No. Worse than that.
She loved you in every single one, just not ours.
She cared for me once in all my life when it benefitted her.
And cast you out when it was convenient to save you.
She loved us in all but one.
And we got the shortest straw...

”he’s probably doing this because he likes you”
Oh
So making me afraid of going to school
Was because he likes me?






No





He liked the way i looked
He liked making comments about seeing me naked
He liked trying to make me forget it with candy and some ****** ******* water bottle
But he didn’t like me
That wasn’t love



It was so obvious
Why didn’t i see it until now?
…
Because you told me that he’s doing this out of love

Like a bird with broken wings,
I look on with eyes full of envy
as all those around me take flight.
Held down by my own chains,
Left alone, aside from the emptiness;
The hollow realization
That something is missing,
But never knowing the slightest sense
Of what that something is.

Like yin and yang,
Opposites attract,
The sadist and the *******,
Could attest to that.
Though their relationship was uncertain,
There was one fact,
He’d never raise a hand to her,
No, he’d never hit her back.

She let out all of her pain,
As she relished in his.
She hoped that he would fight back,
That was her one wish.

He cried out in pain,
As he took each of her kicks,
Feeling pleasure,
Though he was embarrassed to admit it.

The ******* had convinced his mind,
That he needed someone inside his life,
To break away his fleeting pride,
To break him down to where he wanted to die.
He never tried to run.
Why would he?
Who would be there to let his wife,
Blow off steam?
He took all of her blows,
Wiped the blood from his broken nose,
And deep down he knows,
He should get away, but he won’t.

She feels triumphant,
Her heart felt filled,
Laughing at the misery,
She never felt any guilt.
He hides his bruises,
Panting with relief,
As he covers his contusions,
Cursing the reprieve.

The sadist convinced her mind
That she just needed someone to hurt in her life,
Someone to satisfy,
Her parasitic urges before they killed her inside.
She never pushed him away.
Why would she?
Where would she let out her pain?
Who would bring her glee by hurting?
She punched and she beat,
Trying to blow off steam,
An attempt to retreat,
From the loss surrounding her feet.

One day, the sadist hit the *******,
After having beaten him around.
There was no scream, there was no cry,
Just a thump as he crashed onto the ground.
The sadist dropped the hammer,
And hid her mouth behind her hands,
Thinking she killed the love of her life.
The previous pleasure,
Faded to more pain,
As she cried and sobbed,
His blood left a nasty stain.

She called the police,
And turned herself in,
They took him away in an ambulance,
As she was in cuffs.
She felt no peace,
Her heart now broken,
Their fractured romance,
Was never enough.

But the ******* wasn’t dead,
And awoke months later in a hospital bed.
Paralyzed down from his neck,
He wouldn’t feel much of anything again.
While the sadist spent the rest of her days,
Locked in a cell, boiling with her pain.
She promised that if she ever got to see the light of day,
She’d go to the ******* and say,
How sorry she was, and she’d try to change.

Yin and yang,
Forever broken apart,
Though opposites may attract,
They can also shatter and leave scars.
The relationship,
Long gone,
But does anybody,
Win in the end?
No,
Nobody does.

He who shall not be named,
Is the beginning, the creator, the cause
Of the rewiring, and the broken pieces to my brain
For I was just only 18 years old
He was a little older, maybe 20
But what he put me through
Felt like a world of hell, eternally
For I was not experienced, I was a ******
It all changed after the night I gave in,
With barely an ounce of courage
For after that, he changed and became sexually enraged
I didn't want it like he did, My life was becoming a bid
I would lock myself in the bathroom like it was a hidden cage
Only because he forced himself upon me and I always cringed
He tried busting through the door!
So I got really scared and started shouting
I WON'T LET YOU DO THIS ANYMORE!!
But it didn't help, a house full of people
And all I could do was silently cry, and welp
Being dragged back to the bedroom that I now hated
Feeling so disrespected, so misguided, so jaded
I would tell him no, please don't do this
He'd look at me and tear my clothes off,
With an eager look in his eyes, as he's licking his lips
I'd push him away, I'd push him off of me!
But he was stronger and he held me down!
He covered my face with a pillow, hollowing out the sound
A house full of people, and they thought I was just going to town
After a while I gave up and let him just have it, have me
And every relationship after that, was the same
Yet, somehow, so much more differently
The bruises I had developed on the inside of my legs
Were always blue and purple, and sometimes even beat red!
Only the punishment didn't stop there, that's where it began
He treated me like I was part of a *******
Like I was just some pig he wanted to hurt and hang
After 6 months, I finally told him I needed space
I don't know how I managed to gather the strength
To look this monster in his eyes, straight to his face
I told him, I said,
"You need to leave and never come back to this place!"
The next day I told everyone who was there at the house
But no one believed me, so I continued to live in trauma
All by myself, and all alone, and as silent as a mouse.
For he was the first person to introduce me into a world like that
Which is something I'm trying my hardest to let go of and forget!


Stephanie A. Ludwig
04/24/2025

This isn't a poem but a story i really needed to get out there. If it gets taken down, i don't mind, it's not a poem after all. It would be nice if you read it tho.

TW: suicide, self harm, abuse, ****** assault (this is my first time putting a trigger warning on something here)

My mom met her current boyfriend when i was 10. During the 4 years i lived there i was abused physically, emotionally, medically (idk if it counts, basically i didn't get the medical care i needed) and financially, i'm a minor so i kinda depended on his and my mother's money. He committed ****** assault against my mother multiple times, leading to her having a child with him and being pregnant again. Me, my brother (11 years old) and my mother were all told we have stockholm syndrome. I was later diagnosed with autism and some other stuff. In 2021 my school called the cps, they didn't do anything. A few months ago i was told that what we had to do there was slavery. I ran away from home in May of 2024 and stayed with my grandma ever since. In January, 2025, he kidnapped me and i stayed there for the next 2 months. He did a lot of worse things as well but that's not the point.

On valentines day, 2025, i woke up to my brother telling me to open the windows in his room, because there was smoke in his room from making the fire (they heat the house with wood and coal) so i did. A day earlier i was cleaning the house and my stepfather told me to lean the wet mop against the furnance (i have no idea what it's called). It obviously melted down. My stepfather yelled at me and my mother and told me to buy a new one with money i didn't have. I went with my mom and my brother to check up on the horses, around 30 minutes away and we went to a shop to buy a new mop. My mom paid for it and told my stepfather i bought it. When we arrived at home, he yelled "where is this *****" (me) and threw the old mop at me. He then told me to go chop wood. It was 1pm. I went to chop wood and at 7pm i was let out of the basement. My mother took my backpack and things from my shelf and closet, threw them on the floor and said it was a mess (i did have a bit of a mess in my backpack though). She then told me to give her my phone. I would normally obey, recognizing my mistake but the last time my phone got taken away (August 31st, 2022) i never got it back and later discovered it was smashed with a hammer. I gave her the phone eventually, she said it won't be broken. A minute later i heard my stepfather yell at her to let him smash the phone. He threw a barely working laptop (which he stole from me) and my phone on the table and told me to download my school stuff on there. When i began to open the laptop he grabbed me by the back of my hoodie and threw me on the ground, i was scared and begged him to stop (he was choking me like this), my mom just watched and didn't do anything about it. He yelled at me to clean up the mess so i did. He yelled more. Now, i was a 14 years old autistic trans boy, had an 11 years old brother in the house, a 2 years old brother, and a pregnant mother with cancer, along with a very violent man who began smashing everything he saw. I knew i would get in trouble but i grabbed my phone and ran out of the house, at first they tried to stop me but later they didn't. I ran out of the house around 8pm, with my crocs on, in snow, in a thin hoodie and ***** sweatpants. I ran to the shop which was like 1500 meters away, it took me around 3-4 minutes and i noticed i wasn't tired at all, nor cold. I hid in the bushes in a parking lot and called the police, explaining the situation. They told me to go back to the house so they know the call isn't a prank. I tried to get there by a different route, but my stepfather found me, he forcefully threw me into his car and later into the house. He smashed my phone with a hammer and told me to hand wash some ***** clothes he found. The police arrived a while after. I ran there again, they tried to stop me, the door was locked. I went to my room which was on the first floor and jumped out of the window. The police entered the house and my stepfather started saying how mentally ill i am, that i made it all up and things like that. The police took pictures of my room (it was like 2 x 2 meters, with nothing but a mattress inside). They believed my stepfather as always, but one of the adults there told them that she needs to check for any signs of physical abuse (it was a lady and i'm so grateful she was there). She asked me to roll up my sleeves and saw my self harm. They told my stepfather they have to take me to a psychiatrist right now and maybe keep me there for longer, he said it's good and was needed because of how delusional i was. Then he left upstairs and they asked me a few questions (like if i tried to **** myself and stuff like that and how i tried to do it). I said i did and told them how, since anythign was better than staying at that house. The lady went to the room upstairs with me and made sure i can change in peace (my clothes were ***** and torn). Then we went downstairs, my stepfather kept making those comments about me, the lady made sure i stayed right next to her because i was having one of those silent anxiety attacks or whatever they're called. I got taken to a mental hospital that day, stayed there for a while and i'm currently living at my grandma's house, i'm also in therapy. The second day i was in the mental hospital my mother brought me things like spare clothes, a notebook which i still have and a few books. She told me she wanted to die because of me and hugged me. I want to take my siblings in when i grow up but i have no idea if i'll be able to financially. I want to at least take the 11 years old in. Technically all of them are my step-siblings but i don't mind. Anyway, this is how i spent my valentines day this year, thank you so much for reading this.

Her scream is swallowed, thick and deep,
But no one stirs, no one weeps.
A fist like stone cracks open her face,
Blood spills out, a slow disgrace.

He pulls her by the hair, she crawls,
Her body a wreck, her dignity falls.
The blood pools at her feet, a crimson flood,
Her skin shredded, soaked in mud.

The walls whisper of bone that snaps,
Of ribs that break, of flesh that cracks.
Her lips are split, her teeth are gone,
Her spirit erodes, but she still hangs on.

He calls it love — a brutal game,
Her eyes are hollow, her skin a flame.
She bleeds inside, where no one sees,
A lifeless corpse still gasping, "Please."

The neighbors hear, they turn their backs,
Her cries are buried under cracks.
Her blood runs thick across the floor,
A river of red, forevermore.

Her skin is torn, her soul is rent,
A broken body, a life spent.
And when they find her, cold and pale,
They’ll say, "She should’ve screamed, but she was frail."

Apart
Blaming
Conditional.
Defined by
Expectations
Fears
Grades.
Heavily moving
Into dark.
Joined by anxiety
Keeping it all in.
Longing.
Mad mix of feelings
Never far away.
Only living to please
Pursuing ways to disappear.
Questioning the established.
Repeating behavior.
Secrets.
Temptress
Underneath the mask.
Victimized.
Willingly responsible.
eXit from religion.
Yearning to be special.
Zero confidence.

cbd03/28/25

So maybe I see you in him.

Maybe I see unconditional love on both sides.

Maybe I see none of his mistakes, and none of mine because he doesn’t bring them up.

Maybe I see some one who has some type of control over something I don’t.

Maybe he needs the fact I live life day by day and I need his plans.  
Maybe he needs me to show him plans don’t go accordingly but my bubbly personality makes that worth while, maybe my optimism needs his pessimism so together we have a realistic view, for realism is both optimistic and pessimistic, but not without a realistic view-

You mix two colors together and get an idea plastered in purple -

Your favorite color is red and so is his.

Blue is the color that I associate to you.

He told me he would show me purple sky’s and I have a portrait to show the accuracy -  

He’s purple sky’s

If the sky was around my neck.

And painted with a belt.

But, I could belt out how much I love you.

With screams under my pillow because maybe it’s too abrasive.

But is abrasive compatible with abusive?

Maybe I too am abusive? Or maybe I was just prepared enough for abuse that I fight back and I’m reactive.

Not like an active volcano, because in technicalities he’d be reactive to his emotions, and we could call that reactive abuse-
But we know what the term reactive abuse refers to.

And as i reference purple sky’s this guys hand painted the picture around my neck when I was actually supposed to be using my neck to look above me and reaching for the galaxy behind the sun set that painted the sky purple for me.

And I wasn’t being facetious when I said I have the portrait it’s on my camera roll but I was on a roll when I drew the picture for you as he drew his belt from around his waist for me.

What a waste my life would be if he’s The One that kills me.

I wasted my time on him drugs and alcohol, I wasted my potential- when he’s my potential murderer. And I his potential victim.

It’s crazy when I think back.

He told me he saw my potential, but did he really mean my potential as me. Or did he mean his potential that he had set for me. Victim me.

So, yeah I guess I would be lying if I said I see him in you.

You’re nothing alike…
You’d choke him for choking me.
And he’d choke me because I drank today.

When you’d tip the bottle back and tell me to chug..

Y’all are nothing alike.

That’s why I was in love with you, and he is the love i let my life have.