Two In The Morning. One At Dawn

On a day like this, February 23, “2 In The Morning” was released as another single for “The Block.” The lyrics are so powerful… Don’t you think? And today they brought me some memories… and something came out of it…

I always felt the New Kids On The Block, with their lyrics, were telling me how a boy – and then a man – should love me; that they were teaching me, “this is how you deserve to be loved and treated.” So, when the backstage interview of the “2 In The Morning” video came out, I made my (now ex) husband watched it, thinking, “maybe he’ll get it too.”

At the beginning of the clip Donnie says, “It’s a very personal song for me; it sort of details the personal experiences of about a year and a half ago of my life;” … I was heartbroken to hear that, and my ex-husband felt sad too; we both thought, “I hope he finds ‘the one’ soon; we are so lucky to have found each other.”

We also reflected on the lyrics and talked about how important it was to not go to bed mad at each other… and, probably that same night, we got drunk as we used to… Probably that same night he made another hole in a wall with his fist, when my face was actually what he wanted to punch. And surely the next morning, he cried his eyes out saying how sorry he was and how he was going to change “for real, this time.” And I believed him.

Before I met him, I used to watched women on TV who had been abused by their husbands and think, “Why didn’t she leave? That’s stupid! How can you fall for a man like that? She must have some issues.” And well… Let’s just say I got the answers the hard way.

A man like that… is like a wizard; regardless of how smart and strong we could be, he’ll wash our brains, smoothly, without us noticing it … And then by the time we begin to realize the nightmare we are trapped in, we’ll be too exhausted, too afraid… too sick. A man like that, makes us sick.

The way I see it, the way I “feel” it, my story began like a fairytale and it turned into a nightmare like a thunder storm in the summer… Out of nowhere… “Boom.” But, I felt it coming… I saw the lightnings from far away… but I just couldn’t leave. I used to think, “I can help him; I’m strong; he loves me; no one else is going to love me like he does; deep inside he’s a good man; I can help him.” And by the time I was soaking wet, drowning… and I couldn’t even help myself.

By the end of my marriage, I was obese and with depression; and he was an addict and alcoholic.

One time, while he was in rehab, he snapped at me during a meeting with the psychiatrist and he stormed out of the room; I said to the doctor, “I’m sorry; he’s not feeling well today;” and the look on her face… gosh, it is still printed in my mind. She said,

“I see this all the time; and this ends in only one way; do you understand that?”

“But he’s here because he wants to get better; he never punched me!,” I replied

“He will.”

She explained to me the mind of people like him; and even though she couldn’t make me change my mind at that moment, she did plant a seed in me…

As I was leaving, I walked towards the stairs to go up and say goodbye to him; and she came after me… She stopped me and said, “No.” And I said,

“But he’ll get worried; he’ll be sad.”

“No. Leave.”

She even walked me out of the building…

I spent five months in bed… I used to get up only to feed my cats or to go to visit him at rehab; but that seed, it kept growing…

That wasn’t the first trauma or depression I was experiencing, so I knew I could find a way out; thus, I started watching TED talks about motivation, inspiration…, until I found Amy Cuddy and her famous “Your Body Language May Shape Who You Are”. And I thought, “Could that be true? I’ll try it” And so I did.

She basically says that if we put our arms up (like when we win a race) or stand tall with our fists on our waists (like wonder woman!) for two minutes, our body will tell our brain, “Hey, I look like a winner,” and so our brain will release some hormones’ mix and it will make us feel like winners.
It’s science. Adopting a “high-power pose” for two minutes, can make our brain change the level of two hormones: decreasing the cortisol (the stress hormone, that makes us feel down) and increasing our testosterone (the dominance hormone, which makes us feel good!)

For over a month probably, I would get up and try her technique and I would feel exhausted after 5 seconds and crawl back to my bed; but I kept doing it every day, over and over again… until it worked. And I got up; I got dressed; and I got out.

I signed up for a photography course, once a week, and I finished it! Then, I signed up for Community Management course, and I finished it the night before I left the house – and the city – for good; I had planned it that way, to stay up and busy until I could leave.

I always wanted to start writing about this at “Neurodivergent” but – besides the fact that it drains me, ‘cos I still have PTSD “of a lifetime” – I never knew how… Because I wonder: if I wouldn’t have listened to anyone, why would any woman listen to me? They will say, “But my husband really, really wants to change;” they’ll say, “No, my story is different”

… I said that too, you know …

Plus, do you think I learned that time; that I left him and became oh-so-powerful? Hell to the no! Two years later, I was moving in with the sweetest and most handsome Irish angel, who one night decided to try his strength on my throat… and he squeezed it… There I learned.

The doctor was right; a relationship with a man like that ends only in one way.

So, this is my first try, my first draft on this. Donnie found his true love with Jenny… Isn’t that something!? And I found mine too! I found the love I used to have for myself… and now it’s stronger than ever.

There are no more fights at 2 in the morning in my life anymore, as there aren’t two people in the morning either; there’s just me… But every single dawn is full of hope, and I am free.

If you feel even a tiny bit related to my story, that’s the seed… Let it grow…