasure. He would enter my bottom with no preparation. He would "slip" and enter the wrong area and not stop till he was finished, leaving me sobbing into the pillows that he forced my face into so that my screams and pleas couldn't be heard and with any amount of begging or pleading from me with him to stop would result in him gagging me, being smothered with a pillow, or choked until I passed out. With my sobbing and tears urging him on to inflict more pain.

And even with all of this, I stayed. Because when it was over, he would say he was sorry, rub my back and hair and say that he loved me. That only I could make him feel this way. That he didn't need anyone else but me, and that if I ever left him he would die. He would kill himself because he couldn't take the pain of me leaving him. He convinced me that I deserved this treatment. He told me that my actions throughout the day caused him to "need" to punish me. I was bad and I had to know it deep down whether I admitted it or not. I was terrified all the time, and out there alone, away from my family, I broke.

So how do I explain to myself what my nature is? Because one thing I know about myself is that I like being dominated. Even though now I am on my own, I live by myself for the first time in my life. I have a job, and I once again pay my own bills. I'm free of him and his influence and I like myself again. But I still want to share my life with someone who is stronger than I am, who likes to be in charge of things. Who praises me when i please him, does romantic things for me just because he wants to see me smile. Who pleases me in bed because he craves my moans and cries of pleasure, knowing that it spurs my desire to please him.

I know that what my ex husband did was abuse, it was torture. To be frightened all the time, to never know what to expect when he returned home from work or knowing what would set him off. To know that even though I submitted every time, that I was going to be hurt no matter what. But I still crave it. How can I have that urge? Is there a happy medium? Can a man dominate you without inflicting pain?

Because I don't know if I can truly be happy with a partner unless they are strong enough to do so, but without hurting me emotionally or physically. To be strong in the knowledge that he honestly loves me for who I am, for the way I do everything I can to show him that I love him, and what I do for him sexually as well. I have a need to please my mate. I need to know that my mate is happy with me, that his needs are met and his wishes fulfilled. To know he is proud to be with me, and that he is secure in that knowledge. That he wants me to be who I am, because it makes him happy as well.

Knowing this about myself, I ask you these questions. How do I use this to help myself? Are these tendencies destined to hurt me all over again? How do I trust myself to find a healthy relationship? Especially within the limitations that I have put forth.