At age 12, I met my now ex-husband, who was 18 years old at the time, in the Pentecostal Evangelical Christian church in Tempe, Arizona that I was born and raised in my entire life.
The church focused on God’s will for your life. We were not allowed to own a TV, watch movies or listen to secular music, and we were discouraged from spending time with others outside of the church for fear of becoming “spiritually compromised.”
When I was 12, my now ex-husband began to show an interest in me, despite the fact he was 18. We began courting each other, and we became physically affectionate when I was 13. During my early teen years, our relationship was facilitated and encouraged by my mother, who would drive me to various sites so we could meet in secret without my father’s knowledge. I believe my mother was using my relationship for her own selfish gratification to increase my parents’ stature in the church.
I graduated high school at age 15, and my mother and ex discouraged me from utilizing the partial scholarship I received from Arizona State University because it would get in the way of God’s plan for my life, and they did not want me to waste time on my education.
He proposed to me when I turned 16, but I sidetracked our marriage plans. I knew I did not want to be with him anymore, much less marry him. Our relationship had an unhealthy parent/child dynamic, and he was very controlling. When I ended the engagement, my parents became really upset; in retaliation, they started making my life at home incredibly difficult and restricted my personal life with friends.
A few weeks after I broke up with my ex, my mother convinced me to go to dinner with him in hopes of reconciliation. On the way home, he parked the car and insisted I have sex with him one more time before we break up, because he deserved it. I repeatedly refused his unwanted advances and was furious that he tried to forcibly have sex with me. He was upset and irrational and begged me to take him back, refusing to believe that I did not want to be with him. I repeatedly told him no; I did not want to get back into a relationship with him, ever. This made him angry; he became violent and started hitting me. I screamed for him to stop, but he wouldn’t. Eventually, he hit me so hard that he knocked me unconscious.
When I came to, he was speeding excessively and driving through red lights and stop signs. I begged him to stop and not to crash the car. He had hit me so hard that I was bleeding from my left eye, and it was swollen shut. Ironically, I began to feel guilty for what I had “caused.” To protect him, we made up a story that we had been jumped by random people in a parking lot. No one questioned why he had not sustained any injuries.
The next morning, my parents forced me to go to church even though I had visible injuries. I called a coworker early that morning and told her what happened. We made plans for her to come get my stuff from my parents’ house that day so I could run away. My dad pulled me out of the morning service and told me that my mom found my bags packed, and they knew I was trying to run away. I told him the truth, and he proceeded to tell me it how it was my fault, how could I not have expected that reaction from him, and I brought this upon myself. He told me I was ruining God’s will for my life and ruining my ex’s destiny with God, as well.
I was done, and I was desperate to get out of my relationship. My co-worker gave me money to buy a plane ticket to Denver, and I immediately ran away from Arizona to my grandmother’s home in Colorado. My grandparents did not approve of the relationship and my parents’ plans to marry me off at such an early age, and they opened their home to me. They wanted me to stay with them and start going to a local college. My parents were insistent that I return to Arizona and forced me to go back about six weeks later.
The day after I returned home, my mother brought my ex to the house to work things out. I felt defeated at this point, realizing that I had exhausted all my resources in attempting to get out of this relationship and conceded to getting back together. I had given up and lost all hope. We were re-engaged, and my mom insisted on a wedding sooner rather than later. We were engaged for six months, and one week after my 17th birthday, I was forced to marry him in the church. My mother had to sign my marriage license because I was not legally able to. My mother signed the paperwork that allowed him to legally continue to statutorily rape me like he had been doing before we were married.
While we were married, he was emotionally, physically, verbally and financially abusive. When he would get mad, he would break household items or my cell phone, and even punched his way through the bathroom door to get to me. I began questioning the ideology and culture of the church I was raised in. I wanted out of it all. As soon as I could financially separate from him at age 20, I quietly left him with the help of one of my brothers and two close friends. I knew that by doing this, I would be reviled and ostracized by my friends in the church community. I also knew my parents would not support my decision. When they found out my younger brother helped me leave my husband, they kicked him out of their house as retribution.
When I filed for divorce, I lost everything. My credit was ruined. I gave him most of what he asked for in the divorce settlement because I just wanted to get as far away from him as I could. I had to get a new job. I was excommunicated from the only church I had known. I lost all my friends, and my family refused to talk to me or even see me. I still have no contact with most of the people I knew for the first 20 years of my life. This experience robbed me of my childhood and my ability to freely express my spirituality.
I am so thankful I was able to escape the emotionally, physically, financially and spiritually abusive relationship that I was forced into. I now reside in California, where I am in a loving relationship and have a family. It still blows me away that my own parents allowed this to happen to me here in the United States of America! No state should allow any child to marry. I have been SET FREE!
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