I'm in my twenties and he's in his thirties. We're 9 years apart.

Am I going to far calling it abuse though? I wasn't exactly perfect and sometimes I think maybe I was the problem. I checked everything. When I first moved in I went through his email, that's how I found out he had cheated on me for 8 months, not 1 month like he told me. And how i found out he had all these pictures of others girls saved. I would go through his phone all the time. U was just so scared he was going to start cheating again. I use to bring up what he did a lot, he use to get mad and say I just can't let anything go.

I feel so conflicted about everything. I'm not going back to him, I feel like I've woken up from coma and finding out all this time this was allowed to happen to me. I've been thinking all day about all the crap he did. All the lies, even when I knew it was a lie and his cover up was just pathetic I still believed him. And if I didn't believe him he'd get mad at me for being crazy.

I'm not going to go back but I don't want to believe I allowed myself to be in an abusive relationship. He never straight out was verbally abusive. Only when we fought would he say mean things. It was like he didn't have to say anything to make me feel like crap. But isn't that me being crazy? Aren't you the only one who controls how you feel? Maybe I made more out of it then I should have.

Or maybe it was emotionally abusive. I don't know.

Then I start thinking physically. There were two times where it foot really bad. Like punching me and throwing me to the ground and kicking. But it only happened twice. And I did kinda provoke it.

And then I read that and I want to slap myself. How could I exuse that..and yet I did. Then I started thinking further back, before my daughter. There was a short time where he kept choking me in bed. He wanted something sexual that I didn't want to do so he'd choke me or punch me in the side. But this was so long ago, can I really hold it against him now? When that happened I remember being seriously scared for my life. And I stayed.

I never told anyone that and guess I just want to put it out there. Because it's real and it feels like it's not.

The times that he got physical which was just those few times he was always so apologetic afterwards.

I start thinking about his joking. Sometimes it was hurtful but he was joking. I thought about how he always had something bad to say about whatever I was wearing. I'd buy a new shirt that I liked and he'd make fun of it.

I'm smart,I'm college educated, I freaking minored in psychology. I'm kind and make friends with everyone. I always smile and laugh and joke. A guy recently told me in college I looked happy. Happy while all this has been going on. While I've been just so miserable for so long.

Is this all in my head? Am I crazy like he's always said?

And if not then how the hell did I put myself in an abusive relationship and not even know it?! How did I become that? How was I in an abusive relationship and condemning my sister for liking Chris Brown after he hit Rihanna? How could I be in an abusive relationship and no one could see that?