Toxic relationships affect men too…

About the book…

This is one man’s story…

“I didn’t want to write this book.

I had been planning to write an altogether different book. One about the Roman Empire. However, as I was preparing, researching and planning the layout for that book, long buried memories intruded again and again.

Yet I persevered. Researching, communicating with scholars and reading old Latin texts, I had named the chapters and arranged my research into a series of document boxes. One for each chapter.

Then one day, after not much sleep, and many nightmares, I began to write. Instead of opening with an analysis of the state of Republican Rome in 200 BCE, an altogether different book began to write itself. I could not
stop it. The flashbacks and cold sweats took over, as my memories intruded.

Shaken, I stopped. Got up. Went to the bathroom and had a shower. This had often calmed me before. The rain of warm water and scent of the soap always worked a kind of magic.This time, however, it didn’t. As the water fell, memories of violence and degradation rose up. Haunting. A sense of despair enveloped me. Then, the vision faded and reality once more intruded. Shaken, I got out of the shower and dried myself off. Getting dressed I began to feel much better and went downstairs to the kitchen to make a cup of coffee.

A dizzying turn enveloped me. Another flashback.

I saw myself, being stabbed, scolded and insulted. On and on this waking nightmare persisted. Until. As if satisfied. It faded into the darkness. All that was left from then on was softening laughter fading into the silence.

Shaken. I spent the remainder of that day drinking heavily.

The following day I once more sat in front of my computer to write. Again, Rome fled before me and something else took its place. So, I thought, “well let’s just write a few pages and get this out of my system”.

So, I started writing.

An hour came and went, and I was still writing. Then a day, a week a month. Finally, two and a half years had gone by, and an altogether different book now existed.

It was almost as if this book had written itself!

One day I was planning to write a history of Rome, a few years later I was putting the finishing touches on this book. What had happened? Heaven knows. But here you have it. So, what is it about?

This is a Memoir.

But one where I skip over most of the nice bits and focus on the violent abusive and frightening things that happened. I will describe the confusion, despair, terror and loss I felt when I realised that the person I loved was, in reality, an abuser. An individual, who desperately wanted to hurt me.

You will see my struggles, mistakes and victories.

It is hoped that at the end you will increase your understanding of the phenomena of domestic violence in all its gory reality. The nature of the victim and the characteristics and motivations of the abuser. (At least in my case.)

I also want you to understand why so many victims see suicide as such an attractive escape. Finally, I will show you the difficulties experienced when trying to break away from an abusive relationship, and the negative ramifications that this can have. But as odd as it might seem to say, this is not just my story. Instead, it is a story that will resonate with many who have writhed at the hands of a domestic abuser, Men, Women, Children and the Elderly.” Read First Chapter On Amazon

Mathew A’Dylan

This is one man’s story...