A substance abuse called love

I’m a recovering addict, and no, it wasn’t alcohol or drugs — it was you.

The addiction to loving a man who does not know how to love correctly is substance abuse, and you were poison. The bruises on my body may have faded over time, but they left scars on the inside of my brain like an itch that never gets scratched. The lingering — oh God, the lingering. Is this why I crave such intimacy but am so deathly afraid of it? Afraid of the next time a man raises his voice at me, his fists following shortly after. It’s easy for you to forget about me, but it’s hard to forget you when I’m flinching after some guy reaches over my knees just to grab something from his glove compartment — his glove compartment. When a stoner needs something strong because he doesn’t get high anymore, he smokes a lot more weed to reach that same level of high. Every time we fought, it built that tolerance, and I needed something stronger because little fights resulted in little reward. But throwing me into walls and bringing me flowers the next day gave me a new high, and you never knew I’d never leave because you knew I was addicted. Loving you was the drug that stayed infiltrated through my veins, and the residue is now trapped within my body and will always live inside of me.

Now I’m in recovery, looking in the mirror at a boy whose eyes were once swollen shut, using concealer to cover the bruise marks where kisses should have been placed instead. After all that, I’m still soft. What is this obsession I have with broken glass and angry people? I may have grown up in an angry household, but I didn’t realize that I’d grow up to love the people who made it angry in the first place. But was it my fault because I stayed? Because I let you take the light out of me? Because I kept handing you the knife that was slowly killing me?