Everyone thinks I'm a liar, but my gallery holds the timeline of his violent attacks.
I’ve spent the last couple of weeks going through my files, to compile photos and videos of my first baby's first year to make a birthday video. On the surface, the clips are beautiful. My husband looks like the most fun, loving, and attentive dad ever.
But as I scrolled through the timeline of her first year, my stomach was in knots. Interspersed between the cute videos of my baby’s milestones are the hidden photos of the aftermath of 15 different physical attacks from him that I documented in secret.
Everyone in our lives: his family, my own mother, and the professionals now assigned to our case, believes that I am a liar. They believe I had severe postpartum psychosis and made up the abuse to manipulate everyone.
My first memory of postpartum violence happened before we even left the hospital. We were in a private room for six days while I was hooked up to IV antibiotics. I remember holding our newborn baby girl in my arms when he snapped, backing me deep into the corner of that hospital room. I was completely trapped, holding my newborn, shocked at the audacity of his behavior.
The day after we finally got home from the hospital, we were trying to bathe the baby together. He was using a digital thermometer that only checks surface area by pointing at it. I made a joke about how we should check the water temperature "like in the olden days" using our hands, to make sure there wasn't a pocket of scalding water.
He flew into a rage because I was "criticizing his parenting". He slapped me across the face so hard I almost fell over. My mother was arriving from America the very next day. I remember lying in the bed crying holding an ice pack to try to prevent a bruise from forming. It was the second time he had slapped me and I had already asked him to just not give me any bruises that were hard to explain! And then he went and did that!
When my mom arrived, the nightmare only escalated. One week after giving birth, I was struggling with severe postpartum insomnia and out of control anxiety. The IV antibiotics had activated my PTSD related to almost dying from a skin infection at 18.
I have managed insomnia before in my life, so I know what works for me. I was alone in our room using headphones to listen to music which can help me sleep. My husband and my mom both decided they knew better than me and thought it was keeping me awake.
My husband came into the room under the pretense of "confiscating" my phone and headphones like I was a teenager. After ripping them away from me, he grabbed my head and violently twisted and snapped my neck in a way that came terrifyingly close to breaking it.
Terrified and in shock, I took my phone back and dialed the police. As I was calling them, my mom tried to take the phone from my hands because she thought I was just being paranoid and delusional, refusing to believe he had just violently assaulted me in the next room. Even though you could see red marks where he had grabbed and twisted my neck, my mom said she couldnt see anything. When the police arrived, the massive response turned our lives upside down. But because I am an immigrant and my legal status and finances are completely dependent on him, I was in a terrifyingly weak position.
The system scared me into silence. To protect our family's income, prevent him from losing his job, and prevent any chance of social services from taking my baby away, I eventually cracked under the pressure. While completely sleep-deprived at the station, I lied to the investigators. I took the blame. I told them I had hallucinated the entire physical assault due to severe insomnia.
Because I gave them that lie to survive, his family and the caseworkers now look at me with complete distrust and disgust. His mother told me she wants me deported and permanently separated from my child and she told all of her brothers and sisters I'm a vile women who falsely accused their precious nephew of DV.
I am now trapped in a situation where I have to attend weekly couples therapy sessions and handle uncomfortable interviews playing the villain, pretending I was the one who made up DV to get my way. I have to visit with his extended family knowing they probably still hate me and think I'm horrible.
The hardest part is that I love my husband, and despite these horrific flaws, there hasn't been violence in six months and we are actively trying to work on our marriage and fix things. But looking at these videos of her first year is a heartbreaking reminder of what should have been a beautiful time of my life... and how amazing it could have been if he would have just excercised some self control and not assaulted me all those times.