I had a lot of time to think about and review my pitiful life while I was in the hospital. I had a lot of thoughts of suicide and wished it could just be over. I think in some ways I indirectly tried to kill myself, because even in the hospital I was getting high on cocaine. Friends brought it in and I snorted it up.
Shortly after that, I started seeing a guy named Jeff who I thought was different from other guys. I had known him for a long time, and he was one of my best friends. He was sort of like a brother, except we started having feelings for each other. Hence, a new relationship started. This one was very different than the last. He did not consistently physically abuse me. Instead, he cheated on me with many girls; some I knew and a lot that I did not. For the most part, he treated me pretty decent, except for his extra-curricular activities.
It wasn’t long before things started changing. His real anger started to manifest itself, but not always in violence. He was a con-artist and a thief, and there were times when he would steal my car and get arrested and expect me to bail him out of jail. The sad part was I would feel so sorry for him that I would bail him out. Then, of course, I felt like such an idiot. He took advantage of me like that for about four years.
When Jeff got drunk, he acted as if he were evil. He was an alcoholic, and when he drank too much, his eyes would look like the devil himself. There was a time he was very drunk while on vacation, and he got very violent with me. It was one of the most devastating, fearful times of my life. He wanted us to have a four-some with another couple that he met at a bonfire on the beach. He got very angry that I said no, and he started throwing me down and got on top of me and choked me. I thought that he was going to kill me. I managed to run away from him and try to get help from a person walking through the dunes. The person rejected me, I assume out of fear. He put on his hood and kept on walking. At that point I thought I was dead. Jeff grabbed me again and started choking me even harder this time.
This was the first time that I really knew that God intervened in my life. At the very moment that I was being strangled to death, the entire island blacked out into total darkness. This snapped Jeff out of his rage and he started crying. God had saved my life! It was only by His grace and miracle that I lived that night. That night Jeff had the rage of Satan in him, and although I had seen him hurt many other people, sometimes ten guys at a time, I never thought he would hurt me. I was wrong; but I stayed with him out of pity. Somehow no matter what this guy did, I always felt sorry for him - like he couldn’t survive without me in his life. I hated to be with him, and yet I felt guilty when I was not.
The only solution I could come up with was to move to the other side of the country. I made a decision one day while we were broken up (which had happened many, many times). I decided that I would move to California, which was almost 3,000 miles away. At the time I was nineteen years old and had never even lived outside of my parent’s home. I thought somehow I could make it on my own. I was a girl on the run to find my life, or to run away from it.