Broken Men

by Matty B. Duran

All I ever went with were broken men, broken in their sins. They were successful men but there was something wrong with them. There was something wrong with me, or they couldn't have played with my feelings. For many years I blamed myself, I felt unlovable, this was tattooed deep into my heart. I grieved for a lot of years, my soul mourned, I was in torment. All of the cutting was torment, was a soul in deep crisis. I wore my wounds, and they attracted certain type of men, men with low self-esteems.

They may have not believed that of themselves. They were successful in their fields. Because they were successful I thought there was nothing wrong with them. It was the fact that they were in positions of trust that they were able to set me up to be in a relationship with no love. If I had been well, they would not have been able to take advantage of me the way that they did. But I was not well, I cut myself and they all knew it.

There are professional men who use their positions of power to lure a weaker prey, one entrusted to them. These men were my professors, one was my therapist. Men who use their position in this way are unethical, there is a reason it is unethical, for doctors, priests, ministers, teachers, therapists to manipulate one entrusted to them. Men and women in these positions are already starting from a position of power, they are looked up to, for an unstable man or woman, especially child, there is a vulnerability present that is very easy to exploit. It was like walking into a giant spider's web, as sticky, an atmosphere of attachment when you walk into their office. These men invite you to become familiar with them. They invite you and almost insist that you tell them your troubles. These men want your trust; it takes a well person, a person with self-esteem to be in a position of trust so they don't abuse their power. It is very easy to abuse power. In my case, these men should have set boundaries. Male professors should never let their female students sit in their offices so long. The relationship needs to be professional, and not personal. It is so easy for the interaction to become personal. It is easier than you think.

But these men were looking for something, validation to prop up their sagging self-esteems. They were looking for something they saw in me, something that I could give them. Because I was not well, I looked for love from these men. As a young woman, I had looked for love. These men were not available and since they were not available they should not have pretended. I was a desperate young women in search of man to love me. But I wasn't going to get love from this crowd, men like this had no intention and no desire to love me. There were actually selfish and very immature men.

But what was worse was I didn't understand that their intention was to merely use me for their amusement to life themselves up at the expense of myself. Some of them used me sexually. Some of them teased me. What got used was my heart. They wanted to use my heart for self-gratification, in some cases to make them feel young again. But to release your heart from such a pit is hard. It was a place of rejection and heartache, of feeling unloved and utterly worthless. These were the emotions I received from them. The lure was that they would listen to me; they sensed my loneliness, the deep wound that loneliness had been. I wanted to stop the bleeding, I only wanted to stop the bleeding. Because I didn't trust my Jesus to stop my bleeding. I walked into the enemy's trap, looking to these weak men to do something only God could do.

These men didn't want to marry me. In some cases they were already married or involved with someone else. But I stupidly believed that they could love me. It was the same twisted game every time that I played until I became lost in the labyrinth of their scars; these men who only used me like a pawn.

Over the years, there have been people who thought it was my fault that I allowed myself to become involved with these men. I wasn't a child, I was already a woman, that I should have seen that they were only playing with me, and that they were not serious about me. But you don't expect that, I didn't expect these men to treat me this way. It was a betrayal; these men were supposed to be sources of safety. But they weren't. There was nothing safe about these relationships.

JESUS is The True Refuge. These were false places to seek refuge. They cannibalized my heart.

It is more common than we believe, professionals using their positions to lure young men and women into sexual relationships. How many teachers have we heard of in the media that had sexual relationships with their students? In some cases, they are only teenagers. A famous sex scandal was that of Mary Kay Letourneau who had sex with her 12 year old student Villi Falou. Instead of give up this boy, she willingly went to prison. He fathered two of her children and they eventually married, but what a twisted relationship. She damaged him. He was a child and she was a grown woman. This is a very extreme case; she raped this boy. We have men and women who use their positions for themelves, for their own sick pleasures. We should be able to trust our public servants, bus sin is loose in this world, and everything has become perverted. It is perverted for a public servant to seek an inappropriate relationship with someone he is there to help, either teach or treat in therapy. But there is no one to stop them. I could have reported these men, but I didn't I didn't want to betray them. I don't know if they would have been punished, it is hard to fire someone who has tenure as a professor. But I should have said something, if only to help the next vulnerable woman who sat in their office.

The only reason I didn't kill myself was because I have a Savior and a Lord who didn't let me. Yes, I betrayed my Lord when I went looking for love in all of the proverbial wrong places, but I have a Savior. What about the young men and women and in some cases children who do not know that Jesus died for them, Jesus died to forgive and free them.

I remember I didn't want to be vindictive. I still needed them to see me. I can't write love, as I knew after a while they didn't love me. But I couldn't get away from them. There are a lot of women who cling to men that don't really want them, they stay anyway. I stayed. I question myself as to why I stayed. I felt worthless, lonely, utterly desperate to be loved. In some cases, they reminded me of my own father, I think they knew this. I know that they knew that I loved them. I didn't tell all of these men I loved them, but they knew, they had to have known.

This is why is is hard for me to trust men. This is not the impression God wanted me to have of men. Men were created for honor and respect; men are not supposed to behave in such a way. God expects more from a man. He expected more from Adam in the Garden of Eden than He expected of Eve. Adam was Eve's protector. He was supposed to be her covering. He was created for strength, a man was never created to deceive a woman. God didn't create men to be sexually active with every woman they are able to get into bed. He was created for one woman for a lifetime.

A woman is created to respect her husband. Both of them are to be in a relationship, eventually a marriage of love and mutual respect. Sin has ruined this covenant between a man and woman. Men were not meant to cheat. Women were not meant to be men's mistresses. God intended a higher purpose for us.

I sinned too when I went with these broken men. I was broken too, instead of look to them for comfort and love I should have looked to Jesus.

So often, we search for the tangible instead of what is right in front of us. I sat in front of them with visible wounds. I still remember the torture I suffered in these relationships, the torture that had me cutting myself to free myself. Jesus wept for me. Jesus was crucified for me. Jesus didn't want me to live this kind of life. I didn't think I deserved any better. The devil had exploited my loneliness, he found these broken men and he laughed every time I cut myself. True healing comes when we admit we are broken, when we look to God as our real source of love. These men needed healing. I needed healing. There is a world that needs to be healed. Only by the Blood of Jesus can we be cleansed of our brokenness.

"I will say to the Lord, my Refuge and my Fortress, my God in whom I trust."

(Psalm 91:2)

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