I was 18 when I fell in love with my first boyfriend.

I felt as if I had achieved all that I had always wanted to achieve in my life after I met him. I would constantly dream of getting married to him.

Our parents were against our relationship because we belonged to different castes. But we were adamant about getting married.

So we eloped and got married.

After a while, all our family members accepted our marriage. My life seemed like a fairy tale to me now. But destiny had something else in store for me. Within a fortnight of getting married, I was asked to take up a job because my husband was not able to handle the financial expenses on his own.

I was completely OK with this because I just wanted him to be happy.

We were living with his joint family. So it was very difficult to manage all the household work in the morning and then rush to the office. I then had to study for my MBA in the night.

I would get completely exhausted at the end of the day every day yet I put in all my efforts to keep the spark alive in my married life.

But soon I got the see the other side of this man. Once I was very exhausted and it was at this time that my in-laws’ taunted me saying that had their son married someone else from the same caste, at least they would have got several things during the marriage ceremony.

I was deeply hurt by their words and vented out my anger on my husband in our bedroom. But he reacted very badly to this. He started hitting me. That was the day I lost all the respect that I had for this man. I kept working on our relationship with the hope that things would improve but in vain.

After a while, my husband decided that it would be better if we moved to a different flat. He realized that his parents had started torturing us a lot and this stress was creating issues in our relationship.

I stood by his decision. I was happy and thought that we could give more time and attention to each other now.

But the situation only worsened after that. Since only both of us lived together now, it was very convenient for him to come home drunk. He would return late in the night. He would then start hitting me if I refused to get intimate with him.

I would feel so helpless. I had to sleep with him but I hated myself for doing so. He would always tell me the same thing –that if I didn’t sleep with him, he had several other options that he could explore.

I was scared that he would carry out his threats so I would always give in to his demands. I would often spend several sleepless nights.

I could not share any of my problems with anyone else in my life. I felt really uncomfortable sharing all this with my parents. I thought they may not support me because I had chosen to get married to this guy.

5 years passed in this manner. My husband continued to create problems in our marriage.

One fine day I was surprised when my team leader professed his feelings for me. He said, “I know you are married. But I have always loved you from the day I first saw you. I know you have a husband. I also know you are really happy with him so I don’t want to mess up your life. I just wanted to confess my feelings for you.”

I just smiled at him and said, “I don’t want to complicate my life by getting into any other relationship. I hope this does not affect our professional relationship.” He looked at me calmly and said, “Don’t worry. I was just sharing my feelings with you.”

I had accepted the challenges of my life by now. One night, my husband was badly drunk when he returned home.  Suddenly at 3 a.m. in the night the telephone rang. I picked up the phone and was shocked to hear a female voice. I asked her if it was something urgent and told her that it was 3 a.m. in the night. She said she wanted to withdraw some money and had called because her ATM card was not working. She then said she wanted to ask my husband if he could help her out with it. I was very annoyed when she said this. I said, “Next time you call someone, please see the time and then make the call. I hope you know that the person you called up is a married man. I don’t think this is the right time to call him.” She then said, “Your husband is the one who keeps calling me. Ask him to stop calling me first.” I immediately woke up my husband and asked him about the call and the female.

But he was so angry about the whole thing that he started hitting me badly.

When I went to the office the next day, my team leader could clearly make out that something was wrong with me. He saw my swollen eyes and asked me to come into the meeting room. He wanted to know if I was fine.

I simply broke down in front of him.

That day he said, “You don’t deserve this kind of a life. I thought you were happily married.” That was the turning point of my life.

I was happy to know that someone cared enough about me to make me smile every day. I was glad that someone loved me so much.

He introduced me to his parents and they too were completely fine with the idea of me getting married to their son.

But that was also the time I realized that it was high time I faced the reality. I just couldn’t marry him because I knew I would be dragging my parents into all the mess that I was creating in my life.  I wondered what kind of answers they would give to the people of our society in case I chose to marry him. I was also scared of my husband’s anger.

So I decided to make my team leader realize that I was happy with my married life. I told him that all couples have some issues in their lives. I asked him to leave me and move on with his life.

I then started ignoring him. I changed my number. I changed my job and closed every possible door that I could to avoid getting in touch with him. I focussed on my relationship with my husband.

But I knew that he would never change his lifestyle for me. He continued to go out with his friends. He would play cards, lose bets and come home drunk. Then he would physically and verbally abuse me.

I had accepted all this as a part of my life so did not get very affected by all that he continued to do.

Whenever I asked him to take me out he would ask me to settle his credit card dues. I would agree to do this so that I could spend some time with him.

I now thought it was time for us to start our family. I thought he would become more responsible if we had a child. I hoped that this might bring about a change in his behaviour and attitude. But unfortunately, even after trying to conceive for several months, I failed to become pregnant.

I then got to know that I had some complications and would have to undergo some treatment. I did take all the treatment but did not conceive even after this. The doctor told me that I had only two options now. I could either go in for IVF or adopt a child.

My husband was not ready to go in for IVF. He said we did not have money to pay for this kind of treatment. I was not too keen on adopting a child so I didn’t know how to handle the situation.

I called up my parents and asked them to convince my husband about IVF. But nothing worked out.

Then suddenly, last Diwali he gave me a divorce notice based on some false allegations. I was completely shattered because I had never expected him to do this to me. I pleaded with him and asked him to take back his notice.

I asked him to work on our relationship. But he was adamant about getting a divorce.

I had been married for 11 years and now had suddenly got a divorce notice from my husband. I accepted his decision and decided to move on with my life. I hope God has planned something good for me.

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