“Unveiling the Shadows: My Journey Through Teen Dating Abuse”

I am a sophomore in high school from Texas. My abuse happened during my freshman year when I was only fourteen years old.
In July 2022, I met someone- let’s call her Evi- and fell in love with her. I introduced her to my best friend and my current partner, who wishes to stay anonymous, and we were a fun little trio for a while. Eventually, Evi and I began dating in October. The first month was absolutely perfect. She treated me well, called me pet names, showed genuine interest in the things I loved, and was always there for me. The only thing wrong was she seemed to get annoyed with my best friend for no apparent reason. She claimed that it was just her being horrid and that she was a really bad person, but I didn’t believe her. How could someone so nice be the scum of the earth?
Well, I’d soon find that out.
On November 30th, 2022, Evi doxxed my best friend. For those of you who don’t know what doxxing is, it’s taking your personal information and showing it to others without permission. She threatened to leak the information if my friend did not hurt herself on video call. I was manipulated into doing it for her by Evi when Evi realized she wasn’t getting what she wanted.
I wasn’t able to leave the relationship for a long time. She told me that if I left, she’d send the people after my friend, so I didn’t. I was trapped in a horrid situation with no way to get out and too much fear to speak out. So, I did what I thought was best: I gaslighted myself into believing I was in love with her. I truly convinced myself that she loved me and that I loved her, and that nothing was wrong. She absolutely took advantage of that. She manipulated me into who she wanted me to be. She would discreetly shame me for my habits or my likes and then convince me that her way of thinking was better. She was controlling and limited the people I hung out with. If she didn’t like them or if they did something hurtful to me, she threatened to hurt them as well. She also manipulated me into hanging out with her friends who all did similar things as her, and she almost convinced me to relapse or even get willingly groomed.
Evi was was also absolutely obsessed with me. She wrote my name in her blood, talked about killing others for me, and much, much more. But I never questioned it. I thought it was so romantic because of how delusional I was, because of how heavily I convinced myself everything was fine. You can imagine my heartbreak when she broke up with me in March of 2023.
It took me a while to get over her, but now I’m in a loving relationship and I’m slowly working to recover from that incident. I was diagnosed with PTSD and was enrolled into Therapy, but it’s still not enough. I still get triggered by things that remind me of her or freak out at even the mention of her name. She has become a permanent part of my past, something I will never truly move on from. All I can do is my best to keep on going. Being able to share my story publicly means so much to me and I’m extremely grateful to have this opportunity, especially with other survivors.
I’m often told that my story is fake, that I’m making it up for attention: but I’m not. I’m grateful to be able to share to people with similar experiences, to people who will hopefully see that they are not alone, and that this can happen at any age. Your gender, sexuality, race, age, all of that; none of that matters when it comes to abuse. It can happen to anyone. You are the victim, you are not the problem. What happened to you is wrong and it is not your fault. Again, I hope sharing my story can provide people with well needed comfort and closure.