SEVEN YEARS OF LOVE, LONELINESS, AND INSECURITY by Ashley Martinez
I could not just pack up and decide to move away to college. I had to do extra planning. For me, going to college was no easy task. As with any other person, starting one’s life as an adult is difficult, but it is particularly challenging when you have a physical disability.
While attending South Plains College in Lubbock, I lived in the Texas Tech University dorms as part of the Gateway Program. The hardest part was that my mom lived with me in the dorm and needed to be away from my five-year-old brother. We tried to go out as friends. I ate. She drank. We fought and cried through our frustrations together. Unfortunately, I landed in a depression which led me to abandon my college dreams.
I made a rash and stupid decision, but it seemed right for me at the time. My first love came back into my life after that hard year. We started talking and again and I fell in love with him again. I did not want to see that he was manipulating me and treating me badly because he was the only person I dated through my teenage and young adult years. I tried dating while I was in Lubbock, but it did not work out.
Eventually, Robert proposed the summer after I got back to Georgetown. We talked on the phone and wrote letters to each other for four months and then Robert proposed. For the two weeks we lived together before getting married, life was wonderful. He dressed me, fed me breakfast, and talked to me. He was romantic, dancing with me in the kitchen for no reason. I grew to love him more than I ever did in high school. I wanted to believe that when he asked me to marry him, it would be the final time he would propose, and we would never grow apart. Our relationship was always on-again off-again mostly due to Robert’s insecurities and fear of what other people would think. When we were in high school, he always broke up with me when people made fun of him for our relationship. I believed that this time he had really changed for the better. I believed he wanted to learn how to take care of me, that he wanted to know what it was like to live with a person like me. But there were tell-tale signs that I ignored because I wanted to believe that somebody could love me in a romantic way. For example, he would look at images in magazines that made me feel insecure about my body image, but I basically had blinders on at the time. Three days after our marriage, things grew incredibly violent. He forced himself on me, and I could not fight back. He raped me only three days after our marriage.
People do not understand what it is like to get out of a horrifying situation like that when you are disabled. You have to begin your life over without access to domestic violence shelters. Shelters are usually unequipped to help disabled clients, and therefore, the shelters could not help me start my life again. There are no resources available for a woman with a disability. When you are treated like a second-class citizen from the beginning, when there are people who cannot help with daily needs, and when your abuser is the only person who seems to have any rights, you have to find a way to gain strength on your own. I knew that standing up for myself was the only option. I needed to look past all those who ridiculed me for getting myself in this situation. I needed to hold Robert accountable for his actions, no matter how difficult that would be. I was going to find my way back to myself one way or another.
Robert beat me up for the last time, and threw me out of his house. I had nowhere to go except back to my parents’. That day in December I knew that our relationship was over. I would begin my spiritual journey, one which Robert would not walk with me. Through that nine-month process, I would go through the worst events of my life: miscarriage, harsh medical exams, and, worst of all, the court system that gave Robert all the breaks. I would come out stronger, and others would know who Robert really was. More importantly, I would know who he really was. The court system believed that the abuse I endured was my fault, and the best they could do was a four-year plea bargain in which he pleaded guilty. After the court case, after approximately six months, I was then able to start my life from scratch. During these six months, I was baptized at Easter Vigil on Holy Saturday. I was received into the church and into that community. The acceptance of the church, even if only by a few people in the Rite of Christian Initiation of an adult, was a fresh start and the only consistency in my life at the time.
Once the court case was settled, eight months passed before I headed back to school at Temple College. I had been at school for a year when I decided to transfer to a four year college. So, I decided to get some extra help for the transferable classes and tutoring in subjects such as history, math, English, government and eventually sought help from the student support services to help prepare me for the four-year college. All the struggles of my past have put me on a path to help people with disabilities who are going through domestic violence. I want to create a women’s shelter specifically equipped for the needs of the disabled. I have learned that the disabled who have gone through domestic violence need help getting their lives together to gain independence and hope. My passion lies in empowering men and women to get help when they need it. Whether or not you can walk or see, you don’t deserve to be abused or hurt by somebody who is supposed to love you.
//ww
While attending South Plains College in Lubbock, I lived in the Texas Tech University dorms as part of the Gateway Program. The hardest part was that my mom lived with me in the dorm and needed to be away from my five-year-old brother. We tried to go out as friends. I ate. She drank. We fought and cried through our frustrations together. Unfortunately, I landed in a depression which led me to abandon my college dreams.
I made a rash and stupid decision, but it seemed right for me at the time. My first love came back into my life after that hard year. We started talking and again and I fell in love with him again. I did not want to see that he was manipulating me and treating me badly because he was the only person I dated through my teenage and young adult years. I tried dating while I was in Lubbock, but it did not work out.
Eventually, Robert proposed the summer after I got back to Georgetown. We talked on the phone and wrote letters to each other for four months and then Robert proposed. For the two weeks we lived together before getting married, life was wonderful. He dressed me, fed me breakfast, and talked to me. He was romantic, dancing with me in the kitchen for no reason. I grew to love him more than I ever did in high school. I wanted to believe that when he asked me to marry him, it would be the final time he would propose, and we would never grow apart. Our relationship was always on-again off-again mostly due to Robert’s insecurities and fear of what other people would think. When we were in high school, he always broke up with me when people made fun of him for our relationship. I believed that this time he had really changed for the better. I believed he wanted to learn how to take care of me, that he wanted to know what it was like to live with a person like me. But there were tell-tale signs that I ignored because I wanted to believe that somebody could love me in a romantic way. For example, he would look at images in magazines that made me feel insecure about my body image, but I basically had blinders on at the time. Three days after our marriage, things grew incredibly violent. He forced himself on me, and I could not fight back. He raped me only three days after our marriage.
People do not understand what it is like to get out of a horrifying situation like that when you are disabled. You have to begin your life over without access to domestic violence shelters. Shelters are usually unequipped to help disabled clients, and therefore, the shelters could not help me start my life again. There are no resources available for a woman with a disability. When you are treated like a second-class citizen from the beginning, when there are people who cannot help with daily needs, and when your abuser is the only person who seems to have any rights, you have to find a way to gain strength on your own. I knew that standing up for myself was the only option. I needed to look past all those who ridiculed me for getting myself in this situation. I needed to hold Robert accountable for his actions, no matter how difficult that would be. I was going to find my way back to myself one way or another.
Robert beat me up for the last time, and threw me out of his house. I had nowhere to go except back to my parents’. That day in December I knew that our relationship was over. I would begin my spiritual journey, one which Robert would not walk with me. Through that nine-month process, I would go through the worst events of my life: miscarriage, harsh medical exams, and, worst of all, the court system that gave Robert all the breaks. I would come out stronger, and others would know who Robert really was. More importantly, I would know who he really was. The court system believed that the abuse I endured was my fault, and the best they could do was a four-year plea bargain in which he pleaded guilty. After the court case, after approximately six months, I was then able to start my life from scratch. During these six months, I was baptized at Easter Vigil on Holy Saturday. I was received into the church and into that community. The acceptance of the church, even if only by a few people in the Rite of Christian Initiation of an adult, was a fresh start and the only consistency in my life at the time.
Once the court case was settled, eight months passed before I headed back to school at Temple College. I had been at school for a year when I decided to transfer to a four year college. So, I decided to get some extra help for the transferable classes and tutoring in subjects such as history, math, English, government and eventually sought help from the student support services to help prepare me for the four-year college. All the struggles of my past have put me on a path to help people with disabilities who are going through domestic violence. I want to create a women’s shelter specifically equipped for the needs of the disabled. I have learned that the disabled who have gone through domestic violence need help getting their lives together to gain independence and hope. My passion lies in empowering men and women to get help when they need it. Whether or not you can walk or see, you don’t deserve to be abused or hurt by somebody who is supposed to love you.
//ww