The election is over, and now the work begins to heal from the hurt. I’m not referring to a nation, I am speaking exclusively about my own challenges with those in my life, who knowing everything I have been through, still supported a hate filled, sadistic man.

To look at the truth which surrounded every part of who he is and deny it, to ignore clear and consistent signs that this individual abuses power, to look away and not just make excuses but feed into his impunity to treat others as little more than pawns in his game, to dismiss his heartlessness leaves me feeling battered and re-victimized.

For most it was an election. For me, it was everything I had lived with on a daily basis in my marriage, in my face again; front and center for the last eighteen months. Every day, it felt hauntingly familiar and personal. He was not someone running for office, he was someone I knew intimately.

The name calling, the mocking, the verbal attacks, the sexual assaults, the victim blaming, the entitled belief system, considering himself smarter than getting caught, bragging that he could do whatever he wants without repercussion or consequence and the actuality of that, the lies denying what he said and did despite irrefutable documentation, the bigotry, the two faced-ness, the smear campaigns; all stirred deep injuries from a past I try to leave behind every day.

He is my husband. Any small misstep, any slip of tongue, shortcoming or change of mind brought up over, and over, and over; mercilessly thrown in my face and used as its own weapon to beat me down. Despite it all, I rose.

I am Hillary. I have fought tirelessly, trying to stay the course and not succumb to the hate being spewed at me by those I did nothing to harm. I am not perfect. I have done the best I could. I have made mistakes. I have had lapses in judgment. I’ve made decisions with the information I had. I have said the wrong things. I have behaved in ways I’ve regretted. I know contrition. I have tried to make amends. I have been held to a standard of perfection that diverts attention from the decent person I try to be.

The challenge that lies before me is how do I move forward from here to find a place for those who looked away from goodness and truth to enable someone to perpetuate hate, as happened in my own life? How do I forget the betrayal of those who continued to believe and support him, the oxygen that fed a flame and supplied a narcissist; in the face of the overwhelming evidence of who he was? How will these wounds heal over when the source, revealed, remains unchanged? Is there any going home again or has this, too, forever changed me?

He won’t simply go away if I stay off social media, or turn the news off as my therapist suggested to minimize my PTSD. He is once again in my home, poisoning everything. It is the dividing line of friendship, the new battleground in the fight for personal peace.