It's better to die living, than to live dying...

That is the quote Craig andrew emailed to me!

This actually describes me down to a tee!!!

That's exactly how I feel, I feel like the burdens I live with have crippled me from living, which makes me a living dying person!

But it is only recently that I have decided it is time to actually live before I die!!!


Continuing from my last post, 'Monster 1' I will now post about another experience on my list of 'the battles' that I have suffered with for a very long time.


To be honest, this is not the next thing on my list, I have actually missed a few Monsters who's offences involve rape. But these experiences I will have to pass on posting about because it is extremely difficult for me to talk about. In a way I feel by explaining these times in detail, would almost be like reliving them again, but I am not strong enough for that yet.

What I can tell you though is that these people that I can not speak of are the biggest Monsters of them all. It is them who have caused the most pain and suffering for me and it is these experiences that have made it very difficult for me to have a healthy sex life with my husband.

I have only had 'willingly' sex with one male in my life and that is hubby. I have been scared by these Monsters for what they have done to me, which had made it almost impossible for me to trust and get close to males on an intimate level.

Hubby and I were together for about 2 years before we got married. We actually made love for the first time after our wedding!

But to be honest, it wasn't easy, and it still isn't easy for me to this very day. Sometimes I can really struggle during intercourse, and it can put me in a trance where I feel like I am being raped all over again! We have worked through a lot of it, and Hubby is unbelievably supportive, so I'm doing much better now. But it still happens sometimes, and it is really truly awful! I blame these Monsters for this.

But I will move right along to another Monster that I CAN post about!

This Monster I believe is the cause of my extremely low self esteem problems!

MONSTER 2

About 8 and a half years ago now, when I was about 15, I was desperate to get out of high school. I had issues with the way males would treat me, while many of my girl friends loved the attention from males, I on the other hand didn't. The attention from them made me feel so uncomfortable, I was always getting hit on by them. And as a girl if you didn't flirt back, you would either get teased for being frigid or a lesbian.

But I simply just wasn't interested! It was pretty tough for me, and it didn't help that one day I was hiding in the school toilets from this guy that was stalking me, and when I thought he was gone, I came out to find that the fucking janitor had locked the toilet block from the outside!

This was first thing in the morning so I was locked in these toilets for about 9 hours before someone heard my screams!

Anyways, it was around that time that I had decided I had enough of school, my grades were shit anyway, I couldn't concentrate on anything because I was just too damn unhappy! The only good grades I got were from my male teachers who loved to get close and discreetly feel me up! They thought I wouldn't suspect it, but I wasn't stupid!

So I decided to look for a full time job! I handed my resumes around to every shop in a local shopping complex, and by the end of the day, I got one!

It was a lovely little gift shop! Selling gorgeous fountains, photo frames, novelty gifts, everything! I just loved it! I thought I was the luckiest girl in the world, being so young and now working full time in this fun little gift shop while my friends had to go to school! A lot of my friends envied me, but it didn't take long to realise that it wasn't so great after all.

The job was fantastic, the shop was too, even the customers I loved! But it was my boss (Monster 2) that made it hell for me.

At first there were quite a few staff - Monster 2 the owner and boss, Les who was 2IC, (she's a lesbian hence the nickname) Posh who was a senior casual, (very posh music teacher) Dimple who was a junior casual, (yes she had huge dimples!) and of course ... me who was now working full time.

M2 actually had a very bad back which could have her bed ridden for days, so she employed me to take her place and help out Les because it was too hard for her now.

But even on the days her back was giving her grief, she couldn't help but come in and take out all of her suffering on the rest of us!

It was fantastic when she would stay home, the job was stress free! But when she did come in, she would storm in like a bat out of hell and start abusing us all! Even customers were afraid of her, in fact it was the customers who nicknamed her 'The dragon lady' she was THAT scary.

It didn't take long till everyone around me would drop like flies and quit and walk out because she was too nasty to handle. Posh couldn't handle being bossed around by M2 because Posh is a bossy person herself, so that didn't last long! Poor Dimple who i adored, ran a mile when she brought in a birthday cake that she made for ME and got in trouble by M2 for lighting it's candles in the shop! M2's a witch I tell you! Dimple was shocked, and was too terrified to ever return again. Before long it was just Les and I left.

Les was more terrified of M2 than I was, she had been there for 5 years and never had the guts to stand up to her!

So she was in a bit of a rut and felt that the longer she stayed, the harder it was for her to leave, but she was clearly unhappy.

At first I felt sorry for M2, and I would defend her and be like "come on you guys, don't take her personally, she has a bad back and is in constant pain" but in all honesty that was never an excuse to do the things she did to us.

It wasn't long before Les had finally had enough of it and decided it was time to leave. She was so terrified about leaving, that she made up the lie that she had to move out of town for personal reasons. She finally worked up the guts to tell M2, but as good as this fake excuse was, M2 gave her hell about it!

M2 was so furious with her, that Les became too frightened to come in for her last day, she rang me and asked me to pass on the message to M2 that she wouldn't be coming in. This was the angriest I had ever seen M2! She took it all out on me and said some pretty hurtful things that brought me to tears.

It was from that moment that things got much more worse than I could ever imagine.

Now it was only me and M2, we were under staffed but M2 just didn't seem to care! At first she decided to come in and help me herself, which meant that this miserable suffering woman would be with me 24/7!

She was angry and bitter every minute of the day, and would make my life a living hell too. I became sick to my stomach every single night dreading the next day at work that I would have to spend with her.

When ever I was actually sick, too ill to come in, she would abuse me and tell me that I am not allowed a sick day and would demand me to come in. Then when i would come in while I was sick, she would abuse me for bringing in a sickness for her and customers to catch!

When ever we had a slightly under day of intake, she would blame me. "Its because you are not wearing enough make-up,when you look ugly, you scare customers away" she would say to me. "I'm sorry" I'd say back. And when it wasn't my make up she was talking about, it was the clothes I was wearing or my weight she would pick on. "You're getting fat," she would say as she would grab hold of the side of my hip "look, you are getting disgusting rolls, you need to lose weight before you scare away more customers!" "I'm sorry" I'd say.

If you just scroll up for a minute and have a look at the picture under the title 'Monster 2' ... this picture is pretty much what M2 looks like! She has short red hair, ugly face, and over weight. She looks like an ogre frankly! But she had no problem criticising me and telling me I was ugly every day.

I was very pretty as a teen, I got a lot of attention from males (even though it was unwanted) so as you can imagine, when I started working there, we started having a lot more male customers. M2 took advantage of this, she just LOVED that I could sell anything to a male because they would buy something just for an excuse to talk to me. It was business to M2 so she took advantage of this, and basically would try and force me to dress like a tart and flirt with the customers! This was the whole thing I was trying to get away from!

It started to feel like I was working in a brothel and M2 was my pimp! But with me being so young, and this being my first serious job, I really didn't know any better. I figured that this was how all the work industries are? Bosses are suppose to be bossy? and I have no right as an employer to defend myself or say anything about it? Besides this I was terrified of her, she had me wrapped around her little finger and had me out of my comfort zone every second of the day.

But verbal abuse and manipulation wasn't the only things she did to me. We had to wear these awful looking aprons with big ugly pockets over our clothes as our uniforms. M2 would have this large metal ruler in her pocket, and any time I would do something wrong, she would pull it out a smack me over the head with it.

But it wasn't even work related mistakes I would be punished for, I would rarely make a mistake with my work because I was terrified of getting the 'ruler'! I can remember feeling a crumb or something on my bottom lip (I had just finished my lunch) so I moved my finger to my lip to wipe it off. But before I could, M2 pulled out the ruler and smacked me one! "Don't chew your fucking nails!" she'd say. I wasn't, but I didn't say that, instead I'd just say "I'm sorry" and continue to work.

Every single day was like this, it was a goddamn misery!!! But I didn't say anything to anyone about it, I just figured that I was being a big baby by getting upset over something that is completely normal right? I didn't know any better.

During all this, I had done a televised advertisement for the shop. Once a year a camera crew would go to each shop and film a little clip of a worker dancing, holding a product from their shop. It was advertising for the shopping complex.

I had to do this stupid dance to a jingle while holding a teddy bear! Not long after it was aired, I had myself a weirdo stalker!

This guy would ring me over 40 times in one day at work, just saying freaky things about how sexy I was on the add. He would threaten me and tell me that he will figure out where I live and come and kidnap me in my sleep! I begged M2 for her protection but instead I got the 'ruler' for being responsible for too many phone calls.

This guy even scared me in his car one day while I was walking home from work! He spun around me doing donuts, and then started to follow me home. I just hid in a corner store until Ex (my boyfriend at the time) came to pick me up. I decided then that I would never do an ad again, and would avoid as much attention as I possibly could.

This shop is a franchise, and M2 owns this one, but there are many more around Australia. Every now and then the Manager from head office (who I'll call 'Strange' because he is!) would come to visit and help us with big sales through the busy times. I would get excited about it, because when he was around M2 pretended to be nice! Though she would still verbally abuse me in front of him. I would pray every time that he was there that he would see the way she would treat me and would put an end to it.

After a hectic day with Strange helping out, he pulled me aside for a chat. I thought 'THANK YOU GOD, he has finally acknowledged what a bitch M2 is and is going to offer me some kind of support!'

But no...

This is what Strange said to me, "VBF I noticed that you seem to be a bit unhappy, it is obvious to the customers," my heart sank as he continued, "It is important that you smile more, I need you to really put 100% into your work here because poor M2 is suffering with extreme back pain." I wanted to cry! "I'm counting on you to pick up your act a bit and do everything that M2 tells you to do, at this stage what you are doing is not good enough."

So it appeared that I was all alone, and it seemed that it is true that M2 had every right to treat me the way she did. "I'm sorry" I'd say to Strange.

What Strange didn't know was that M2 had actually been ripping off the company, she had been stealing profits and stock and wasn't being honest about stock take. I'd be damned if I were to dob her in though, so of course, I just kept my mouth shut!

So I think eventually it came to a point where I was comfortably numb with the whole thing. There were even times that I got the 'ruler' but it didn't affect me at all. In fact, I was able to keep smiling!

But then the most wonderful thing happened! M2's back became so bad that she just could not come in any more!

I never thought I would be so happy about someone being bed ridden! But I was, I was so excited that I would now become in charge and that we would get a new employer to help me out.

But it didn't turn out like that at all! M2 was too cheap to employ anyone else, the pressure was now ALL on me to deal with. All the customers and the stock take, the ordering, the banking, just everything!

While it was fantastic to not have M2 breathing down my neck and bashing me every chance she could get, it all became too stressful.

Now she was constantly ringing me, threatening me to make sure everything was done before I was allowed to go home.

I would stay back 3 -4 hours later almost every night, trying to get 4 peoples worth of work finished! She would come in once a week and give me a huge bashing because I couldn't keep up with it all. But I was never paid a cent for over time.

I had customers abuse me and get frustrated and storm out because I couldn't serve them quick enough, as the queue was huge. Some customers even threatened to make a complaint about me because they would have to wait so long. I would burst into tears and beg them not to.

But at this stage it was the mystery shoppers I really dreaded the most. Every month M2 would have a report sent to her about the service I was giving. While the customer service was friendly, bubbly and helpful, it was failed because there wasn't enough staff to attend to everyone quick enough! I would get in deep shit for this.

But the worst thing about running this shop by myself was that I wasn't allowed to have my breaks any more. I was allowed to sneak a bite of something to eat every moment and then, as long as the customers didn't see it. That was a small price to pay quite frankly, I preferred to do this rather than have to work with M2 all day! (Even though I didn't get paid for no breaks!) But it was not being allowed to go to the toilet that bothered me!

To this very day I suffer from severe bowl problems and bladder infections! Because I had to hold it in every day for about a year! Sometimes it would get to the point where I would wet myself, and I would be in horrible discomfort and smell for the rest of the day.

It even got to the point where sometimes I had no choice but to duck in the back room and use a plastic bag as my toilet! It was humiliating and uncomfortable, and it really messed with my head.

I started doing my best to avoid it, by starving myself and not having a drop of liquid all day, just to avoid needing to go to the toilet. This really fucked up my health too over a year of it!

Eventually it was coming to a point where I was SO close to having a breakdown. It was one day that M2 came in like a bat out of hell as usual and walked straight past me to sit out the back. "Hi M2, I wasn't expecting you today, shouldn't you be resting?" I said politely. "I should be yes! I'm not staying long, I just popped because I heard the camera crew are in to film the yearly add, so I'm here to watch the shop while you deal with that." She said.

"Oh M2, you know that I'm not comfortable with that, after that creepy guy started to stalk me because of it, do you really need me to?" I pleaded. (The adds are optional by the way) "EXCUSE ME?" she snapped! "Of course you fucking have to! I am your boss, how dare you talk to me like that!" I started bawling my eyes out, I started shaking like I was about to break! "Oh get the fuck over it" she continued "Wipe those tears off your face and grow up! Look! They are here... get to filming!" I was in no state to go through with it. "Please M2 could you please just do it for me just this one time, I can't handle it." I begged. "Oh you little bitch! How dare you! You know I don't like being on camera!" She screamed! I just broke down to the floor shaking and crying! "I'm sorry" I said, for what would be the last time ever. "FINE!" she said as she angrily stormed up to the camera men and started dancing sarcastically, while glaring at me as if to frighten me.

I decided there and then that I wasn't putting up with it any more, I quietly grabbed my things and started heading for the door.

"EXCUSE ME! Where the FUCK do you think you're going? She said, I'm not DONE WITH YOU!"

That was it! I cracked...

"No M2, I'm done with YOU!" I said. She looked shocked. "FOR TWO YEARS I have let you push me around and bully me, I've let you call me names, I've let you HIT ME, I've let you make me do so many things that I was NEVER comfortable with!" I screamed! "You have done NOTHING but taken advantage of me, and EVERYONE else that has worked here, you have USED me and ABUSED me, UNDERPAID me and have DAMAGED MY SELF ESTEEM!!!!!!!"

She got so angry and said "DON'T YOU FUCKING TALK TO ME LIKE THAT!" I interupted her and said "NO! Don't YOU fucking talk to ME like that!" I continued " You are an EVIL Bitch and I am NOT putting up with your shit any more!!! I FUCKING QUIT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

She was speechless!

It was then that I walked out.

That was the last time I ever saw or spoke to M2, as much as it freed me to have the last word and stick up for myself finally, I still suffer with it every day.

I hold her responsible for my low self esteem which I still have to this very day. This experience is a huge reason for why I let people intimidate me, and I apologise to offenders out of fear of making them angrier.

Since then I could never return to that shopping complex out of fear of running into to her, my bowls and bladder are perminately damaged from being unable to have toilet breaks. It was extremely hard for me to get another job after that, because while it helped having the 2 years experience in retail, all who concidered to hire me, wanted a reference from M2.

I didn't put her as a reference because I knew that would be silly. But some employers went ahead and called her anyway for a reference, and as you can probably guess, I missed out on a lot of job oppurtunitys because of the lies that came out of this witches mouth!

I'm just a fucking mess to be honest, and even though it was 8 and a half years ago... she still rules my life today.

I need this to stop too, so I plan to contact her next.

xx