My Life, My Choice

I lay here in the dark listening to my lovely fiancé snoring and light breathing, watching his chest rise and fall, although not wanting to close my eyes as not wanting to miss a second of this lovely meaningful night. So I pulled the cream fluffy comfy blanket over him so he wouldn't notice me leaving. As the whole house begins to fall into silence, it's as if the spirit of the house was watching over us, making sure that everyone was safe so that no harm could ever come to those it was protecting.

Tonight was different to every night since I moved into the safety of this household, finally finding the one place to call home and truly meaning it. The smell of my blueberry vape liquid reminded me so much of my mum who had moved six hours away from my new home to live with my father; I could still picture her face when she left me with my new home and new family, although tonight I couldn't stand to think of that. I wanted to remember every instant of this long stressful journey to get to this happy place.

That long and stressful journey is something that still haunts me constantly to this day, but how could I get sad about those dark days when I'm in such a wonderful place, I guess it's necessary to talk about it, so let's start from the beginning.

My name is Shannon. I have one brother named Tyler who is older than me and is a very level headed and down to Earth kind of person. I'm the youngest in my household, and we both live with our mum and our dad. Mum, I love dearly with all my heart; she is more like a big sister to me and means the world to me. My Dad, on the other hand, I'm not close to, due to him being abused as a kid so he got it into his head that it was okay to be abusive to your children and your wife—which is why I don't trust him and why I don't think I will ever be able to truly forgive him for the hell he rained upon me, my mum, and my brother.

My mum and brother have found ways to make peace with him and what he has done, although I can't seem to forgive him for all the pain and suffering he not only put me through, but also everyone who got involved with any of my family—even if it was just a friend coming to say hello, that turned into a fight or an argument, and even to this day, I still fail to understand why exactly he was this mean to our family and to our friends. Some say the idea of living in an abusive household is nothing but a made-up nightmare; think of it this way, if it was nothing but a made-up nightmare, then why are so many children having life problems like I am? Growing up in an abusive household causes a lot of problems when growing up, believe me. I faced all of them and so have my friends—the most reoccurring one of the problems is not being able to trust others, isolating yourself, and bottling up your feelings until you explode like a volcano on the wrong person, which you can end up really badly regretting later on in your life.

My first ever problem came to be the realization of what I was watching my family put up with—the problems and the pain of this abusive household, the impact from the father of the household whom I grew up calling Dad. I was around the age of five years old when mum came to collect me from Hawkhurst First School to take me back home. My Dad was there and so was Tyler when we got home. They were shouting so loud, you could hear them from the end of the road. I stopped apprehensively, scared to continue, until mum looked at me and knew exactly how I was feeling and I knew in that second I couldn't leave her to face this alone. No matter how scared I felt, I had to put all of it aside and push through for her sake; this was so easy to put into my head and trust, as I was so young and naive to how cruel this huge, wide world could be—until your faced with just how cruel it really can treat you and others around you.

When it's someone other than you in this situation, it's so much easier to say just shake it off, don't take any notice of them, and continue with your life trying to make the best of everything you're given. In a way, that is kind of what you do, although it's a little more in-depth than just that going through your head at this point; you're always thinking of what could happen next or what awaits around the corner for you, lurking in the shadows, waiting for the perfect opportunity to strike. Because waiting in plain site is nowhere near as fun or as painful. It's more of a shock and a pain when you are scared and caught off-guard like when you are in your room with your headphones on, listening to your favorite tracks and someone decides to open your door with a slam—it scares you completely out of your skin. Whereas, if you knew you would have turned your music down, left your door open, and had expected them to come in so then your reaction would have been completely different.