'Come out, come out, wherever you are.' The day I escaped the man I thought I'd be with forever.

Content warning: This story includes descriptions of domestic violence that may be distressing to some readers.

Violence against women. This topic used to be important to me, but one day it became crucial.

Have you ever looked at someone you love and been scared? Have you ever bargained for your life, sat between your bed and the wall, with him looming over you and twirling a knife?

Have you ever had to look up at someone you plan on spending forever with and known that you could die? At their hand? At his hand? 

Have you ever looked over and seen your reflection in a mirror and registered the bruises, hand marks and mascara running down your face, and wondered who would find you? When they would? If they would? How they would?

I have.

***

I was in. Totally and completely in. I said yes to him. A life together. I said yes, knowing that the man who had put the ring on my finger was the same man who had called me "nothing. You are less than nothing".

Who put his hands on me - not to love me, but to hurt me. 

Who looked at me and told me to run before he could get to me. 

Who chased me through a house where I had no allies.

Who put bruises on my body which I told people were because I'd "accidentally hit myself in my sleep" or "tripped". 

Who told me I couldn't and shouldn't wear that, do that, say that, go there or have that friend. 

Who told me to choose. "You get this or they do. You know I know where they are," he would say about my family. I couldn't let him. I couldn't let him get to them. 

"Ah mate, you should give her your jacket. She's cold," someone once said to him. 

To which I replied: "Don't worry, I'm okay! He needs it, I'll just cuddle into him!"

As I looked at his face, I knew I hadn't smiled and jumped to his defence quickly enough. 

"Baby, I'm sor.." I tried to spit out.

"Don't open your mouth or I'll slam it shut. How could you humiliate me like that? Pull your sleeves down... I'm not answering questions about that sh*t. Plant a nice big smile on that face of yours or I'll deal with the face later," he said.

I still paid my debts later. It took me four hours to stand and put on a shirt after it.

I was called every name you can imagine with the conviction radiating from every syllable. 

"You have no one. You have me. Me is all you deserve," he would say.

Coming home, night after night. I was praying for the first time in my life to a god to save me. 

The moment came when I saw myself in the reflection of a toaster, of all things. Only seconds before had he placed his hands around my neck.

I heard my Mum's voice. 

"I worry about you. I see you cry almost every time he's here. I see you fading right in front of me. I don't want that phone call telling me that my daughter is gone." 

I ran. I grabbed what I could see, not registering what belongings I'd left there to be unclaimed forever. Holding the bathroom door shut with both arms, he screamed, trying to get in. 

"This is over for you! I'll turn you to bones and then I go hunting! Come the f**k out!" 

The sound of a sharpened blade scraped down the other side of the door dangerously edged closer. I had minutes, maybe seconds to do this.

I ordered an Uber with shaking hands and fingers. He kept screaming as he paced like some kind of wild animal. 

"Come out, come out, wherever you are," he said in a singsong voice that I didn't even recognise as his. The metamorphosis was complete - he was not even attempting to shroud his shadow.

I was no longer was I convinced that I could take just one more hit.

You have a minute. Maybe? You also might not. You might have nothing except your final moments. Do I think about family? Friends? Dog? Everything or nothing? 60 seconds. Just one minute.

I unlocked the door and held my arms to it like a shield. My tears had even stopped.

The most he can take from me is my life. The most I can give myself is my life. I can run. He can catch me but I have to f**king run. My mum can't get that call.

So I ran. I struggled out of his grip as he grabbed my arm with one hand and forced the blade to my neck.

"Maybe I'll just do you here, huh? You stupid f***ing girl," he said. 

I breathed in, realising I couldn't without my rib feeling as though it would shatter like glass, and ran. I went down a dark street, to a house where I heard a voice coming from inside a car. I sat in the back seat, with no socks or shoes. No long pants in the cold of night. Window down with the air in my face, trying to cover a cut on my lip with makeup.

Then I was home. Everyone was asleep. I turned the light on, saw my tear-stained face with the purple tinge of his hand, fingers and ring marks beginning to show on my throat and neck. But I was home.

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I'm okay now. I'm actually great. But for every single woman or man who is not, I'm not going to tell you to leave. I'm not going to tell you to just go. I won't look at you and demand that you listen to me and stop listening to him or her. 

I'm telling you this: When the moment comes where you're gasping and running, crying and shaking, when you have a minute or a second, I promise you, you're being the bravest you've ever been. 

You leave. You don't look back. You don't forget, but you forgive. You have to. Not him or her. Yourself. Only you will know what I mean by that when the time comes. Forgive your body, forgive your heart, forgive your soul. None of them betrayed you. The person who left you with bruises betrayed you. 

Forgive the tiny pieces of your fragmented being and not so simply, rebuild. Please trust me when I say to you that the power in looking into the eyes of someone and saying, "No one put me back together. I did that," will surpass any punishment you could give yourself after their punishment is long over. 

Wash yourself clean and begin as though you've just met yourself. No one on this planet knows what it means to love the person who terrifies you until you're in the moment you swore you'd never accept. 

Please don't worry for those who do not want to understand. It's okay. You will spend a long time understanding and recovering. Pieces of you have changed - some will be unrecognisable to those who knew you before. 

The day will arrive when you see you are the hero he never intended for you to become. There will forever be a strength in you that will become the biggest part of your new life. I promise. 

Domestic violence does not care where you come from, the degrees you have, the family you hold close, the friends you cherish, the dreams you have or the person you are. 

But you have to care. Trust me, you have to care. 

Violence against women and men can't just be a topic of conversation brought up when a news story flashes across our screens, shocking us into a moment of awareness. 

It's f**king important. It's down right crucial. It's a permanent presence we can't ignore. I begged people to ignore it when it was my reality - I was in love with a man I was petrified of. 

I promise you I'm not broken. I promise. 

That's the thing that will surprise you: not one thing in us is weak. I'm probably one of the most unlikely paradoxes you'll meet - the girl who knows the darkest of humankind, yet won't tell you to believe that humans are dark.

This. Is. Important. It has to be. Because we are. 

The author of this story is known to Mamamia but has chosen to remain anonymous for privacy reasons.

If this has raised any issues for you, or if you just feel like you need to speak to someone, please call 1800 RESPECT (1800 737 732) – the national sexual assault, domestic and family violence counselling service.

Feature Image: Getty.