Dear Younger Me, victim to Victor, A Heart Wrenching Insightful Memoir To Help Others See and Survive.

Open the door and breathe in the fresh air called truth. My son recently said, “You should write a book so we can know your side.” What a strange thing to say to your mother. “Your side”? To me that was a very telling statement. Yet, those I shared this statement with who walked with me through this trial failed to see what I believed to be so obvious. When pointed out, expressions changed, eyes opened wide, and jaws dropped. It was there in plain sight, so perfectly clear. If my son is saying I should tell my side, that means someone is telling him his side, or more accurately, telling his lies to my children … again. His process was and still is, “If I repeat my lies over and over, they will miraculously become truth.”

Who is he? My ex-husband. The man who beat me with his fists. The man who physically, mentally, verbally, emotionally, and sexually abused me. His obsessive-compulsive behavior, sexual addiction, and need for control and power were a recipe for marital disaster. Health professionals later applied the labels Explosive Anger Disorder and Sociopath Narcissist.

When my son said I should write my story, it held a million meanings. I wanted to cry, to laugh, to surrender to my knees. Had the answer to my long-awaited prayer come? Was the agony over? Was someone finally going to speak the truth? My son was telling me he had matured enough and was healthy enough to see his father’s sickness, craziness, abuse, and lies. He now recognized the often-recounted stories his father spun were false. He had grown enough to see me not just as his mom, but as a woman whose character did not match the crazy one his father’s words painted.

I thank the many before me who have documented their domestic violence stories to create awareness. Every time this happens we collectively help other women realize these dysfunctions, and that they are not to blame as the perpetrators want them to believe. This subject is receiving widespread attention in today’s media. It’s needed. Each story bravely shared reveals the levels and depths of cruelty, violence, and control an abuser wields. Sharing brings a belief that we are not alone. Truth has the power to set us free and to heal the afflicted, but it inherently threatens the abuser since his lies can be shattered and dismantled in the face of it.

For some this book will bring healing, for some understanding, and for others a jump to defense and denial. The abuser and those he has conned may feel the need to discount, deny, or abuse me for now publicly revealing the abuse. This is a hard truth that will sometimes be emotionally difficult to read, but push on anyway.

My book has a distinct Christian view because I am a Bible-believing, Jesus-loving Christian. If your beliefs are different, you will still find help and paths to healing in my true and heart-rendering story.

Along the way someone challenged me about using the words “Victim to Victor” in my title because the person felt there are no victors in domestic violence or in my story.

While I agree there are still hurdles, I no longer rise to a new day with any probability of a hand making impact with any part of my anatomy; no one whose primary goal is to control and suppress me in word or deed is sharing my space. My chest no longer feels anxiety; my mind is no longer overwhelmed with guilt from lack of escape plans or the feat of implementing them. His hits and throws did not bring a death blow and leave my children motherless. I now have a lovely home that is a serene, safe haven, and a superb career. My children graduated both high school and college with honors, though admittedly they too suffer internal scars. Perfection has not and will never be attained, but having lived under a cruel, violent, controlling man for over 20 years, I will celebrate that I was able to make that two-letter change: Victim to Victor.

I thank my adult son and one of my counselors for encouraging me to write this book. It was something I resisted, and has been one of the most gut-wrenching yet freeing things I have ever undertaken. In writing this I hope to bring truth into the light, explore the methods abusive people use to keep their victims captive, and help shed light on how perpetrators also loop in unsuspecting family members and by-standers.

You will find sections called “Dear Younger Me” in which I give the younger me advice and comfort that was so lacking during this scary path. I offer my pain as a platform to assist others, and hope many learn from my mistakes.

For over three decades, Victoria King lived life in her husband’s Narcissist Amusement Park, riding her Carnie’s rollercoaster of abuse and enduring his daily choices of torment, producing the heart-stopping startle of Whac-A-Mole games at a state fair’s midway. Like peeling cotton candy from your face, living with an abuser is sticky and messy. Each encounter made Victoria feel she needed a shower to wash off her abuser’s slimy control residue. Her husband offered an array of mental, emotional, physical, sexual and spiritual abuse, like cheap blue-plate specials that sound good from the menu but taste foul. Denials of his behavior saw him deceiving professional counselors by promoting the idea the problems were hers, not his, ideas too often swallowed. At church, her abuser parlayed “apologies, repentance and forgiveness” to con naïve leaders and congregants alike. It took Victoria a long, painful time to discover her brokenness wasn’t the same as his sickness, but she eventually escaped her Sociopath Narcissist’s control. But jumping from her Carnie’s Merry-Go-Round brought retaliation from her abuser, as he used cruel, calculated parental alienation tactics to break the bonds with her children.

The book is available worldwide in paper and Kindle on amazon.com https://amzn.to/2IdWnos

If I help ONE woman, I will have met my obligation. Those who escape need to help other victims of Sociopath Narcissists escape too.