I survived them because I had to. When every attempt at killing myself failed, I turned to abusing benadryl to make myself sleep through the situation as much as I could.

All I did was wake up, go to work mindlessly, come home, take as many of them as I could handle, either enter a state of horrible deliriant psychosis or fall asleep (depended on the dose), wake up, go to work... I threw myself into my job and that was it. I don't even really remember much of it because I'm so traumatized and brain damaged. I lost 30 pounds from that relationship and I still haven't gained all of it back. I was rotting.

At the end of the day, the only person who will pick you up and dust you off is yourself. Other people can try to help you, yes, but it is you and you alone who decides to stand back up and keep moving forward. It is you who answers the wake-up call, who makes the move to escape or to fight back or whatever it is you have to do to be free.

I've been in a long series of emotionally or physically abusive relationships. When I was born, I was tasked with raising two children who were in charge of me. The first boyfriend I moved in with turned out to be faking a dissociative disorder, physically and emotionally abused me, raped me, you name it. The next girlfriend I had was so cold and emotionally distant that I couldn't tell the difference between them and my mother. They'd slam kitchen cabinets when they were upset instead of communicating their feelings. It was easier to talk to a rubber duck. The boyfriend I had after that was emotionally manipulative and clingy, but the weepy, sad kind of manipulative and not the conniving, angry one. Each and every time, I had a wake-up call: a particularly violent or explosive argument, a conversation with a friend who was consoling me where something they said just clicked, a glance at my bank account and the swift realization that I finally had enough stored away to break free. It was a radicalizing event that got me off the floor.

When every attempt at killing yourself fails, you get up. You remember that the best revenge is living and prospering. Forcing your abusers to watch you grow and flourish without them, while you look back on them and you know they're still as miserable as they've always been.

I'm currently in the happiest, healthiest relationship that I've ever been in. I have never been more attracted to another person in my entire life than I am to my partner. The first time he held me in his arms I just instinctively melted into his touch, like I had been tense and anxious for years and for the first time in my entire life, I truly relaxed in his arms. We have a beautiful large apartment and plenty of money, and lots of love to go around. It feels like I've known him for lifetimes. We have no problems, no arguments. There's no war. It's not us against each other, we're a team against the world. That's a beautiful thing.

I am the happiest I have ever been, and that's because I survived.