Five days ago, I watched Amanda Todd’s video for the first and only time. As those 10 minutes of video unfolded, I couldn’t believe the words I read on the screen. I was horrified and sickened to learn about her story, and in the aftermath of her tragedy my heart continues to ache. Her story touches a tender part of my past that I’ve consistently tried to forget, but that will always somehow haunt me forever. It’s a part of me that I never really knew what to do with, until now.
At one point or another, we’ve all made a mistake. Granted that some of our mistakes are worse than others – they’re bound to happen. Making mistakes is a part of life we’ll always face and I, am no different.
I was in my early 20’s and was in a serious relationship with my very first love. Things were never perfect between us, but we always managed to find a way back to each other and somehow make things work, until one summer, about 3 years into the relationship – I found out he had cheated on me with a close friend of mine. My heart was broken, shattered and I was devastated. It was an incident worse than I could ever imagine and I was completely lost in how to react. Once I calmed down, the only sensible thing to do was to be angry. Deep down, I knew I could never forgive him for this, regardless of how much I loved him. Instead of automatically giving up, we fought, argued, cried and tried talking it out – but I couldn’t see past the pain he caused me.
In the weeks that followed, I tried to keep myself busy from my disappointment and sadness. I distracted myself with school, friends, and a new boy I had happened to meet over the summer. Perhaps it wasn’t the best idea to get involved with someone new so quickly, but I was lonely and hurt – at the time, it was the only thing that made me feel better. When my ex caught word of my new ‘romance’, he wasn’t happy. Even though he had messed up, he figured I was doing wrong by not forgiving him and moving onward. He tried to remind me that we were supposed to have been in love and that our love should conquer the challenges we faced. I understood where I he was coming from, but my heart and head were set on being upset. In an effort to stand up for myself, trying to figure out how to handle my own pain, and find comfort this new relationship – something sparked the fire that would eventually burn a permanent scar in my soul.
My ex pleaded with me to come back to what we had. He claimed he made a mistake, that we could fix it, and that our love was worth the fight. When I declined and continued defending myself, he turned vicious – spewing hurtful names in my direction for leaving him, dismissing what we shared, and moving on so quickly. He would send me hateful text messages, some even wishing me dead. During phone calls he would shout and scream, then hang up after one last insult. I couldn’t believe that he actually believed what he was saying to me. I brushed off all his nasty remarks, thinking they were just meaningless words he was saying in a sad, angry state.
With him being my first real boyfriend and someone a few years older than me, I had always been slightly sensitive throughout the whole relationship. I did everything I could to keep him happy and leave an impression. I wanted him to like me and I wanted to keep him around. When he cheated on me, any self-confidence I had with regards to that relationship disappeared. I was young, naive, and blinded by the love I had for him. It was all these traits that fueled him to feel some sort of power over me. Without better knowledge of what to do and how to react, I became a victim.
No matter what I did, he only became more angry and upset with me. When I gave him the chance to redeem himself so we could at least make peace, we would end up arguing and fighting. There was one time when one of our fights lead him into attempting to purposely get us in a car accident, in his hopes we might not make it. Another time, when I was out with new friends and avoiding contact with him – he went out of his way to stop by my parent’s house. I received a phone call from my parents an hour later, demanding I come home to find out that he had told them untrue stories about me: that I was on a binge of doing dangerous drugs and having unprotected sex. My parents didn’t know who or what to believe; the stories were completely untrue, but it was a while before I could get my parents to believe me. They couldn’t understand why someone would go out of their way to lie to them about something like that, and to be honest, neither could I.
Curse my big heart. I caved to his momentary innocence when he began to apologize for his actions and start again with begging for forgiveness. Regardless of my forgiving nature, my mind hadn’t changed on how I felt towards us being together and when I refused to take him back – he yelled, screamed, and shouted at me, calling me names and telling me that I was horrible person. At one point, he pushed me and tried to shove me out the door. Trying to save myself from getting hurt, I grabbed the door frame – but with my hands gripping the frame and my foot in the way, he proceeded to slam my appendages repeatedly with the weight of himself against the door.
It was the last attack that hit me the hardest and reminds me of poor Amanda Todd. Months before this madness had ever began, my boyfriend had bought me a new camera for my birthday. Not knowing any better and in an attempt to ‘impress’ him, we took a couple of scantily clad photos. At the time, I didn’t think anything of it; I figured that him and I would be the only ones to ever lay eyes on those shots.
But in a mad rage, he threw them back in my face. I woke up one morning to find copies of those photos spread all over the windows of my car. Hours after I discovered this horror, I received text messages from him, threatening to send the photos to all his friends and anyone else who wanted to see them. I couldn’t believe it; I was in shock. There I was, almost completely exposed – and I had no control over who saw. My body, my most prized and sacred entity, was no longer mine to share willingly. It was being used against me.
I had made a mistake taking that photo, just like Amanda Todd had made a mistake exposing her breasts to a man on the internet. Honest mistakes because we essentially didn’t realize the consequences they would have later; decisions that we made, because we were trying to feel loved, accepted and wanted by someone.
I felt dirty, embarrassed and completely disgusted in so many ways. I was hurt that he would do something like that to me. I wasn’t perfect in the way I dealt with our relationship, but I never did anything that deserved that sort of ‘punishment’. I didn’t understand how his mistake had somehow turned into my problem; somehow, him cheating on me had turned me into a victim. He had managed to lure me into every attack, and I had never known how to stop it, fix it, or ask for help.
After that last assault, I knew I had no other choice but to contact the police. They forced to tell my parents some information, but I disclosed only minimal details. I was too embarrassed and too scared to tell them everything; I knew I had done something wrong and I was nervous I’d have to suffer further punishment. For 3 months that followed, I made appointments with a counsellor at school every week. I didn’t really know how to recover from this turmoil. The endless verbal, emotional and physical abuse had left me feeling unworthy and unloved. After a continuous year of furious aggression, I was almost convinced that I had done something wrong and I needed the counsellor to help me realize that this wasn’t my fault.
Eventually, I found a part of my ‘original’ self again. In small strides, I managed to start moving forward and beyond the hurt. Today, I’m better than I was then, but my heart still hurts when I’m reminded of that time in my life. When I catch a glimpse of the tiny scar between the knuckles on my right hand, I feel a sting of pain as the memories creep into my head. And when I watched Amanda Todd’s video, watching as she explained how she made a mistake that lead her to where it all stands today, I fell apart.
It pains me that she felt so alone and unloved, that she thought she was better off dead. It kills me inside to read her flash cards, her silent pleas for help. No one should ever have to experience that kind of grief, that level of hurt.
We should all be more aware of the options we have for help. Although it may sometimes seem so, we are not alone in this world. Someone, somewhere can help you; they want to help you and they will help you. Regardless of what happened, there are people in this life that love you enough to see past your misfortunes and there are people in life that want to see you excel, achieve, and live your life to it’s fullest. Because when we can accept our mistakes and learn from them, we can move forward to be better people.
Even before I was victimized, I looked at bullying as another part of life. I accepted it and let it slide. The reality, is that bullying should never be tolerated, ever.
What happened to me is now in the past and I want it to stay there. I didn’t write this to gain pity or have anyone console me. I wanted to share my story, because it’s something that I don’t want completely defining who I am as I grow. I was once tortured by a horrible person, but in telling someone about it – I refuse to let that person take any more of my life away from me. The memories of that time won’t be forgotten and I have scars that will always remind me of the painful experience, but I don’t have to allow it to rule the decisions and choices I’ll make in my future.
We all make mistakes. Our mistakes should always result in valuable lessons learned to help us better ourselves, our society, our world. Amanda, I’m sorry you made a mistake and I’m so sorry that you had to suffer. May you now, rest in peace.
