[8]
If I Can’t Have You… No One Will: Abusive Relationships
Most girls have dated one man in their lifetime who was jealous, controlling, or just a real jerk. I have successfully dated all three in my twenty-five years of dating. The friends I’ve talked to who have also dated these types of men now can spot them a mile away and run for the hills. But looking back into my own past, I’m amazed that we allowed men to be anything other than respectful partners gliding through this game called life.
My first memory of getting ridiculed by a guy came in seventh grade. He used to punch me in the arm and then tell me I was an idiot with a face that only dogs could love. I used to go home and secretly cry because I had found some truth in it. I went back to school every day in fear I would get abused worse than I already had. So, what did I eventually do to prove my self-worth? I dated him. Yes, that’s right, I dated him. I found that I wasn’t the only idiot in the female race to date a man that is an abusive jerk. Looking back, I realized I wanted to prove to him I was worthy of his respect. I wanted to prove to him that I didn’t have a face like a dog and that I could be pretty if he just really looked at me. Yes, this was only seventh-grade “love,” but these moments are what usually set boundaries and goals for women later in life. My self-worth was then only measured by what other people would say to me. I would believe someone else’s low opinions because they had to know best. I didn’t know who I was, so I needed people to do that for me. This led to being involved in two destructive relationships that brought me down even further. The more I was controlled, the safer I felt. The more I was shit on, the more I felt driven to prove my love to someone. Yes, this is sick, but a majority of women are attracted to the bad guy. Hopefully most women will outgrow these types of relationships, but if they don’t, the consequences could be deadly.
One of the most infamous murder cases involving a jealous and abusive husband was Dorothy Stratten. She was a beautiful young girl living in Canada when a creepy sleazebag named Paul Snider discovered her working in a Dairy Queen. He started dating her and took nude photos of her and sent them in to Playboy. She was accepted and became Playmate of the Year. Not passing up a golden ticket, Paul the sleazebag married her in Las Vegas in 1979. From what the stories say, he was so controlling he poisoned her dog because he was jealous of the attention Dorothy gave it. He also wouldn’t let her drink coffee so she wouldn’t stain her teeth. By 1980 Dorothy had gained some self-worth; she separated from the bastard and moved in with Peter Bogdanovich. Paul the sleazebag, obviously insane, then hired a detective to follow Dorothy. He also made a “sex bench,” which was basically a chair with a built-in dildo, in the hope that he could sell it at a popular sex shop in Los Angeles and make millions off of it. (Fortunately, his invention was rejected.) Not long afterward, he asked Dorothy to meet them at their old apartment to try and hash things out. Dorothy agreed. (Obviously a dumb move, but haven’t we all done the same thing just to get an ex to calm down?) She arrived with $1,000 in cash, hoping to settle the split and move on. When she arrived that afternoon, she was raped and then shot in the side of her face. The “sex bench” was also next to the bed, and according to police reports, it was set in a position for “possible rear entry intercourse.”
On Dorothy’s Playmate profile sheet that all Playmates fill out, she wrote that her turn-offs were jealous men. She should have listened to her instincts.
Ironically, as I write this chapter, Oprah is on TV, doing a show about abusive relationships. She just stated that most murders happen after the wife gets out of the marriage. Weird, huh? Sometimes the ex-wife goes back to try to calm the monster or is forced to go back because of shared custody. The expert on the show, Gavin de Becker, talking about his book The Gift of Fear, said that you must have a plan and get help if you think your partner has the potential to be violent.
They say timing is everything; clearly I was meant to pass on credible advice by an author who knows what the hell he is talking about. So please check out de Becker’s book if you’re considering escaping from a bad relationship.
Because I don’t want to just crap on crazy men, I’m also going to remind you of the infamous death of Phil Hartman, who lost his life at the hands of an abusive wife. Brynn Hartman married the lovable Phil Hartman in 1987. As a result of her failed modeling/acting career, Brynn’s jealous outbursts wreaked havoc on their marriage. She eventually turned to drugs, which drove her into a deeper tailspin. Close friends said it was uncomfortable to be around them due to Brynn’s mental state, and the more famous Phil became, the more psychotic Brynn turned. One night after a particularly brutal argument, Phil told her the marriage was over. Not surprisingly, this did not sit well with Brynn. On May 28, 1998, as he slept, Brynn, drunk and high on cocaine, put three bullets into her husband’s body, ending his life. She then turned the gun on herself a few hours later.
People might think, Why didn’t he get out sooner? My guess is there were kids involved. And like most people I talked to who have been in abusive relationships, there is a thing called hope they hold on to, thinking their partner might change.
The majority of my friends who have “good marriages” have said that their marriage involves typical fights but never anything that gets out of control. There are sincere apologies and efforts to improve themselves, and neither partner ever feels like the other disrespects them. But I’ve also talked to women who had been verbally abused and asked them to share some common insults their abusive partners would say on a regular basis. Here are just a few:
“You gonna wear that?”
“You look like sh*t.”
“I don’t want to have sex because you got fat.”
“Why can’t YOU dress like that?”
“You’re stupid.”
“You’re sleeping with_______!”
“I’m glad you’re not pretty.”
“I so want to get on that [other hot chick].”
“You can’t go out like that.”
“Shut the f*ck up.”
Obviously, since I’m not privy to the details of anyone’s personal relationship, I can’t give customized advice, or tell you to get the hell out of a specific relationship. BUT, I highly suggest that if anything in this chapter rings a bell, please go see a therapist to help decipher if the problems in your relationship merit counseling—or if you just need to get away from the asshole you’re with.
[9]
Chocolate
Throughout my life I was a typical PMS chocolate eater, and then in my early thirties my true love for chocolate began. I found myself eating more and more chocolate every day. I don’t mean just a candy bar here and there. I was up to about ten chocolate bars a day. I was embarrassed to let anyone see what I was doing, so I would hide and eat my chocolate in privacy. At night, I would hear the sounds of the gas station calling, telling me the different bars they had. When those voices won, I would load Evan in the car and drive to Mobil at eight o’clock at night just to sink my teeth into sweet Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, Kit Kats, Twix, Snickers, and Whatchamacallits. People would come over to visit and open a drawer to look for something, only to find foil wrappers exploding from it. My acne then became so bad I had hair extensions added to conceal my face. I even bought Proactiv because I wouldn’t dare to give up chocolate for the sake of vanity.
Then Easter came along, and my body began to convulse with excitement. Chocolate bunnies, chocolate eggs, chocolate everything! I went to an Easter egg hunt with Evan and found myself at the children’s table peeling off wrappers and shoving chocolate into my mouth with the five-year-olds. When we came home from the Easter party, Evan took a nap and I sat there poking through his Easter goodie bag. By the time he woke up, I had consumed everything in it. “Mom, what happened? What happened to my chocolate?” he asked in his cute, innocent voice. I replied, “Um… the Easter bunny came back over when you were asleep and said this chocolate was old and that we should go pick up new chocolate at the gas
station.” He looked at me strangely, but before he had time to comment, I threw him in the car and drove to the gas station. I felt horrible that it had come to this. What mother gorges on all of her son’s chocolate on Easter from his basket? Something was wrong with me.
Later that month I had a meeting with my son’s doctor, Dr. Jerry Kartzinel, who treats Evan’s medical condition. I noticed that his eyes kept moving to my forehead and chin while I was talking to him. I said, “I know, my zits are out of control. I’m so embarrassed. I know you’re looking at them.” He said, “Jenny, you have to be loaded with candida.” I replied, “No, Evan has candida.” He said, “Darling, you do, too. Are you obsessed with chocolate?” I replied, “I’m not obsessed with it, I just want to actually marry a chocolate bar and make love to it and eat it for the rest of my life.” He replied, “Honey, you have candida. Your zits and cravings will disappear if you trust me on this.”
This is the same doctor who healed Evan, so I trusted that he was right. Now, let me explain candida for all those not in the autism world. Candida is a type of yeast. We all have it. The problem with it is only when it gets out of control. How does it get out of control, you ask? Well, after you take antibiotics, they strip all good and bad floras from your gut. We generally don’t know to follow up the antibiotic with a probiotic (probiotics contain good bacteria, which help keep the gut healthy; natural probiotics can be found in yogurt). When good bacteria are not present, yeast grows rampant if the host consumes sugar. Then the host experiences mood swings, severe acne, rashes, bloating, chronic fatigue, and food allergies. In severe cases, people have all of those reactions, and I was one of the severe cases. I immediately went on 200 milligrams of Diflucan a day for sixty days, and I felt like the exorcist was being forced out of my body. I was angry, bitchy, exhausted, gassy, and just plain miserable. I wasn’t allowed to eat sugar during this time. Candida dies when it’s not being fed sugar, which was why I was experiencing those Symptoms: that is what you feel like when those bastards are dying inside you.
By day 30, I noticed that my acne was not only gone, but I now had the most beautiful, glowing skin I had had in years. My moods had stabilized. By day 60 I had not one single craving for my old lover chocolate. To this day, I can actually hold a chocolate bar in my hand, and take it or leave it.
I thought it was important to tell this story in case other women out there are cheating on their husbands or boyfriends with chocolate. There are many reasons we love chocolate. It comes from the seeds of a tropical tree, and it is the most craved food in the world. We each eat almost 11.5 pounds annually. There is a whole list of substances found in chocolate too boring to run through, but the bottom line is that these substances trigger the release of mood-enhancing chemicals in the brain. Some researchers say that one particular substance releases dopamine in the pleasure centers of the brain, which peaks during orgasm. So no wonder we often prefer chocolate to sex.
Other researchers say that women crave chocolate during PMS because it contains magnesium, and that during PMS we actually have magnesium deficiency. Then there are the emotional chocolate eaters, who consider chocolate to be a sinful treat. When they are in a bad mood, it lifts them up and makes them feel like they are getting away with a little naughty treat.
I have experienced an amazing combination with sex and chocolate. Not dripping it on body parts—that’s just stupid, and it gets sticky. I’m talking about eating it while having sex. Go pick up some of your favorite chocolate (mine is chocolate-covered strawberries), and try it out. I shit you not, it’s extraordinary. If sex is mostly a chore for you, then this can definitely make the task a little sweeter.
[10]
Dating the Teletubby
I dated this chubby, hairy guy named Eddie for a whole ten days. I thought a chubby, hairy guy would love me more because I was pretty and he was chubby and hairy. I remember looking into his eyes and thinking, Wow, I’m gonna get so loved by this guy. He’s gonna make a great boyfriend/husband and will be so good with my future children because he’s not the model type. Then I had sex with him. He had the skinniest penis I had ever seen. It was like a pencil…. No, a straw. Wait, those are the same size. Okay, it was a string. A hard string. Like an uncooked piece of linguini. Yeah, that’s it. It was a long, hard, uncooked piece of linguini. In my head I thought, Ew, what the hell am I supposed to do with this thing? Boil it and serve it for dinner? Then I thought, Wait, with this string/noodle he has for a penis, there is no way he’s gonna cheat on me. And I’m prettier than anything he could ever get. He must be so insecure about his tiny dick that there is no way he’s gonna hurt me or leave me … first. This guy is safe!
Now I didn’t really have this conversation in my head. This was all done unconsciously, of course, but if you could press a button and play back what my unconscious could put into words, it would have sounded just like that.
We talked on the phone for hours, of course. New love, that’s what you do! He would tell me sad stories about how his dad was always a total “Debbie Downer” in their relationship. He spoke of how hard that was on him, and I thought it was so sweet that he was revealing his past wounds to me. He finally invited me over to his house and I was taken aback by the disgustingness of it. It wasn’t dirty, it was just pathetic. He lived in the basement of a shack. It wasn’t even a house. It was a shack, AND he didn’t even score the top floor. He was in the freaking basement of the shack. This would have been fine if he was in college or maybe his twenties, but he was thirty-nine. So now I find myself dating a fat, hairy, spaghetti-dicked thirty-nine-year-old man. (I was twenty-five.)
He then gave me a tour of his “crib,” which consisted of me standing in the same spot and just spinning around. The basement was the size of a garage that could maybe squeeze in one and a half Toyotas. He had me lie down next to him, and when I plopped my body down I almost became paralyzed. My body was expecting a mattress, but all that was there was a pile of fifteen blankets all on top of each other—the bottom layer being cold concrete. It was like those dirty shacks that crazy loners live in, in movies that take place after nuclear war. I know what most of you are thinking right now … What the hell is wrong with her? Why is she dating this guy? Or if you are a fat, hairy man reading this, you’re probably asking, “Hey, how can I get me some of that?”
As I lay there running my hands over his hairy man boobs, the smell of mold was starting to asphyxiate me. I just kept thinking, How does this guy not have brain damage from all this mold? He asked me to spend the night, and I said okay—but I lay there on the floor of his basement trying to breathe into a Kleenex, hoping it would block black mold spores from entering my lungs. Needless to say, I didn’t sleep much that night—mostly because of the raccoon family that lived in the wall next to the bed. I bet their place wasn’t as bad as this. But I also lay in this shithole trying to convince myself that this guy was the one. Seriously, this is right after I did Singled Out. I’m still young, cute, and have a little career. What the hell was wrong with me to think that this was what I deserved? I would rather live in a shitty basement with this Teletubby than ever give myself a chance at real love. The next morning I surprised him by telling him I was going to treat him to a romantic night at the Four Seasons in mold-free luxury. He seemed excited.
So that night in the Four Seasons we had sex, which felt more like a Pap smear, and then fell asleep watching some stupid movie. The morning after, I thought I would surprise him with a beautiful breakfast hiding in the other room. He woke up and entered the living room to find me smiling next to a table of food. “Good morning!” I said. He looked at the food, picked up a bagel, and said, “What the f*ck is this?” I was speechless. Did he just say, “What the f*ck is this?” Yeah, I’m pretty sure he did. I thought maybe he was joking around with me, so I responded, “It’s my bunion I just cut off my foot.” He said, “I don’t eat f*cking bagels,” and threw the bagel down on the table.
Yes, that’s right. The Teletubby just yel
led at me and threw the bagel on the table after a night of sex in luxury. I could understand if it was bacon and he worked for PETA or something, but it was a freakin’ bagel. Again, I sat there in shock and felt a huge wave of anger rush through my body. I stood up, walked slowly over to the door, opened it, and calmly said, “Get the hell out of here.” He grabbed his shoes and walked out the door. That was the last time I ever saw Teletubby.
Now, let’s dive into the psychology of this, okay? I convinced myself that a chubby, hairy guy with no penis would make a really good boyfriend because he would never cheat on me and would worship the ground I walked on. If you think that is soooooo crazy and shallow, stop and look at the hot chicks in Hollywood who date the ugliest rockers. I mean, some of them make me want to vomit. I was no better! I was willing to sacrifice ever finding someone attractive, productive, sweet, with a nice penis and a home, just so the odds would be better that he wouldn’t cheat on me or leave me. How pathetic. I sat alone in that hotel room forcing myself to ask these questions about myself. Am I that insecure? Why did I think I deserved a homeless Teletubby? I’m not saying all chubby, hairy men that sleep on concrete are losers; I’m just saying, Aim higher. The answers I found were that my ego felt safe with him, and I also felt more powerful in that relationship because I was the one with an actual mattress. His ego probably couldn’t handle the fact that I had running water. I wasn’t trying to flash money, but I was thinking that maybe he would love me more because I could treat him to nice things. I felt like I had nothing to offer personally because I felt worthless and unlovable. Amazing, but true.
Love, Lust & Faking It Page 4
