“Your Name Used to Taste So Sweet, Then You Beat the Love Right Out of Me”

Explaining to anyone who has not been abused just exactly how it could be possible you ever had an emotional connection with someone who so blatantly, callously, and deliberately devastated you is a challenge that even I face. I am not short on words, and I try to explain things in a way that even someone who has never been in my position can somehow relate. This is tough one, I have to admit, because even once you have explained the technical side to how an abusive relationship and the accompanying dynamics come to be, there is this rift. Reconciling what we know may never make sense at all – emotions, love, and affection – to make it somehow mesh and make sense with the abuse, which itself is the complete absence of love. What I can reconcile is that the emotional bonds we developed with our abusers was a result of the false personae they put on display well before they abused us. We were seduced into loving a person that really did not exist, but once they have begun to abuse you and realize what has happened, there is a confusion thrown into the dynamics that already exist.

I have been trying to stave off a full-blown migraine now in its third day. For whatever reason, when I am having these headaches, I tend to have a continuous wave a nightmares about Kevin, and the past few days are no exception. Conversations in the dreams I have been having with Kevin this time have focused around how someone who claimed to love me could be so barbaric, brutal, and cruel in his treatment of me. Not so much imagined conversations as they are playbacks of memories, small clips of my life when I had realized I was caught in his trap and I boldly announced to him that he was wrong. That he had succeeding in killing off everything good, and that I had warned him. As with all my grand revelations to him about his transgressions and violent behavior, this, too, elicited some punishments that I am not willing to relive. (It’s sufficient to say that the appropriate time to read an abuser the riot act is not during an argument, but I believe if I had the opportunity, if I could go back and change it I would not. Because I stand here who I am today precisely because of it all.)

Forever caught on a loop, even though my logic tells me I loved the lie, my heart still tries to make disjointed pieces that just don’t belong together somehow fit, even if it must be against all sense. I am a creature of emotion, and if the circumstances and personality are right, I get attached easily. I withhold no affection. When I love someone, regardless of if we are alone or surrounded by a crowd, when I look at you, you will know. Everyone will know. It’s distressing to me as I relive these things in my dreams that I ever felt something for Kevin that resembles how I feel about Kerwyn. I am disgusted by it, because the two are diametrically opposite, one very much deserving of my attachment to him, and the other, the abuser, the evil, maniacal, monstrous fraud who stole it from me but led me to believe he earned it. Until it was too late.

I am relieved at the fact that I could at least rectify that situation. Kevin, you can tell everyone all you want that I was cold and distant, but look what you did with my gift. You dashed it to pieces. Kerwyn has been kind and caring enough to help me put it all back together. And I will look at him with such a look of respect, love, and affection that you will never see. Never again.

I came online over lunch to look for something. I didn’t know what, but I found it. And Then You Kissed Me by the Cardigans.

There are two videos for this song, the original and then the reprise. I have included the lyrics below each video. If you have never been in an abusive situation, it may not make sense to you. Try to understand it anyway.

And just like the line says, Kevin….. You beat the love right out of me.

Man I’ve had a few
But they wouldn’t quit blow me like you
You gave me your name and sight
With a halo around my eye
And it hits me like never before
That love is a powerful force
Yes it struck me that love is as bored
So I pushed you a little bit more

Love, you’re news to me
You’re a little bit more than I thought you’d be
A mow in my well fed lawn
You’re a nightmare beating the dawn
Oh it hits me like never before
That love is a powerful force
Yes it struck me that love is a sport
So I pushed you a little bit more

Blue, blue, black and blue
Red blood sticks like glue
True love is cruel love
Red blood say power fuel
Sweet love tasty blood
My heart overfloods

Oh you hit me
Yeah you hit me really hard
Man you hit me
Yeah you hit me right in the heart
Lord I’ve had my deal
But I never quite knew how it feels
When love makes you wake up soar
With fists that are ready for more

And it hits me that love is a game
Like in war no one can be blamed
Yes it struck me that love is a sport
So I pushed you a little bit more

Blue, blue, black and blue
Red blood sticks like glue
True love is cruel love
Red blood say power fuel
Sweet love tasty blood
My heart overfloods

Man you hit me
Yeah you hit me really hard
Baby you hit me
Yeah you punched me right in the heart
And then you kissed me
And then you hit me

Oh you hold me with your violent heartbeat at night
Oh you strike me with your silence baby tonight
Why you hold me with your violence baby come hit me
You hold me with your violent heartbeat

slow dancing tight
my barren heart and i
your name used to taste so sweet
then you beat the love right out of me
it’s a mystery how people behave!
how we long for a life as a slave
when he kissed me i gladly gave in
to a fight nobody could win

man, he left me blue
and if i could i would do it too
i tell you now like i told you before
love is a powerful force
and it’s a mystery how people behave!
how we long for a life as a slave
and tumble into any open arms
that will only ever do you harm

oh, you you it’s always you
the best kisser that i ever knew
true love is cruel love
not much to be proud of
nerve-wrecking acrobatic backwards bend
all for a happy end

it’s a mistery how people behave!
how we worry ourselves to the grave
when he kissed me i lost everything
then i got up and did it again

oh you you, it’s always you, the hardest hitter that i ever knew
true love is cruel love
not much to be proud of

ass-kissing mercy-missing faithless friend
all for a happy end