“God, please heal and change my husband or change me so he will stop hurting me.” I prayed this plea thousands of times during my first abusive marriage. I spent thirteen years trying to make my fantasy of getting married and living happily-ever-after come true.
How Could I Be So Blind?
I kept praying, hoping, and trying to be what he told me to be, but nothing worked. I kept waiting for my “beast” to turn into my prince, like in the fairytale. I didn’t realize my reality consisted of being trapped in the cycle of domestic abuse.
The love I had been shown or learned growing up was unhealthy. My love definition said I was lucky to have anyone give me any attention because I was not special, and I was deemed “used goods” by my dad after being raped at fifteen. To make sense of all the abandonment, rejection, and pain, I felt growing up; I defined love as something to earn, conditional, and an occasional good feeling.
Although my definition of love was unhealthy and flawed according to Christ’s love, my faith that Jesus was always with me was unmovable since the age of seven, when he came into my heart. His strength, hope, and perseverance became the characteristics that grew in me. He gave me a sense of knowing that one day, I would know his true love.
The problem was, I kept thinking I would know his love through my spouse, who also proclaimed to be a “Christian.” I was also caught unaware of what healthy relationships looked like and the types and signs of abuse. These three factors kept me confused and feeling responsible for making my marriage work.
Perfect Victim Mindset for a Love Denial Fantasy
In my confusion, I kept searching for answers to fix myself and my abusive husband. The enemy knew my deepest desire and need; to feel loved. He used it to keep me in the emotions and cycle of abuse. By keeping me focused on filling my need for love and what I could do, I didn’t seek the answers from Christ.
I was so afraid of being abandoned, rejected, and alone that I chose to sacrifice myself to keep hope. I didn’t see how I had subconsciously created a love denial fantasy to make sense of my pain. People create a love denial fantasy to avoid facing or confronting their abusive spouse’s disrespecting, dishonoring, or devaluing words and actions with the hope to keep their marriage.
A love denial fantasy is created to avoid facing truths that may bring feelings of abandonment, rejection, or ending the relationship in divorce. A love denial fantasy can be stronger if the victim believes God will be disappointed or mad at them if they don’t submit to their abusive spouse or get divorced. These spiritual lies come from misquoted and misused verses, often by the abuser, to keep the victim in their control through fear.
In an abusive marriage, you can never satisfy, compromise, or sacrifice enough for your abusive spouse because they are only concerned about maintaining control over you. Their definition of love is control, manipulation, hurt, and abuse. Abuse is not the problem of a couple. Abuse is the choice of the abuser, and only they can stop it. Abusers are the only ones responsible for their abusive words and actions.
Eventually, Reality Meets Our Fantasy
During the thirteen years of my first abusive marriage, I kept lowering my standards until I thought there was no way out. The end of this marriage almost ended in a homicide, which was a reality I had to face. I share my reality to help you see that the cost of trying to live in a fantasy you create in your mind prevents you from seeing what is really going on.
In a fantasy, you accept what your abuser says. You come to believe that you are to blame for everything bad that they choose to say or do to you. If a stranger came up to you on the street and tried to say and do what your abuser does to you, you would see this as it is, wrong and abusive.
No matter how long you are in an abusive marriage, you will have moments of reality when you realize the abuse is not right or God’s will. In these times, you can find the strength to seek the pure love design of Christ to understand how the enemy is deceiving you. As you grow in his knowledge and strength, he will help you see his truth and how to live in his pure love design. Don’t wait until the cost of facing your reality become life and death. Seek God’s answers, and he will show you Christ’s love design.
Live in Christ’s Love Design
Most people start a marriage because they love their spouse, and they believe that their spouse loves them the same way. We want our marriage to be happy, and we will do whatever we need to do to make it happy. In God’s plan, BOTH spouses should have this goal with the knowledge of how to love their spouse as Christ himself, especially if they claim to be Christ’s disciples.
However, we all enter marriage with two individual definitions, understandings, and designs of love while assuming that our spouse’s love matches ours. We don’t examine each broken love design before we start our marriage. We don’t even realize that our love designs are broken and that Jesus has the only perfect love design we can learn and live in.
I have seen many struggling Christian marriages that have found healing and happiness as they have examined their definitions of love compared to Christ’s. They realized some of the ways they have deemed okay to express love are not the ways of Christ. They have repented to God and their spouse and corrected their unhealthy or abusive words and actions by living in Christ’s love design. These couples are walking as Christ’s disciples in their marriage.
However, some marriages have one spouse who chooses to love like Jesus and one who chooses to continue to be abusive. It is NEVER God’s will for anyone to endure abuse in a marriage. When you are Christ’s disciple and realize that you are a victim of abuse, you must decide if you will continue to allow your abuser to abuse Christ living in you or stop them by breaking free. Jesus instructs us to live in reality and work with him to overcome our challenges.
Choosing to live in a love denial fantasy can only end in destruction. If you live in a love denial fantasy or realize that you are being abused, please contact a Christian counselor experienced in abuse. The only person you can change with Jesus is you. It’s time to stop living in your broken love design. Jesus is waiting to work with you and transform your love into his pure love. Learn to love like Jesus and thrive no matter what your spouse chooses.
Learn about healthy, unhealthy, and abusive or toxic relationships. https://godstransforminggrace.com/signs-of-healthy-unhealthy-and-toxic-or-abusive-relationships.
Find encouragement and support for your challenges in my private Facebook group Growing Through God’s Transforming Grace.
