He would threaten to leave me every time I wanted to do something he didn't like (like get a tattoo, piercing, go travel with friends) 

We didn't have as much sex as he'd like, and he'd constantly physically harass me and it would drive me up the damn wall.

He didn't like my friends... like REALLY hated them and told me that they "dumbed" me down.

We stopped going out together, we didn't have any of the same hobbies, and while I feel inclined to be angry with him, I'm not.

I'm a future social worker and a strong advocate for women's rights and for women to leave abusive relationships. At times I questioned if my relationship was abusive because my boyfriend would make me feel bad about being who I was and I would stop doing things I enjoyed just to avoid upsetting him.

I hate to say that he wasn't all that bad but I don't want anyone to hate. My childhood was fairly complicated. My mother had passed away my junior year of high school from her long battle with alcoholism Shortly after my mothers passing my father had relapsed with his drug and alcohol addiction and we eventually lost our house and became homeless and this was my senior year of high school. After that happens my boyfriend after about a year of dating and his family allowed me to move into that place and I have lived with them ever since then. He and his family have been very kind to me and I am forever in debt to them and grateful for the things that they've done for me. I think the thing that I am most upset about is the time that we spent together.

My ex was the only one to meet my mother place she died because of her addiction she never met any of my friends because I was too embarrassed. Shortly before my mother died my mom had a child with another man and he was also there to see my sister when she was first born my mother took a picture of us together with me holding my sister ends a few months later she died. 

Well my ex did do some things that were questionable he was a good man to me and I think we just tolerated each other and we took it out on each other in ways that I guess you could say were because I was not the best girlfriend either.

I don't know why am so relieved I feel like I can do things that I was never able to do before but at the same time I feel like I've lost a piece of me I've lost five years worth of friend of mine that we have no reason to talk anymore we don't have anything in common we don't have any of the same friends we have nothing to talk about after five years of living together planning life together and being there through thick and thin.

Needless to say, I feel ready to move on.