I have been struggling to figure out what to write for a while now - since the end of December, in fact. Every time I sit down to sort out my feelings I end up furious and I slam my computer shut. If I'm alone, I cry, or yell, or kick my desk, or punch my pillow. Sometimes I meditate or pray; sometimes I just try to do something else until I calm down. I've been avoiding my own anger. Maybe it's time to stop.
Here's why I'm angry: Jyoti Singh Pandey.
Do you know her name? If you don't, you should. Maybe you know her as India's Daughter. Or maybe you know her as that girl who was gang raped on the bus in India, and who died of her injuries two weeks later. Or maybe you don't know who in the world she is, or why anyone would be angry about her.
I have a confession to make - I'm not just angry about Jyoti Singh Pandey. I am angry about Steubenville, Ohio. I am angry about Savannah Dietrich. I am angry about New Mexico's House Bill 206. I am angry about the Violence Against Women Act of 2012 which was stalled when Republicans balked at protecting Native American women, immigrants, and the LGBT community from violence.
I am angry for my friends who have been abused and harmed. I am angry for the women and men who are pressured by society not to come forward after they have been raped. I am angry for the soldiers who are shamed by their leaders and comrades after being raped or assaulted. I am angry for the children who suffer in silence because they are afraid to tell someone that they are being hurt by a family member or friend. I am angry for the LGBT people who have been viewed as prey and who are attacked simply because they have different expressions of gender or orientation. I am angry for myself, and angry at the people who decided it was fair and just for them to take what they wanted from me with no thought about the damage they did to my psyche and my soul.
For the past month, I've been trying to find a way to constructively deal with my anger. I have signed petitions, worked to raise awareness, and participated in two magazine interviews on the subject of sexual violence and the rape-friendly culture we live in. I have meditated, read books on healing, shame, and vulnerability. I have prayed endless prayers, asking God to change our world. Asking God why people are so cruel. Asking God how he can allow these things to happen. I have prayed that God would take away my anger.
I wanted peace. I wanted resolution. Instead, my rage grows. Maybe the answer is in the anger - maybe the rage itself is right. Shouldn't good people be angry when they see evil being committed? Shouldn't we be enraged when we hear about innocent women and men and children being abused? Shouldn't we be galled by inequality and injustice?
If everyone was angry, maybe things would change. If everyone felt this same anger that I feel, maybe instead of ignoring these issues or deeming them too controversial, we would all work together for justice. Maybe we would overturn a few tables in our cultural temples, and drive out those who are abusing the system for their own gain. Maybe. This is my hope - that each of us could be as incensed over injustice and inequality as every football fan is when the refs make a call in the other team's favor. That we could all spend as much time working for justice as we spend making up our fantasy football teams and talking about last night's game. This is about human rights, people! Wake up!
Equality. Justice. Peace. Aren't these things worth fighting for?
...let justice roll down like water, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream. ~ Amos 5:24, NRSV
Showing posts with label Sexual Assault. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Sexual Assault. Show all posts
Thursday, January 24, 2013
Monday, July 30, 2012
A Long Way to Go
It is hard to believe that I have completed another trip around the sun, but here I am - forty-one years old, give or take a few days. It feels almost eerie to be this old. OK, I know - forty-one isn't exactly ancient. But bear with me; I'm making a point here. Survivors of violence often feel a sense of a foreshortened future. Since I was a teenager, I have expected to die young. I really never thought I'd get to be twenty, much less thirty. And when thirty-five came around, I was pretty shocked. So shocked, in fact, that I aged myself another two years! I went around for a couple of years telling people I was thirty-seven. It wasn't that I meant to lie about my age, I just lost track of where I was. The year I turned thirty-eight I was not surprised to find myself in a life-threatening situation. After all, I never imagined I'd live to see forty.
It was the night of November 14th, 2009, when I stood in my abuser's kitchen after he had just tossed a plate at me, thrown his glass across the room, and ripped the silverware drawer out of the cabinet. He grabbed my left shoulder with one hand and held a knife in his other fist. A six-inch long blade might not sound like much, but when you expect it to plunge into your throat any minute, it looks pretty impressive. I'm not sure what stopped him from stabbing me at that moment; it certainly wasn't me. I didn't fight with him, didn't struggle, didn't try to take away the knife. All I did was look him in the eyes and say, "I'm not afraid of you." And strangely enough, I wasn't. Fear came later - the next desperate month was spent in a welter of fear. But in that threatening moment, I didn't feel anything at all.
Of course, this is not healthy in any way. I should have been afraid. Any sane person probably would have been. By the time this happened, he had already sexually assaulted me and had been verbally and emotionally abusing me for months. I knew he had a terrible temper. I had seen him destroy my belongings and throw pots and pans and books across the house. I had heard him threaten to rape other women, kill me, and then commit suicide. I had seen the hole in the wall by the front door where he had put a glass through the sheet-rock because he was angry at me for dating someone else after we broke up. I think I wasn't afraid because I honestly believed that I was meant to die young. A violent death seemed like the strange fulfillment of some long unspoken prophecy.
All this disclosure begs the question of why - why I believed I would die young, and why I am still surprised that I'm here today. Post-traumatic Stress Disorder seems to be the most logical answer. It is a feature of PTSD for survivors of violence to have a sense of a foreshortened future - Criterion C7 states that the surviving individual may not expect to have a marriage, a career, children, or to live a normal life-span. (DSM IV Diagnosis and Criteria: Post-traumatic Stress Disorder, 2012).
So here I am, forty-one years old, and feeling like I am very far behind on my life's goals. I think time got away from me because I kept expecting to die young. Sometimes it seemed like making efforts to accomplish things just wasn't worthwhile, because I wouldn't live to reap the rewards anyway. Logically, I know that this is a ridiculous mindset. No one knows when or how they will die. I certainly don't want to die - I am not suicidal and I do not take unnecessary risks with my life. About five years ago, I started making plans for a longer life than I used to anticipate, even though the incident I mentioned above only happened about three years ago. I often still experience disbelief that I am alive at this point, but have begun to live my life in a more forward-thinking way. I will graduate college with my BS in Human Resources this coming January, for example. Sure, it took twenty years longer than I originally thought it would, but I'm getting there. I'm also figuring out how to be a healthier person, one who is PTSD free, who is healed of codependency, and who truly believes that she deserves to have a happy life with good, solid relationships. And I'm looking at ways to give back to other survivors - ways to bring light out of the darkness of my own past. As one of my friends used to say, "It's all good!" - at least, it can be, if you live purposefully and work to make it good.
So I am celebrating myself this month. I made it to forty-one! How cool is that? I've come a long way and have accomplished a lot - even though I get frustrated at the pace sometimes - and I hope I still have a long way to go.
Resources:
Post Traumatic Stress Disorder DSM-IV Diagnosis and Criteria. Retrieved July 30, 2012 from http://www.mental-health-today.com/ptsd/dsm.htm.
It was the night of November 14th, 2009, when I stood in my abuser's kitchen after he had just tossed a plate at me, thrown his glass across the room, and ripped the silverware drawer out of the cabinet. He grabbed my left shoulder with one hand and held a knife in his other fist. A six-inch long blade might not sound like much, but when you expect it to plunge into your throat any minute, it looks pretty impressive. I'm not sure what stopped him from stabbing me at that moment; it certainly wasn't me. I didn't fight with him, didn't struggle, didn't try to take away the knife. All I did was look him in the eyes and say, "I'm not afraid of you." And strangely enough, I wasn't. Fear came later - the next desperate month was spent in a welter of fear. But in that threatening moment, I didn't feel anything at all.
Of course, this is not healthy in any way. I should have been afraid. Any sane person probably would have been. By the time this happened, he had already sexually assaulted me and had been verbally and emotionally abusing me for months. I knew he had a terrible temper. I had seen him destroy my belongings and throw pots and pans and books across the house. I had heard him threaten to rape other women, kill me, and then commit suicide. I had seen the hole in the wall by the front door where he had put a glass through the sheet-rock because he was angry at me for dating someone else after we broke up. I think I wasn't afraid because I honestly believed that I was meant to die young. A violent death seemed like the strange fulfillment of some long unspoken prophecy.
All this disclosure begs the question of why - why I believed I would die young, and why I am still surprised that I'm here today. Post-traumatic Stress Disorder seems to be the most logical answer. It is a feature of PTSD for survivors of violence to have a sense of a foreshortened future - Criterion C7 states that the surviving individual may not expect to have a marriage, a career, children, or to live a normal life-span. (DSM IV Diagnosis and Criteria: Post-traumatic Stress Disorder, 2012).
So here I am, forty-one years old, and feeling like I am very far behind on my life's goals. I think time got away from me because I kept expecting to die young. Sometimes it seemed like making efforts to accomplish things just wasn't worthwhile, because I wouldn't live to reap the rewards anyway. Logically, I know that this is a ridiculous mindset. No one knows when or how they will die. I certainly don't want to die - I am not suicidal and I do not take unnecessary risks with my life. About five years ago, I started making plans for a longer life than I used to anticipate, even though the incident I mentioned above only happened about three years ago. I often still experience disbelief that I am alive at this point, but have begun to live my life in a more forward-thinking way. I will graduate college with my BS in Human Resources this coming January, for example. Sure, it took twenty years longer than I originally thought it would, but I'm getting there. I'm also figuring out how to be a healthier person, one who is PTSD free, who is healed of codependency, and who truly believes that she deserves to have a happy life with good, solid relationships. And I'm looking at ways to give back to other survivors - ways to bring light out of the darkness of my own past. As one of my friends used to say, "It's all good!" - at least, it can be, if you live purposefully and work to make it good.
So I am celebrating myself this month. I made it to forty-one! How cool is that? I've come a long way and have accomplished a lot - even though I get frustrated at the pace sometimes - and I hope I still have a long way to go.
Resources:
Post Traumatic Stress Disorder DSM-IV Diagnosis and Criteria. Retrieved July 30, 2012 from http://www.mental-health-today.com/ptsd/dsm.htm.
Friday, May 18, 2012
All That I Am
Sometimes things happen that leave us questioning who we are, where we are on our path, and everything we thought we wanted or were meant to do with our lives. I had a moment like that this week. Something happened that left me questioning whether I am meant to help survivors of sexual and domestic violence. It left me wondering whether I am strong enough.
For many years now I've felt that the purpose of surviving the things I've lived through was so I could help others who have suffered. Then something happened and I realized how vulnerable I still am and I wondered who I was to think I had anything worthwhile to offer. Who am I to say healing is possible when I am still so wounded and weak?
I felt like a complete hypocrite, like I had been lying to myself about all that I am, all that I ever was, and all I intended to be. Tuesday morning was a very low point and by noon I was ready to give up the idea of serving survivors, speaking again, or getting my masters' degree and becoming a therapist. I felt broken and I really considered giving it all up - the blog, the work, the dreams. All of it - all that I am.
Then something else happened. At that low ebb, I received affirmation from an unexpected source - a lovely gift from a beautiful friend. She made me a wall hanging that represented a woman breaking free from the prison of her own mind, and she wrote me a letter telling me how much she appreciated my work for survivors and telling me that I am strong.
I didn't feel strong. I felt shattered. But her words were uplifting and healing at a time when I needed it most. I was reminded that I am not alone and that I don't always have to be strong. There will be times when I am vulnerable; the key is to surround myself with people who will not take advantage of that, people who respect me and will honor my boundaries. It is okay for me to have moments of fear, sadness, pain, or doubt. I can admit those emotions and move forward anyway. I don't have to be perfect.
How freeing it is to realize that and to feel - maybe for the first time - that all that I am is enough. Thanks, my friend; you know who you are. Your gift to me means more than I can express.
For many years now I've felt that the purpose of surviving the things I've lived through was so I could help others who have suffered. Then something happened and I realized how vulnerable I still am and I wondered who I was to think I had anything worthwhile to offer. Who am I to say healing is possible when I am still so wounded and weak?
I felt like a complete hypocrite, like I had been lying to myself about all that I am, all that I ever was, and all I intended to be. Tuesday morning was a very low point and by noon I was ready to give up the idea of serving survivors, speaking again, or getting my masters' degree and becoming a therapist. I felt broken and I really considered giving it all up - the blog, the work, the dreams. All of it - all that I am.
Then something else happened. At that low ebb, I received affirmation from an unexpected source - a lovely gift from a beautiful friend. She made me a wall hanging that represented a woman breaking free from the prison of her own mind, and she wrote me a letter telling me how much she appreciated my work for survivors and telling me that I am strong.
I didn't feel strong. I felt shattered. But her words were uplifting and healing at a time when I needed it most. I was reminded that I am not alone and that I don't always have to be strong. There will be times when I am vulnerable; the key is to surround myself with people who will not take advantage of that, people who respect me and will honor my boundaries. It is okay for me to have moments of fear, sadness, pain, or doubt. I can admit those emotions and move forward anyway. I don't have to be perfect.
How freeing it is to realize that and to feel - maybe for the first time - that all that I am is enough. Thanks, my friend; you know who you are. Your gift to me means more than I can express.
Thursday, November 17, 2011
Who do you think you are?
How well do you know yourself? I was faced with this question last week. No one really asked it of me, but circumstances forced me to ask it of myself. I had started walking one path and then found myself faced with choosing between two different directions and I was surprised by the choice I made. Maybe it was the right one, maybe not - only time will tell. I didn't expect myself to choose what I chose. Did I make that choice for me or for someone else? I still don't know - that's the kind of thing I never really know - but I know that my heart was speaking to me that day, and it wasn't entirely at odds with my mental process. Sometimes, the voice of the heart must be heard.
My problem is that I have spent a large portion of my life making the choices others wanted me to make. This continual selling of my identity in order to gain momentary peace has left me indecisive and uninformed about the reasons why I do the things I do. It also leaves me second-guessing every single decision I make and wondering if I made it from my own identity or someone else's. So why is it so hard to assume my own identity and give power to my inner authority? And why is it so easy to give my personal power away?
I have some ideas about that. Being raised in a very authoritarian environment was not conducive to learning how to make healthy choices. I've spoken about that here before and don't need to enumerate the ways in which my ability to choose was co-opted during my childhood. I think I could have recovered from that in time and with the independence of adulthood, but then the sexual assault happened, and that made dissent a fearful thing. With the word "no" came great pain, both physical and emotional. This was reinforced much later on by my abuser, who inflicted emotional damage each time I dared to disagree with him. Though I know intellectually that I can't give away my own power, I still find it difficult to make decisions and hold to them in the face of someone else's desires when they are in conflict with my own.
So now that I have finally awakened and understand that I have sold myself and my identity for the price of short-term peace, what do I do about it? How do I recover? I recognize that with this behavior I am avoiding the pain of the moment but inflicting pain that may last a lifetime. I am forty years old - I can't continue to lie to myself about improving my situation "tomorrow" or "next year" or "when I'm more ready." Regardless of age, the truth is that none of us are guaranteed any amount of time. There may not be a next year, or even a tomorrow. I may never be more ready than I am right now.
I have spoken here about this process before and have never come to any conclusions about how to help myself. At this point, I realize that no one can tell me how to get better. I have to take responsibility for choosing what is right for me and not what others want me to choose. I can do it by not making snap decisions, by thinking things through even when it is hard. I can recognize that momentary peace or gratification do not compensate for hours of regret or pain later on, and act accordingly. I can do these things...but will I? Yes, I promise myself that I will - starting now.
My problem is that I have spent a large portion of my life making the choices others wanted me to make. This continual selling of my identity in order to gain momentary peace has left me indecisive and uninformed about the reasons why I do the things I do. It also leaves me second-guessing every single decision I make and wondering if I made it from my own identity or someone else's. So why is it so hard to assume my own identity and give power to my inner authority? And why is it so easy to give my personal power away?
I have some ideas about that. Being raised in a very authoritarian environment was not conducive to learning how to make healthy choices. I've spoken about that here before and don't need to enumerate the ways in which my ability to choose was co-opted during my childhood. I think I could have recovered from that in time and with the independence of adulthood, but then the sexual assault happened, and that made dissent a fearful thing. With the word "no" came great pain, both physical and emotional. This was reinforced much later on by my abuser, who inflicted emotional damage each time I dared to disagree with him. Though I know intellectually that I can't give away my own power, I still find it difficult to make decisions and hold to them in the face of someone else's desires when they are in conflict with my own.
So now that I have finally awakened and understand that I have sold myself and my identity for the price of short-term peace, what do I do about it? How do I recover? I recognize that with this behavior I am avoiding the pain of the moment but inflicting pain that may last a lifetime. I am forty years old - I can't continue to lie to myself about improving my situation "tomorrow" or "next year" or "when I'm more ready." Regardless of age, the truth is that none of us are guaranteed any amount of time. There may not be a next year, or even a tomorrow. I may never be more ready than I am right now.
I have spoken here about this process before and have never come to any conclusions about how to help myself. At this point, I realize that no one can tell me how to get better. I have to take responsibility for choosing what is right for me and not what others want me to choose. I can do it by not making snap decisions, by thinking things through even when it is hard. I can recognize that momentary peace or gratification do not compensate for hours of regret or pain later on, and act accordingly. I can do these things...but will I? Yes, I promise myself that I will - starting now.
Friday, October 7, 2011
Stop Ignoring - Start Acting
Domestic violence isn’t easy to understand. From the outsiders' point of view, it just makes no sense that someone would stay with and continue to love and protect an abusive partner. From the insider's point of view, there's a whole host of fears interlaced with shame, hurt, and longing which keep us enmeshed in a web of deceit and pain. It is possible to love someone when you do not love their behaviors or actions, and love doesn't just go away because someone is cruel or abusive. For these reasons a culture of myth and secrecy has grown around domestic violence and society perpetuates these secrets and lies with comments like:
“It’s none of my business.”
“That’s between the two of them – it has nothing to do with me.”
“A man has the right to keep the peace in his own home.”
“It only happens every now and then, and only in lower class families.”
“She must like it, or she’d leave.”
“He says she provokes him.”
What would the world be like if we told the truth about domestic violence?
“I’m afraid for her safety.”
“I could do something to help.”
“No one has the right to harm someone else.”
“It can happen to anyone.”
“She doesn’t leave because there’s no one to help her, no one to keep her safe.”
“He should practice self-control instead of hitting when he’s angry.”
This October, commit to looking at domestic violence in a different way. Don’t turn a blind eye to the victims. Don’t ignore what you witness. Domestic violence happens to one in three women, and one in fifteen men. Chances are that you know someone right now who is suffering or has suffered. Ask what you can do to help. Here are some ways to start:
“I’m afraid for your safety, and for your kids.”
“It’s only going to get worse.”
“I’m here for you. What can I do to make this better?”
“I can help you find somewhere to stay.”
“You deserve better treatment than this.”
“Let’s make a safety plan for you.”
Get a list of the shelters and helping organizations in your area. The information is readily available with a quick Internet search. Get a list of phone numbers for crisis lines – 1-800-799-SAFE is a good place to start. Be willing to listen and be supportive, not judgmental. You don’t know what kind of hell the victim is living with – she may have been hearing for years that she isn’t worth helping, isn’t worth saving. She may believe it. Yours may be the voice of reason that cuts through the destruction in her life and makes her know that she is worthwhile and that someone cares. Stop ignoring. Start acting. Someone's life may depend on it.
“It’s none of my business.”
“That’s between the two of them – it has nothing to do with me.”
“A man has the right to keep the peace in his own home.”
“It only happens every now and then, and only in lower class families.”
“She must like it, or she’d leave.”
“He says she provokes him.”
What would the world be like if we told the truth about domestic violence?
“I’m afraid for her safety.”
“I could do something to help.”
“No one has the right to harm someone else.”
“It can happen to anyone.”
“She doesn’t leave because there’s no one to help her, no one to keep her safe.”
“He should practice self-control instead of hitting when he’s angry.”
This October, commit to looking at domestic violence in a different way. Don’t turn a blind eye to the victims. Don’t ignore what you witness. Domestic violence happens to one in three women, and one in fifteen men. Chances are that you know someone right now who is suffering or has suffered. Ask what you can do to help. Here are some ways to start:
“I’m afraid for your safety, and for your kids.”
“It’s only going to get worse.”
“I’m here for you. What can I do to make this better?”
“I can help you find somewhere to stay.”
“You deserve better treatment than this.”
“Let’s make a safety plan for you.”
Get a list of the shelters and helping organizations in your area. The information is readily available with a quick Internet search. Get a list of phone numbers for crisis lines – 1-800-799-SAFE is a good place to start. Be willing to listen and be supportive, not judgmental. You don’t know what kind of hell the victim is living with – she may have been hearing for years that she isn’t worth helping, isn’t worth saving. She may believe it. Yours may be the voice of reason that cuts through the destruction in her life and makes her know that she is worthwhile and that someone cares. Stop ignoring. Start acting. Someone's life may depend on it.
Sunday, October 2, 2011
Be the Change
"If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor."
~ Archbishop Desmond Tutu
"Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter."
~ Dr Martin Luther King, Jr.
Our culture is one that promotes violence. Turn on network TV at any point during prime-time and you're bound to see half a dozen murders, beatings, muggings, or rapes before the 11:00 news comes on. We are enured to violence. Once we have become desensitized, it is hard to care about the neighbor in the apartment next door, even when we hear her crying at one in the morning because her boyfriend just punched her in the mouth. We may see the bruises but until we feel them, the pain we witness is remote and doesn't have any impact. In the same way we are able to sit comfortably at home with a bowl of chips and salsa and watch news reports about the starving people in Somalia. Their pain is miles away - it is meaningless because it cannot affect us. It cannot touch us.
Our society happily enslaves millions of people just so we can have conveniences like ready-made clothing, designer-knock-off purses, and discount stores where we can pick up a case of beer anytime, day or night. If we stop to give thought to the plight of the ten year old workers in Indonesia who made our fake Prada bags, we often smugly state that they must be grateful for the money they earn. Never mind the fact that in some factories in some parts of the world, children whose thigh-bones are broken so they can't run away are forced to sit and sew those purses that we paid $30 for. Never mind the fact that workers the world over go home to starving families subsisting in tar-paper and tin shacks and know that even the money they earn with their eighteen hour work-days can't feed their kids and their aging parents too. We live as if it is only our comfort and needs that matter.
So what does this have to do with violence against women? After all, that's my usual subject. Well, in a word - everything. When we refuse to fight oppression, we give license to the oppressors. When we turn a blind eye to evil, we are propagating evil. When we ignore the neighbor who sits on her porch, staring blankly out through swollen, bruised eyelids because it isn't our place to say or do anything about her suffering, then we might as well throw the next punch.
October is domestic violence awareness month. I've thought for a while now about what I should post to help raise awareness, make my readers think about intimate partner abuse and what it does to people, but I confess that until this afternoon, I've had trouble deciding what to say. Not because I have run out of words; not because everything that there is to say has been said, but because it seems like an uphill battle and just now, I am really tired of fighting and climbing. I'm tired of trying to make a difference in a world that doesn't seem to give a damn. I'm tired of working to change attitudes and then watching commercials where women in bikinis are used to sell everything from cars to cheeseburgers as if their bodies were just another commodity to be bought, sold, or traded. But if those of us who have suffered do not use our experiences to bring light into the darkness, then who will? The media? The government? The church?
No - it is individual voices that begin to affect change. It is up to us - to me and to you - to raise our voices in solidarity until society can no longer ignore what we are saying. In every situation of injustice, if those of us who see and understand choose to remain silent, then we join the oppressors and the enemies of humanity. Your cause may not be the same as mine, but whatever you believe in, don't make the mistake of staying silent because it "isn't your place" to speak up. Speak up! Be heard! Do not be silent about the things that matter. Victims of all kinds need you, because their voices and their choices have been taken away. We must live the change we look for - if we don't, then who will?
~ Archbishop Desmond Tutu
"Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter."
~ Dr Martin Luther King, Jr.
Our culture is one that promotes violence. Turn on network TV at any point during prime-time and you're bound to see half a dozen murders, beatings, muggings, or rapes before the 11:00 news comes on. We are enured to violence. Once we have become desensitized, it is hard to care about the neighbor in the apartment next door, even when we hear her crying at one in the morning because her boyfriend just punched her in the mouth. We may see the bruises but until we feel them, the pain we witness is remote and doesn't have any impact. In the same way we are able to sit comfortably at home with a bowl of chips and salsa and watch news reports about the starving people in Somalia. Their pain is miles away - it is meaningless because it cannot affect us. It cannot touch us.
Our society happily enslaves millions of people just so we can have conveniences like ready-made clothing, designer-knock-off purses, and discount stores where we can pick up a case of beer anytime, day or night. If we stop to give thought to the plight of the ten year old workers in Indonesia who made our fake Prada bags, we often smugly state that they must be grateful for the money they earn. Never mind the fact that in some factories in some parts of the world, children whose thigh-bones are broken so they can't run away are forced to sit and sew those purses that we paid $30 for. Never mind the fact that workers the world over go home to starving families subsisting in tar-paper and tin shacks and know that even the money they earn with their eighteen hour work-days can't feed their kids and their aging parents too. We live as if it is only our comfort and needs that matter.
So what does this have to do with violence against women? After all, that's my usual subject. Well, in a word - everything. When we refuse to fight oppression, we give license to the oppressors. When we turn a blind eye to evil, we are propagating evil. When we ignore the neighbor who sits on her porch, staring blankly out through swollen, bruised eyelids because it isn't our place to say or do anything about her suffering, then we might as well throw the next punch.
October is domestic violence awareness month. I've thought for a while now about what I should post to help raise awareness, make my readers think about intimate partner abuse and what it does to people, but I confess that until this afternoon, I've had trouble deciding what to say. Not because I have run out of words; not because everything that there is to say has been said, but because it seems like an uphill battle and just now, I am really tired of fighting and climbing. I'm tired of trying to make a difference in a world that doesn't seem to give a damn. I'm tired of working to change attitudes and then watching commercials where women in bikinis are used to sell everything from cars to cheeseburgers as if their bodies were just another commodity to be bought, sold, or traded. But if those of us who have suffered do not use our experiences to bring light into the darkness, then who will? The media? The government? The church?
No - it is individual voices that begin to affect change. It is up to us - to me and to you - to raise our voices in solidarity until society can no longer ignore what we are saying. In every situation of injustice, if those of us who see and understand choose to remain silent, then we join the oppressors and the enemies of humanity. Your cause may not be the same as mine, but whatever you believe in, don't make the mistake of staying silent because it "isn't your place" to speak up. Speak up! Be heard! Do not be silent about the things that matter. Victims of all kinds need you, because their voices and their choices have been taken away. We must live the change we look for - if we don't, then who will?
Friday, April 15, 2011
A Disease of Darkness
In January of 2010, after the great exodus from my abuser’s home, I was alone one Saturday afternoon and I chose to spend it doing my laundry. At that time, I lived in an apartment with an on-site laundry-mat. Carrying my hamper, I stepped out onto the sidewalk and started past the other two apartments in my row. It was sprinkling rain and the air was damp and cold. As I approached unit 3, I could hear voices; as I got closer, there was the unmistakable sound of a fist striking flesh. I heard a woman’s short, startled scream and a man shout, “You can’t do this to me!” before he struck her again. I don't know what happened next, because I was swept away into a moment that had occurred back in November; a moment of trauma and pain that I would have preferred to forget.
I am huddled at the end of the sofa and he is looming over me, his fists pounding the back of the couch in front of my face. His voice, high-pitched in his fury, rings in my ears: You can’t do this to me! I am frozen, watching in horror as he stops hitting the couch and starts hitting me instead, first punching me in the forehead, and then striking the left side of my head again and again, on the temple and above my ear. There is a burgeoning explosion – fire blossoming white-yellow-orange-red. Pain radiates outward across my skull, curling on the edges of this neural flame. I clutch my hands to my head, covering my face, voicing a sharp, startled scream –
When I came to myself again, I was wet with rain, even though it was still just sprinkling. The hamper was overturned beside me and a few articles of clothing were lying on the sidewalk. I was clutching the left side of my head with one hand and guarding my face with the other. The only sound coming from apartment three was from the television, where some unseen salesman was hawking a new kind of furniture polish. I didn’t have to wonder what had happened – I knew: I had just suffered a flashback, a vivid recreation of past trauma. It was the first one I’d had related to the abusive relationship I had just left a couple of weeks before, and a definitive sign of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).
PTSD is best defined as a normal human reaction to an abnormal event. Many people are familiar with it as something suffered by combat-veterans; at one point, it was even called shell-shock. What many people don’t know is that anyone who suffers a life-threatening event, or actual or perceived threats to physical integrity, can develop Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. PTSD is characterized by feelings of intense horror, helplessness, or fear, re-experiencing distressingly vivid memories of the event (these are flashbacks), and sometimes, intense nightmares about the trauma. People with PTSD regularly avoid reminders of their trauma – these reminders are called triggers. They often show symptoms of increased arousal such as sleep difficulties, hypervigilance, irritability, and an exaggerated startle response. A diagnosis of PTSD is given if these symptoms are experienced for more than a month (RAINN, 2009). PTSD is a disease of darkness and helplessness, it traps and entangles you; your body is no longer yours to control. The fear engendered by flashbacks is almost indescribable – how dreadful to know that you are safe and yet to be unable to feel it, how awful to know that you are free from the danger but to re-experience that trauma again and again. Your body disengages from your will and you may even feel ghosts of the pain you once felt.
What happened to me that day on the sidewalk was a deep flashback, triggered by a fight between my neighbor’s daughter and son-in-law, who had moved in with her when they lost their home due to unemployment. I was unprepared for the swiftness of the symptoms though not unfamiliar with them – for years after the sexual assault that happened when I was a teenager, I had suffered and dealt with PTSD. I knew my triggers and I assiduously avoided them: pine-scented cleaner, the echoing sound of running water in a public restroom, adolescent male voices with no visible source, the taste of Dr. Pepper, and the smell of bourbon. But after the violence of my recent relationship, it appeared there were new triggers to be learned and dealt with. It was a depressing thought. I knew as well as anyone how debilitating PTSD can be – for me, it had led to a kind of quiet, social anguish that kept me cloistered at home and unable to work or even deal constructively with people at all. Things as simple as making telephone calls or paying bills had become an ordeal for me in the past, and it had taken a lot of conscious work to overcome the symptoms and be able to live my life again. The last thing I wanted was to have to go back through those days of darkness.
Soon after the flashback that January afternoon, I began experiencing nightmare-flashbacks of being trapped in a car with my abuser; snow pelted down and the sensation of reckless speed made my skin crawl. He screamed, pounding the dash and the windshield, threw wild punches at me, connecting with my mouth, my jaw, my shoulder. Sometimes the dreams were not memories, but were new fears being expressed during sleep – I would be moving through my day and would look up to see him, standing somewhere near, watching me… Probably the most horrific of these night-terrors were the ones in which I was frozen and unable to move as he slid into bed beside me; I could actually feel his body against mine and would awaken with my heart pounding and my throat aching from screams I could not voice.
Fortunately, I had developed some good coping mechanisms during my struggle with PTSD. For example, I had learned how to ease myself out of a flashback by concentrating on the ocean-sounds of my breath as air moved in and out of my body. This grounded me and helped me to focus on what was real. Another tool was counting down from 10 to 1 as I inhaled and exhaled deliberately, controlling and calming my breathing. As the weeks and months went by, the flashbacks became fewer, though they have not completely gone away even now, over a year later. I am still learning my new triggers; the sound of a man shouting, driving in snow, and the sound of breaking glass to name just a few. They are little things, but they plunge me down into darkness, and it is hard to climb back up.
Women who suffer sexual assault are at high risk of developing PTSD. In the month after a rape or assault, 94% of women report symptoms of PTSD. Nine months after a rape or assault, 30% of those women are still experiencing full-blown Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (US Dept. of Veterans Affairs, 2007). Throughout their lifetimes, 11% of women who survived rape will continue to experience PTSD. So does that mean that there is no cure?
No – it just means that our society doesn’t always know how to help sufferers of PTSD. However, there is help if you are experiencing symptoms. You should talk to a mental health professional. The treatment you receive could range from talk therapy to cognitive behavioral therapy, to EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) to medications. Your health care professional should be able to help you discover the best treatment for you, but be careful to choose someone who has experience in dealing with survivors of rape and assault, and the treatment of PTSD in survivors. Not all physicians have the knowledge needed to help you find the best treatment for your PTSD; the first doctor I spoke to about my symptoms wanted me to take Zoloft. I refused; I wasn’t depressed. I was traumatized. I opted instead to begin with talk-therapy, which I found helpful.
I am not yet 100% PTSD free, but it is possible to be. There are some great resources out there for knowing how to help yourself, but one of the most encouraging ones I’ve found is Heal My PTSD, a website founded and managed by Michele Rosenthal. While she is not a survivor of sexual assault, Michele’s struggles with PTSD and her subsequent healing can provide a wealth of inspiration and information for anyone with PTSD. So – help is available, and there is hope. This knowledge is what I hold onto when the darkness rises – and it does, more often than I care to admit - like last night, for example.
I can’t move. It’s the first thing I notice – my body is heavy and I feel as if some invisible force has immobilized me. Behind the heavy curtains I can hear furtive movements – the scratching of rats inside a wall. But it isn’t rats…rats can’t speak – rats can’t whisper threats, can’t urge each other to do unspeakable things. I am frozen in place and the harsh words echo inside my brain: Let’s get her. The curtains swirl and then I see hands, pale in the gloom, hands reaching and grabbing and tearing at me…
Though I know that this moment ended almost twenty-six years ago, I am THERE, I am pinned and used and broken; though I try, I cannot escape. Almost thirty years later, I am still trying, but that’s what surviving is about – you never give up.
Hope:
http://www.rainn.org/
http://www.healmyptsd.com/
http://www.hopeforhealing.org/
Resources:
Rape Abuse Incest National Network (RAINN). 2009. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Retrieved April 15, 2011 from http://www.rainn.org/get-information/effects-of-sexual-assault/post-traumatic-stress-disorder
US Department of Veterans Affairs. 2007. National Center for PTSD: Sexual Assault against Females. Retrieved April 15, 2011 from http://www.ptsd.va.gov/public/pages/sexual-assault-females.asp
I am huddled at the end of the sofa and he is looming over me, his fists pounding the back of the couch in front of my face. His voice, high-pitched in his fury, rings in my ears: You can’t do this to me! I am frozen, watching in horror as he stops hitting the couch and starts hitting me instead, first punching me in the forehead, and then striking the left side of my head again and again, on the temple and above my ear. There is a burgeoning explosion – fire blossoming white-yellow-orange-red. Pain radiates outward across my skull, curling on the edges of this neural flame. I clutch my hands to my head, covering my face, voicing a sharp, startled scream –
When I came to myself again, I was wet with rain, even though it was still just sprinkling. The hamper was overturned beside me and a few articles of clothing were lying on the sidewalk. I was clutching the left side of my head with one hand and guarding my face with the other. The only sound coming from apartment three was from the television, where some unseen salesman was hawking a new kind of furniture polish. I didn’t have to wonder what had happened – I knew: I had just suffered a flashback, a vivid recreation of past trauma. It was the first one I’d had related to the abusive relationship I had just left a couple of weeks before, and a definitive sign of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).
PTSD is best defined as a normal human reaction to an abnormal event. Many people are familiar with it as something suffered by combat-veterans; at one point, it was even called shell-shock. What many people don’t know is that anyone who suffers a life-threatening event, or actual or perceived threats to physical integrity, can develop Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. PTSD is characterized by feelings of intense horror, helplessness, or fear, re-experiencing distressingly vivid memories of the event (these are flashbacks), and sometimes, intense nightmares about the trauma. People with PTSD regularly avoid reminders of their trauma – these reminders are called triggers. They often show symptoms of increased arousal such as sleep difficulties, hypervigilance, irritability, and an exaggerated startle response. A diagnosis of PTSD is given if these symptoms are experienced for more than a month (RAINN, 2009). PTSD is a disease of darkness and helplessness, it traps and entangles you; your body is no longer yours to control. The fear engendered by flashbacks is almost indescribable – how dreadful to know that you are safe and yet to be unable to feel it, how awful to know that you are free from the danger but to re-experience that trauma again and again. Your body disengages from your will and you may even feel ghosts of the pain you once felt.
What happened to me that day on the sidewalk was a deep flashback, triggered by a fight between my neighbor’s daughter and son-in-law, who had moved in with her when they lost their home due to unemployment. I was unprepared for the swiftness of the symptoms though not unfamiliar with them – for years after the sexual assault that happened when I was a teenager, I had suffered and dealt with PTSD. I knew my triggers and I assiduously avoided them: pine-scented cleaner, the echoing sound of running water in a public restroom, adolescent male voices with no visible source, the taste of Dr. Pepper, and the smell of bourbon. But after the violence of my recent relationship, it appeared there were new triggers to be learned and dealt with. It was a depressing thought. I knew as well as anyone how debilitating PTSD can be – for me, it had led to a kind of quiet, social anguish that kept me cloistered at home and unable to work or even deal constructively with people at all. Things as simple as making telephone calls or paying bills had become an ordeal for me in the past, and it had taken a lot of conscious work to overcome the symptoms and be able to live my life again. The last thing I wanted was to have to go back through those days of darkness.
Soon after the flashback that January afternoon, I began experiencing nightmare-flashbacks of being trapped in a car with my abuser; snow pelted down and the sensation of reckless speed made my skin crawl. He screamed, pounding the dash and the windshield, threw wild punches at me, connecting with my mouth, my jaw, my shoulder. Sometimes the dreams were not memories, but were new fears being expressed during sleep – I would be moving through my day and would look up to see him, standing somewhere near, watching me… Probably the most horrific of these night-terrors were the ones in which I was frozen and unable to move as he slid into bed beside me; I could actually feel his body against mine and would awaken with my heart pounding and my throat aching from screams I could not voice.
Fortunately, I had developed some good coping mechanisms during my struggle with PTSD. For example, I had learned how to ease myself out of a flashback by concentrating on the ocean-sounds of my breath as air moved in and out of my body. This grounded me and helped me to focus on what was real. Another tool was counting down from 10 to 1 as I inhaled and exhaled deliberately, controlling and calming my breathing. As the weeks and months went by, the flashbacks became fewer, though they have not completely gone away even now, over a year later. I am still learning my new triggers; the sound of a man shouting, driving in snow, and the sound of breaking glass to name just a few. They are little things, but they plunge me down into darkness, and it is hard to climb back up.
Women who suffer sexual assault are at high risk of developing PTSD. In the month after a rape or assault, 94% of women report symptoms of PTSD. Nine months after a rape or assault, 30% of those women are still experiencing full-blown Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (US Dept. of Veterans Affairs, 2007). Throughout their lifetimes, 11% of women who survived rape will continue to experience PTSD. So does that mean that there is no cure?
No – it just means that our society doesn’t always know how to help sufferers of PTSD. However, there is help if you are experiencing symptoms. You should talk to a mental health professional. The treatment you receive could range from talk therapy to cognitive behavioral therapy, to EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) to medications. Your health care professional should be able to help you discover the best treatment for you, but be careful to choose someone who has experience in dealing with survivors of rape and assault, and the treatment of PTSD in survivors. Not all physicians have the knowledge needed to help you find the best treatment for your PTSD; the first doctor I spoke to about my symptoms wanted me to take Zoloft. I refused; I wasn’t depressed. I was traumatized. I opted instead to begin with talk-therapy, which I found helpful.
I am not yet 100% PTSD free, but it is possible to be. There are some great resources out there for knowing how to help yourself, but one of the most encouraging ones I’ve found is Heal My PTSD, a website founded and managed by Michele Rosenthal. While she is not a survivor of sexual assault, Michele’s struggles with PTSD and her subsequent healing can provide a wealth of inspiration and information for anyone with PTSD. So – help is available, and there is hope. This knowledge is what I hold onto when the darkness rises – and it does, more often than I care to admit - like last night, for example.
I can’t move. It’s the first thing I notice – my body is heavy and I feel as if some invisible force has immobilized me. Behind the heavy curtains I can hear furtive movements – the scratching of rats inside a wall. But it isn’t rats…rats can’t speak – rats can’t whisper threats, can’t urge each other to do unspeakable things. I am frozen in place and the harsh words echo inside my brain: Let’s get her. The curtains swirl and then I see hands, pale in the gloom, hands reaching and grabbing and tearing at me…
Though I know that this moment ended almost twenty-six years ago, I am THERE, I am pinned and used and broken; though I try, I cannot escape. Almost thirty years later, I am still trying, but that’s what surviving is about – you never give up.
Hope:
http://www.rainn.org/
http://www.healmyptsd.com/
http://www.hopeforhealing.org/
Resources:
Rape Abuse Incest National Network (RAINN). 2009. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Retrieved April 15, 2011 from http://www.rainn.org/get-information/effects-of-sexual-assault/post-traumatic-stress-disorder
US Department of Veterans Affairs. 2007. National Center for PTSD: Sexual Assault against Females. Retrieved April 15, 2011 from http://www.ptsd.va.gov/public/pages/sexual-assault-females.asp
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
Holistic Healing
As a survivor of sexual violence, I spend a lot of time thinking about and working toward healing. Usually when I speak about being healed, I'm looking at it from an emotional/mental/spiritual viewpoint. Because most of my hurts are spiritual and emotional, I tend to focus on those, but I’ve noticed lately that my body also responds to these emotional hurts. Case in point: on the anniversary of the first time my ex-partner hit me, I developed a terrible headache centered on the left side of my head. It corresponded to the same area where he punched me last year. This psychosomatic pain was no less real than the pain I experienced when he first hit me. I had headaches for a week both times. This made me think about my body and how physical health is related to emotional health.
Most of the folks who know me know that I’ve had a long-term struggle with obesity. In 2007, I began working hard to lose weight and become healthy. Over the course of two years, I lost 130 pounds. It wasn’t easy, but it was definitely worthwhile. Through the process, I learned that I was worth fighting for, and that I could accomplish great things if I tried. This summer, I began struggling again with weight gain. The stress of obtaining an order of protection against my abuser took its toll and I know that I used food to help me cope. I gained 20 pounds from the end of May when I filed for the order. Again, here is this apparent correlation between the physical body and the emotions. So my question today is this: can the mind truly be healed if the body is struggling? Can the body be healthy if the spirit is suffering?
I will be searching for the answer. In the meanwhile, it is obvious to me that I must seek healing for both parts of myself as an integrated whole; body and mind must be healed in order for me to be the healthy, complete person I want to be.
Most of the folks who know me know that I’ve had a long-term struggle with obesity. In 2007, I began working hard to lose weight and become healthy. Over the course of two years, I lost 130 pounds. It wasn’t easy, but it was definitely worthwhile. Through the process, I learned that I was worth fighting for, and that I could accomplish great things if I tried. This summer, I began struggling again with weight gain. The stress of obtaining an order of protection against my abuser took its toll and I know that I used food to help me cope. I gained 20 pounds from the end of May when I filed for the order. Again, here is this apparent correlation between the physical body and the emotions. So my question today is this: can the mind truly be healed if the body is struggling? Can the body be healthy if the spirit is suffering?
I will be searching for the answer. In the meanwhile, it is obvious to me that I must seek healing for both parts of myself as an integrated whole; body and mind must be healed in order for me to be the healthy, complete person I want to be.
Tuesday, December 7, 2010
Voices of Hope
I'm happy to announce that I had another appearance on Voices of Hope on BlogTalkRadio. If you'd like to listen in, the podcast is availble here:
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/voicesofhope/2010/12/07/voices-of-hope-lunch-buffet-with-amy-ramsey
Hope for Healing.org, the parent non-profit of Voices of Hope is doing great work for survivors - check out their website at http://www.hopeforhealing.org/. Today, we talked about how to deal with the holidays as a survivor of domestic violence or sexual assault, and how these problems are compounded by PTSD. Listen in for some tips on how to keep yourself emotionally and physically safe as you prepare for your holiday.
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/voicesofhope/2010/12/07/voices-of-hope-lunch-buffet-with-amy-ramsey
Hope for Healing.org, the parent non-profit of Voices of Hope is doing great work for survivors - check out their website at http://www.hopeforhealing.org/. Today, we talked about how to deal with the holidays as a survivor of domestic violence or sexual assault, and how these problems are compounded by PTSD. Listen in for some tips on how to keep yourself emotionally and physically safe as you prepare for your holiday.
Monday, August 23, 2010
Steps on the Journey: The meaning and purpose of forgiving, and where I am now
Forgiving is a concept that should be at the forefront of the Christian mind. God commands us to forgive the people who do us wrong. Because he offers us forgiveness, he wants us to extend that kind of grace - in other words, in order to be forgiven, we must first forgive. It's no secret that God doesn't appreciate a closed, hardened heart. He wants his followers to be open, to be loving, and to be filled with grace. Among other things, Christ admonished people to turn the other cheek when someone struck them and he also said that if someone forced you to walk one mile carrying his goods, you should -- without hesitation or complaint -- walk a second mile, too. How do we reconcile this teaching with our own hurts and wounds crying out for healing? What do we do with the anger, with the fear, with the sorrow that we feel because of an injury we suffered at someone else's hands?
I don't know about you, but it seems unjust to me to be commanded to forgive and to let things go. I mean, really! I want to stand up and shout to God -- "Hey, wait a minute! Don't you remember what I suffered? Don't you remember how this person hurt me? Don't you remember the awful things he said to me, the way he tore me down? Don't you remember his fists? Well, if you don't, I do! I won't quickly forget the way it felt when he punched me in the head, the way that fire blossomed inside my skull -- white-yellow-orange-red -- an explosion that I STILL SEE when I close my eyes at night. I won't forget the week afterwards when I was dizzy and half-sick with pain and fear that it would happen again. And I won't forget the way he treated me, the way he screamed at me, the way he threatened to hurt other people so I would submit to him. So don't ask me to forgive! I won't and I can't, and it isn't fair of you to expect it!"
But then I think about the cross. I know...I know...you don't want to hear it. Well, neither do I when I'm angry, but hey, as a Christian, I have to remember what Jesus did for me. And there's that nagging line that he said while being crucified -- "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." Oh... I hear that line and the flames of my anger are dampened. No, nothing that my abuser did to me is lessened or changed by it, but I am changed. No Christian can be unchanged by those words! It turns us on our heads, makes us do a 180, and reminds us that we have a standard of behavior to strive for, though we know we'll never achieve it.
So -- what do we do with forgiveness? What is it, exactly? Does it really mean just forgetting about what happened and treating the people who hurt us as if they are still our friends? Does it mean accepting pain over and over, without trying to defend or protect ourselves? Does it really mean turning the other cheek and walking that extra mile?
Forgiveness is a difficult concept for most people. It belongs to a family of words that are generally considered synonymous with one another -- forgiveness, pardon, excuse, and condone are often used interchangeably, but there are differences in their individual definitions. Let's examine each word and its meaning more closely.
Excuse: To make allowance for; to overlook.
Condone: To overlook or disregard an offense without protest or censure; to grant tacit approval by turning the other way.
Pardon: To release from penalty; to allow an offense to pass without punishment.
Forgive: To renounce anger or resentment against another person.
Okay - it's obvious that each of these terms is similar, but it is also obvious that there are some differences. We aren't asked to make excuses for people who hurt us. We are not asked to overlook or make allowances for the harm they caused. We are certainly not asked to condone evil or hurtful behavior - Christ didn't; in the temple when the moneychangers were causing harm to the people, Christ didn't step in and say "I forgive you, go in peace." He came in like a whirlwind and forced them out, thereby ending their ability to cause harm - you wouldn't catch Jesus condoning evil in anyone, or making excuses for it and allowing it to continue. Pardoning and forgiving are the terms we are left with. Let's think about them for a moment.
Forgiving is renouncing anger or resentment against another person, and pardoning is deciding that there need be no repayment for the wrongs. In my case, I found that I needed to examine my feelings about my abuser and acknowledge the hurts he had caused. The wounds caused by months of being told that I had no rights, of being used for gratification with no thought for my own needs or wants, the way he used me financially, of being told that my emotions and feelings didn't matter had to be looked at and dealt with. The physical and sexual assaults also had to be acknowledged and dealt with. The threats to others that he used to manipulate me into doing what he wanted and staying with him had to be brought out into the light. And that meant examining my actions also, looking at my own behaviors and trying to figure out where I went wrong, where I allowed him to have access to my inner life, and where I enabled him to cause me more harm by forgiving over and over without trying to protect and defend myself. I didn't just turn the other cheek, I effectively opened my arms and said, "here I am, abuse me." I didn't just walk the two miles with this man; I walked two hundred. And I had so much unresolved anger toward myself that my anger toward him was dwarfed by it -- like a campfire swallowed by a conflagration.
I was appalled and overwhelmed by my rage. Not the rage I felt toward him, which I believe was a normal human reaction. But the rage I felt toward myself frightened me. I didn't know what to do with it, until I remembered that God also commanded us to love our neighbors as we love ourselves. Not more than we love ourselves, and certainly not less, but as much as we love ourselves. The inverse of that implies that we actually love ourselves.
Love myself! What an idea. I did not deserve to be loved. After all, I let this abusive person come into my life, allowed him access to my innermost chamber of self, loved him openly and completely, and then stayed when he began to hurt me. I stayed when he told me he didn't love me. I stayed when he screamed at me that I had ruined his life. I stayed when he forced me to have sex by threatening to harm himself and others if I refused. I stayed when he accused me of infidelity and beat me. I stayed -- how could I possibly love myself after that?
I didn't know what to do with the rage and the self blame. Sometimes, I still don't. I prayed about it, but honestly, it was even hard to pray. I hated myself so much that I had a hard time coming to God. I felt unclean. Not just because of the things my abuser did to me, though certainly I felt stained by his actions, but because I had made such horrible choices and because I was so angry. I felt unworthy of God's love. But God spoke to me in a lot of ways, even though I couldn't hear him in prayer. He spoke through friends, through nature, through reading. His voice and presence were with me. And he told me that his love is offered by his grace, not by anything I do to deserve it. Therefore, nothing I do can separate me from his love; since I didn't earn it, I cannot unearn it. So I accepted his love, but I still could not love myself. God kept on talking, though. He always does. One morning, I remembered Peter and his vision of the animals being lowered in a sheet, and being told to take and eat what he wanted. Peter protested that as a good Jew, he would eat nothing unclean, and that's when God asked him, "Who are you to call unclean what I have made clean?"
So who am I? Here I am, calling myself damaged goods, hating myself for my anger and for my helplessness, and God gently reminded me that he has already cleansed and repaired me. Sure, I made bad choices. But God didn't hate me for it, and he didn't find me less clean for having stayed in a relationship that was unhealthy. He renewed me, and in his eyes, there were no stains. So, I began to release the anger I felt toward myself. I know I'm not perfect, so why did I expect myself to be? I formally granted myself pardon for having failed in my judgment, for having been involved with him in the first place, and for having stayed. That last part was the hardest. I still choke on it, sometimes, but I'm working through it.
With self-pardon came the realization that I was now healthy enough to begin dealing with the idea of forgiving my abuser. I had already seen through Christ's example at the temple that I could not condone his evil. I could not turn a blind eye to the fact that he hurt others before he hurt me, and that he would go on to hurt others after me. He used the fact that he was a pastor to get close to me in the first place; I worried that he would do that again. I don't even want to think about the people he might have hurt this way in the past. So I could not be a part of enabling his future abuses, and I could not condone his past abuse. What I could do was release the anger I felt toward him for using me, for taking my love and giving nothing but pain in return.
There is no magic button that you press in order to forgive someone. It is not something you feel, but something you do. Like love, forgiveness is a verb (or should be!). When I began working to forgive my abuser, I sometimes repeated the words "I forgive you" twenty or thirty times a day. Every time I thought of him with anger, I would say his name aloud and say, "I forgive you." I found myself repeating it over and over, especially when I would pass him on the street or when he would call me, as he often did during that first month after I left him. I began to realize that it wasn't healthy for me to have contact with him and that his reasons for wanting to talk to me were also unhealthy, and so I blocked him from calling me any further. It was hard to do that because I wasn't sure that it followed with the idea of the second mile, but after thinking how far I had walked with him already, I decided that it was in both our best interests to cut off contact. After all, Christ said walk the second mile, not the thousandth. And he said turn the other cheek, but he did not say, "offer yourself as a sacrifice."
I worked on forgiveness during those months and made it an active part of my day. Though my abuser began stalking me, I still worked on forgiveness. There was a time of deep confusion as I tried to reconcile the ideas of forgiving and pardoning with that of self-protection. It was difficult to make the decision to seek an order of protection, but I did it for two reasons; one, I knew I had a responsibility to myself and my children to make sure we were safe; two, I knew that I had a greater responsibility to make sure my abuser couldn't easily abuse again, and the PO was the first step in that process. I reread the story of Christ and the moneychangers and remembered that it was not okay to enable someone to continue to cause harm.
This morning, I was on Facebook before I came in to work and found photos that a friend of mine had posted. One of the pictures was of my abuser. Six months ago, if I had run across his picture, I would have been triggered - I'd have had an episode of PTSD and would have been miserable. And I'd have been angry, I admit it. This morning, I looked at the photo that had popped up in my stream and I felt nothing. Not anger, not rage, not hatred. Not even fear. I felt nothing. I moved on and went about my day. That's what forgiveness is -- you don't have to revisit the relationship or let the person who hurt you back in your life. You are simply renouncing your anger and resentment, you are refusing to carry that burden or feel it's effects. You are freeing yourself from the prison of rage and tortured remembrance. If you act from that point, you know for sure you aren't acting for the sake of revenge, you are only doing what you have to do. Your motives are right and pure. That's where I am now, and I feel pretty good about that.
So the purpose of forgiving is clear; it is something we do to free ourselves from anger. It is incredibly healing to release the rage and resentment and move forward without it. And you've seen where I am in my journey - I've forgiven my abuser, though I will never condone what he did, and I will do my best to make sure no one else is hurt by him. I have also mostly forgiven myself, a much harder task; when I feel my self-resentment and hatred building, I work at releasing it. Forgiveness doesn't just happen on it's own - it's a choice we make. Forgiveness is something we should offer in an emulation of God's grace. The person we forgive doesn't have to deserve it -- after all, do any of us really deserve God's love or grace?
I don't know about you, but it seems unjust to me to be commanded to forgive and to let things go. I mean, really! I want to stand up and shout to God -- "Hey, wait a minute! Don't you remember what I suffered? Don't you remember how this person hurt me? Don't you remember the awful things he said to me, the way he tore me down? Don't you remember his fists? Well, if you don't, I do! I won't quickly forget the way it felt when he punched me in the head, the way that fire blossomed inside my skull -- white-yellow-orange-red -- an explosion that I STILL SEE when I close my eyes at night. I won't forget the week afterwards when I was dizzy and half-sick with pain and fear that it would happen again. And I won't forget the way he treated me, the way he screamed at me, the way he threatened to hurt other people so I would submit to him. So don't ask me to forgive! I won't and I can't, and it isn't fair of you to expect it!"
But then I think about the cross. I know...I know...you don't want to hear it. Well, neither do I when I'm angry, but hey, as a Christian, I have to remember what Jesus did for me. And there's that nagging line that he said while being crucified -- "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." Oh... I hear that line and the flames of my anger are dampened. No, nothing that my abuser did to me is lessened or changed by it, but I am changed. No Christian can be unchanged by those words! It turns us on our heads, makes us do a 180, and reminds us that we have a standard of behavior to strive for, though we know we'll never achieve it.
So -- what do we do with forgiveness? What is it, exactly? Does it really mean just forgetting about what happened and treating the people who hurt us as if they are still our friends? Does it mean accepting pain over and over, without trying to defend or protect ourselves? Does it really mean turning the other cheek and walking that extra mile?
Forgiveness is a difficult concept for most people. It belongs to a family of words that are generally considered synonymous with one another -- forgiveness, pardon, excuse, and condone are often used interchangeably, but there are differences in their individual definitions. Let's examine each word and its meaning more closely.
Excuse: To make allowance for; to overlook.
Condone: To overlook or disregard an offense without protest or censure; to grant tacit approval by turning the other way.
Pardon: To release from penalty; to allow an offense to pass without punishment.
Forgive: To renounce anger or resentment against another person.
Okay - it's obvious that each of these terms is similar, but it is also obvious that there are some differences. We aren't asked to make excuses for people who hurt us. We are not asked to overlook or make allowances for the harm they caused. We are certainly not asked to condone evil or hurtful behavior - Christ didn't; in the temple when the moneychangers were causing harm to the people, Christ didn't step in and say "I forgive you, go in peace." He came in like a whirlwind and forced them out, thereby ending their ability to cause harm - you wouldn't catch Jesus condoning evil in anyone, or making excuses for it and allowing it to continue. Pardoning and forgiving are the terms we are left with. Let's think about them for a moment.
Forgiving is renouncing anger or resentment against another person, and pardoning is deciding that there need be no repayment for the wrongs. In my case, I found that I needed to examine my feelings about my abuser and acknowledge the hurts he had caused. The wounds caused by months of being told that I had no rights, of being used for gratification with no thought for my own needs or wants, the way he used me financially, of being told that my emotions and feelings didn't matter had to be looked at and dealt with. The physical and sexual assaults also had to be acknowledged and dealt with. The threats to others that he used to manipulate me into doing what he wanted and staying with him had to be brought out into the light. And that meant examining my actions also, looking at my own behaviors and trying to figure out where I went wrong, where I allowed him to have access to my inner life, and where I enabled him to cause me more harm by forgiving over and over without trying to protect and defend myself. I didn't just turn the other cheek, I effectively opened my arms and said, "here I am, abuse me." I didn't just walk the two miles with this man; I walked two hundred. And I had so much unresolved anger toward myself that my anger toward him was dwarfed by it -- like a campfire swallowed by a conflagration.
I was appalled and overwhelmed by my rage. Not the rage I felt toward him, which I believe was a normal human reaction. But the rage I felt toward myself frightened me. I didn't know what to do with it, until I remembered that God also commanded us to love our neighbors as we love ourselves. Not more than we love ourselves, and certainly not less, but as much as we love ourselves. The inverse of that implies that we actually love ourselves.
Love myself! What an idea. I did not deserve to be loved. After all, I let this abusive person come into my life, allowed him access to my innermost chamber of self, loved him openly and completely, and then stayed when he began to hurt me. I stayed when he told me he didn't love me. I stayed when he screamed at me that I had ruined his life. I stayed when he forced me to have sex by threatening to harm himself and others if I refused. I stayed when he accused me of infidelity and beat me. I stayed -- how could I possibly love myself after that?
I didn't know what to do with the rage and the self blame. Sometimes, I still don't. I prayed about it, but honestly, it was even hard to pray. I hated myself so much that I had a hard time coming to God. I felt unclean. Not just because of the things my abuser did to me, though certainly I felt stained by his actions, but because I had made such horrible choices and because I was so angry. I felt unworthy of God's love. But God spoke to me in a lot of ways, even though I couldn't hear him in prayer. He spoke through friends, through nature, through reading. His voice and presence were with me. And he told me that his love is offered by his grace, not by anything I do to deserve it. Therefore, nothing I do can separate me from his love; since I didn't earn it, I cannot unearn it. So I accepted his love, but I still could not love myself. God kept on talking, though. He always does. One morning, I remembered Peter and his vision of the animals being lowered in a sheet, and being told to take and eat what he wanted. Peter protested that as a good Jew, he would eat nothing unclean, and that's when God asked him, "Who are you to call unclean what I have made clean?"
So who am I? Here I am, calling myself damaged goods, hating myself for my anger and for my helplessness, and God gently reminded me that he has already cleansed and repaired me. Sure, I made bad choices. But God didn't hate me for it, and he didn't find me less clean for having stayed in a relationship that was unhealthy. He renewed me, and in his eyes, there were no stains. So, I began to release the anger I felt toward myself. I know I'm not perfect, so why did I expect myself to be? I formally granted myself pardon for having failed in my judgment, for having been involved with him in the first place, and for having stayed. That last part was the hardest. I still choke on it, sometimes, but I'm working through it.
With self-pardon came the realization that I was now healthy enough to begin dealing with the idea of forgiving my abuser. I had already seen through Christ's example at the temple that I could not condone his evil. I could not turn a blind eye to the fact that he hurt others before he hurt me, and that he would go on to hurt others after me. He used the fact that he was a pastor to get close to me in the first place; I worried that he would do that again. I don't even want to think about the people he might have hurt this way in the past. So I could not be a part of enabling his future abuses, and I could not condone his past abuse. What I could do was release the anger I felt toward him for using me, for taking my love and giving nothing but pain in return.
There is no magic button that you press in order to forgive someone. It is not something you feel, but something you do. Like love, forgiveness is a verb (or should be!). When I began working to forgive my abuser, I sometimes repeated the words "I forgive you" twenty or thirty times a day. Every time I thought of him with anger, I would say his name aloud and say, "I forgive you." I found myself repeating it over and over, especially when I would pass him on the street or when he would call me, as he often did during that first month after I left him. I began to realize that it wasn't healthy for me to have contact with him and that his reasons for wanting to talk to me were also unhealthy, and so I blocked him from calling me any further. It was hard to do that because I wasn't sure that it followed with the idea of the second mile, but after thinking how far I had walked with him already, I decided that it was in both our best interests to cut off contact. After all, Christ said walk the second mile, not the thousandth. And he said turn the other cheek, but he did not say, "offer yourself as a sacrifice."
I worked on forgiveness during those months and made it an active part of my day. Though my abuser began stalking me, I still worked on forgiveness. There was a time of deep confusion as I tried to reconcile the ideas of forgiving and pardoning with that of self-protection. It was difficult to make the decision to seek an order of protection, but I did it for two reasons; one, I knew I had a responsibility to myself and my children to make sure we were safe; two, I knew that I had a greater responsibility to make sure my abuser couldn't easily abuse again, and the PO was the first step in that process. I reread the story of Christ and the moneychangers and remembered that it was not okay to enable someone to continue to cause harm.
This morning, I was on Facebook before I came in to work and found photos that a friend of mine had posted. One of the pictures was of my abuser. Six months ago, if I had run across his picture, I would have been triggered - I'd have had an episode of PTSD and would have been miserable. And I'd have been angry, I admit it. This morning, I looked at the photo that had popped up in my stream and I felt nothing. Not anger, not rage, not hatred. Not even fear. I felt nothing. I moved on and went about my day. That's what forgiveness is -- you don't have to revisit the relationship or let the person who hurt you back in your life. You are simply renouncing your anger and resentment, you are refusing to carry that burden or feel it's effects. You are freeing yourself from the prison of rage and tortured remembrance. If you act from that point, you know for sure you aren't acting for the sake of revenge, you are only doing what you have to do. Your motives are right and pure. That's where I am now, and I feel pretty good about that.
So the purpose of forgiving is clear; it is something we do to free ourselves from anger. It is incredibly healing to release the rage and resentment and move forward without it. And you've seen where I am in my journey - I've forgiven my abuser, though I will never condone what he did, and I will do my best to make sure no one else is hurt by him. I have also mostly forgiven myself, a much harder task; when I feel my self-resentment and hatred building, I work at releasing it. Forgiveness doesn't just happen on it's own - it's a choice we make. Forgiveness is something we should offer in an emulation of God's grace. The person we forgive doesn't have to deserve it -- after all, do any of us really deserve God's love or grace?
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Finding Healing
Recognizing and Naming Abuse
Those of you who read this blog know that I recently experienced an abusive relationship. During the time when I was involved with this man, I was so numbed by the emotional pain he inflicted that when the physical violence started, it was almost a relief. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t like being hurt. It was a relief because I was finally able to say, “Yes, this relationship really is unhealthy, he really is an abuser.” This knowledge gave me the ability to take action for myself and to finally leave the relationship, though it took me over a month to break free. Recognizing abuse for what it is can be very empowering; it certainly was for me. Once I named his abuse – emotional, physical, and sexual – I was able to release myself from that cycle and begin healing.
It would have been very helpful for me to have a domestic violence checklist to consult during the earlier days of that relationship. I might have recognized warning signs and have gotten out much sooner. Instead, I ended up waiting until I had been threatened with a knife, coerced into sex by his threats of self-harm or harm to others (which is rape by definition), and punched in the head and mouth. Below I’ve added a common domestic violence check-list that I found very recently, with my responses filled in. (Turning Point Services, 2010). I hope that it helps someone else recognize abusive patterns before violence occurs.
EMOTIONAL ABUSE CHECKLIST
• Do you have to get permission to socialize with your friends?
I did not have to get permission, but it was very clear that he did not want me to contact my friends or family. When I did speak to friends or family on the phone, he always asked me if we had talked about him and demanded to know what was said.
• Are you accused of flirting or cheating on him when you leave the house to do errands, etc.?
He often accused me of being too flirtatious with men, especially when men would compliment me or ask me out or for my phone number. He accused me of cheating on him when we had agreed to break up and see other people; though he had expressed that our relationship was over, when I went out on a date with someone else, he became furious and abusive.
• Does he blame you or others for the things that go wrong in his life? Does he refuse to accept responsibility for his own actions?
Yes – every time something went wrong, it was always someone else’s fault, usually mine.
• Does he have control over the money and monitor your spending?
He insisted that I give him money for groceries and other expenses, though I often paid for groceries and covered many of our expenses myself.
•Does he tell you no one else would ever want you?
Yes, he used to tell me no one else would ever accept me because of my children.
• Does he threaten to harm himself if you leave him?
Yes, he threatened to harm or kill himself and to burn down his home and to burn a church if I left.
• Does he go through your purse or open your mail?
No, not to my knowledge
• Does he use things against you that you've confided to him in the past?
He knew about my past hurts and used those against me; for example, he knew I had been sexually assaulted as a teen, and once forced me to look at rape-scenes as a way to hurt me.
• Does he express romantic or sexual interest in others in front of you?
Yes, he did this all the time.
• Are you nervous about being on the phone when he is around?
Yes, because he always seemed to be listening in.
• Is it okay to return home later than scheduled without being fearful?
I knew he’d be angry if I was late, especially if the kids were home.
• Does he withhold affection, give you the silent treatment when you want to talk or work things out, or refuse to answer the phone when you call?
He did all these things, all the time.
• Does he try to turn the children against you?
We did not have children together so this doesn’t apply.
• Do you feel manipulated by his kindness or gifts?
He rarely gifted me and was more unkind than kind, however, after the physical abuse occurred, he brought me flowers and an engagement ring, which I rejected, and I believed this to be an extremely manipulative act.
• Do you feel obligated to be sexual with your partner? Does he threaten or coerce you for sexual contact? Does he threaten to leave you or harm himself if you don’t have sex?
I was more than willing to be sexual with him until he began using pornography constantly in our relationship; after that, my interest level decreased. We had agreed to part ways on the night when he forced me into sex by threatening to drive drunk - thereby harming himself or others - if I didn’t comply. He used threats of leaving, threats of harming himself or others by his actions, and withholding affection if I didn’t watch pornography with him and have sex the way he wanted to. He became verbally abusive when I refused to consider having group sex or allowing others to watch us have sex via webcam.
• Are your activities and interests looked upon as unimportant and trivial?
Yes, often. He also interrupted me continually and told me in many ways that I had no rights in our relationship and that my emotions and needs were unimportant.
• Does he sabotage your schedule and outside commitments?
Yes – he often made me late for work and often called and kept me from sleeping at night.
Answering yes to any of these questions denotes a potential problem. I answered yes to almost every single one! During the early months of our relationship, these behaviors were scattered and sparse. But as time went on, more and more of the pattern became clear. Finally, the emotional and verbal abuse escalated to physical violence. Here are some markers for that type of behavior as well:
Domestic violence usually starts small and becomes more severe and frequent over time. Many times it progresses through the following stages, and I’ve noted my responses in italics:
1. Pre-battering violence
Hitting or breaking objects, threats of violence, verbal abuse. My abuser did these things – he threw glasses, plates, and books. He punched walls. He damaged some of my belongings. He shouted at me, cursed me, and called me names. He accused me of “chasing him” when he had, in fact, always been the one who pursued me (he admitted this several times when he was drunk). He accused me of ruining his life and of destroying his marriage, when he had communicated to me that his marriage was dysfunctional and he was seeking a divorce before our relationship began.
2. Beginning level violence
Pushing, restraining, blocking doorways, holding down, shaking. He engaged in these behaviors also, but most of them happened after the actual physical abuse – the night I left, he kept pushing me down onto his sofa and onto his bed, holding me down by sitting or lying on top of me. Before he hit me the first time, he did shove me and grab me by the shoulder, shaking me.
3. Moderate level violence
Slapping, punching, kicking, pulling hair, spanking. He punched me with his fists on two separate occasions, hitting me in the forehead, in the side of my head above my left ear, and in the mouth. He also threw things at me.
4. Severe level violence
Choking, beating with objects, use/threat of weapons, sexual abuse. He physically threatened me with a knife, threatened and tried to wreck his car with me in it, and forced unwanted kissing and touching (by definition, this is sexual assault) as well as coercing me to have sex by threatening to harm himself and others.
I was lucky to get away from my abuser. However, for a month after I had ended the relationship, he continued to call me, often just to “talk” as he said, or to ask for my advice about another relationship he had entered. During each call, I would request that he stop calling me, and he would promise that this would be the last call. Finally, after a month of this, I blocked him from being able to call me. Then, a month later, I moved to a different city because I did not feel safe and because our paths still often crossed. After a peaceful few weeks, I began seeing him near my new home and at my work place. He did not attempt to make verbal or physical contact, but my apprehensions grew as it became obvious that he was continuing to turn up nearby. Because of his patterns of behavior in the past – revisiting relationships, trying to coerce renewed involvement with an ex-wife over a year after their divorce – I called the police to ask for their advice. After hearing about his physical abuse and his threats with a deadly weapon, the officer I spoke to advised me to quickly apply for an order of protection, and told me that his current behavior – unwanted phone contact coupled with recurring proximity – constituted stalking.
I did apply for the order, but not right away. It took seeing him nearby several more times and him actually contacting my employer before I had the courage to apply for the protective order. That is currently in process. However, the process is hampered because I did not report his behavior to the police when he physically abused me. If I could go back and do one thing over, it would not be to keep him out of my life entirely (though that is certainly tempting). It would be reporting him immediately for what he did. At the time, I was so afraid that I felt paralyzed and unable to act. I was numb from all the pain he had put me through. And I admit that when he hit me the first time, I still cared about him, and cared about what happened to him. I did not want to see his life destroyed. Now, however, those feelings are gone. I understand that I have a responsibility to more than myself; there were other women who came before me, whom he hurt – he admitted this to me. There are other women who will come after me. If my willingness to tell the truth about his behavior saves even one person from harm, then it will have been worthwhile.
Bottom line – if you read these checklists and if you answered yes to some of these questions, take a long, honest look at your relationship. Believe me, you deserve to have healthy boundaries. You deserve to be treated with kindness, not with violence. No one should have to live in fear. Get help – talk to the police, a trusted friend, or a family member. You are worth saving.
Domestic Violence Checklist. Turning Point Services. Retrieved online from http://www.turningpointservices.org/domesticviolence.htm on 6-12-2010.
Those of you who read this blog know that I recently experienced an abusive relationship. During the time when I was involved with this man, I was so numbed by the emotional pain he inflicted that when the physical violence started, it was almost a relief. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t like being hurt. It was a relief because I was finally able to say, “Yes, this relationship really is unhealthy, he really is an abuser.” This knowledge gave me the ability to take action for myself and to finally leave the relationship, though it took me over a month to break free. Recognizing abuse for what it is can be very empowering; it certainly was for me. Once I named his abuse – emotional, physical, and sexual – I was able to release myself from that cycle and begin healing.
It would have been very helpful for me to have a domestic violence checklist to consult during the earlier days of that relationship. I might have recognized warning signs and have gotten out much sooner. Instead, I ended up waiting until I had been threatened with a knife, coerced into sex by his threats of self-harm or harm to others (which is rape by definition), and punched in the head and mouth. Below I’ve added a common domestic violence check-list that I found very recently, with my responses filled in. (Turning Point Services, 2010). I hope that it helps someone else recognize abusive patterns before violence occurs.
EMOTIONAL ABUSE CHECKLIST
• Do you have to get permission to socialize with your friends?
I did not have to get permission, but it was very clear that he did not want me to contact my friends or family. When I did speak to friends or family on the phone, he always asked me if we had talked about him and demanded to know what was said.
• Are you accused of flirting or cheating on him when you leave the house to do errands, etc.?
He often accused me of being too flirtatious with men, especially when men would compliment me or ask me out or for my phone number. He accused me of cheating on him when we had agreed to break up and see other people; though he had expressed that our relationship was over, when I went out on a date with someone else, he became furious and abusive.
• Does he blame you or others for the things that go wrong in his life? Does he refuse to accept responsibility for his own actions?
Yes – every time something went wrong, it was always someone else’s fault, usually mine.
• Does he have control over the money and monitor your spending?
He insisted that I give him money for groceries and other expenses, though I often paid for groceries and covered many of our expenses myself.
•Does he tell you no one else would ever want you?
Yes, he used to tell me no one else would ever accept me because of my children.
• Does he threaten to harm himself if you leave him?
Yes, he threatened to harm or kill himself and to burn down his home and to burn a church if I left.
• Does he go through your purse or open your mail?
No, not to my knowledge
• Does he use things against you that you've confided to him in the past?
He knew about my past hurts and used those against me; for example, he knew I had been sexually assaulted as a teen, and once forced me to look at rape-scenes as a way to hurt me.
• Does he express romantic or sexual interest in others in front of you?
Yes, he did this all the time.
• Are you nervous about being on the phone when he is around?
Yes, because he always seemed to be listening in.
• Is it okay to return home later than scheduled without being fearful?
I knew he’d be angry if I was late, especially if the kids were home.
• Does he withhold affection, give you the silent treatment when you want to talk or work things out, or refuse to answer the phone when you call?
He did all these things, all the time.
• Does he try to turn the children against you?
We did not have children together so this doesn’t apply.
• Do you feel manipulated by his kindness or gifts?
He rarely gifted me and was more unkind than kind, however, after the physical abuse occurred, he brought me flowers and an engagement ring, which I rejected, and I believed this to be an extremely manipulative act.
• Do you feel obligated to be sexual with your partner? Does he threaten or coerce you for sexual contact? Does he threaten to leave you or harm himself if you don’t have sex?
I was more than willing to be sexual with him until he began using pornography constantly in our relationship; after that, my interest level decreased. We had agreed to part ways on the night when he forced me into sex by threatening to drive drunk - thereby harming himself or others - if I didn’t comply. He used threats of leaving, threats of harming himself or others by his actions, and withholding affection if I didn’t watch pornography with him and have sex the way he wanted to. He became verbally abusive when I refused to consider having group sex or allowing others to watch us have sex via webcam.
• Are your activities and interests looked upon as unimportant and trivial?
Yes, often. He also interrupted me continually and told me in many ways that I had no rights in our relationship and that my emotions and needs were unimportant.
• Does he sabotage your schedule and outside commitments?
Yes – he often made me late for work and often called and kept me from sleeping at night.
Answering yes to any of these questions denotes a potential problem. I answered yes to almost every single one! During the early months of our relationship, these behaviors were scattered and sparse. But as time went on, more and more of the pattern became clear. Finally, the emotional and verbal abuse escalated to physical violence. Here are some markers for that type of behavior as well:
Domestic violence usually starts small and becomes more severe and frequent over time. Many times it progresses through the following stages, and I’ve noted my responses in italics:
1. Pre-battering violence
Hitting or breaking objects, threats of violence, verbal abuse. My abuser did these things – he threw glasses, plates, and books. He punched walls. He damaged some of my belongings. He shouted at me, cursed me, and called me names. He accused me of “chasing him” when he had, in fact, always been the one who pursued me (he admitted this several times when he was drunk). He accused me of ruining his life and of destroying his marriage, when he had communicated to me that his marriage was dysfunctional and he was seeking a divorce before our relationship began.
2. Beginning level violence
Pushing, restraining, blocking doorways, holding down, shaking. He engaged in these behaviors also, but most of them happened after the actual physical abuse – the night I left, he kept pushing me down onto his sofa and onto his bed, holding me down by sitting or lying on top of me. Before he hit me the first time, he did shove me and grab me by the shoulder, shaking me.
3. Moderate level violence
Slapping, punching, kicking, pulling hair, spanking. He punched me with his fists on two separate occasions, hitting me in the forehead, in the side of my head above my left ear, and in the mouth. He also threw things at me.
4. Severe level violence
Choking, beating with objects, use/threat of weapons, sexual abuse. He physically threatened me with a knife, threatened and tried to wreck his car with me in it, and forced unwanted kissing and touching (by definition, this is sexual assault) as well as coercing me to have sex by threatening to harm himself and others.
I was lucky to get away from my abuser. However, for a month after I had ended the relationship, he continued to call me, often just to “talk” as he said, or to ask for my advice about another relationship he had entered. During each call, I would request that he stop calling me, and he would promise that this would be the last call. Finally, after a month of this, I blocked him from being able to call me. Then, a month later, I moved to a different city because I did not feel safe and because our paths still often crossed. After a peaceful few weeks, I began seeing him near my new home and at my work place. He did not attempt to make verbal or physical contact, but my apprehensions grew as it became obvious that he was continuing to turn up nearby. Because of his patterns of behavior in the past – revisiting relationships, trying to coerce renewed involvement with an ex-wife over a year after their divorce – I called the police to ask for their advice. After hearing about his physical abuse and his threats with a deadly weapon, the officer I spoke to advised me to quickly apply for an order of protection, and told me that his current behavior – unwanted phone contact coupled with recurring proximity – constituted stalking.
I did apply for the order, but not right away. It took seeing him nearby several more times and him actually contacting my employer before I had the courage to apply for the protective order. That is currently in process. However, the process is hampered because I did not report his behavior to the police when he physically abused me. If I could go back and do one thing over, it would not be to keep him out of my life entirely (though that is certainly tempting). It would be reporting him immediately for what he did. At the time, I was so afraid that I felt paralyzed and unable to act. I was numb from all the pain he had put me through. And I admit that when he hit me the first time, I still cared about him, and cared about what happened to him. I did not want to see his life destroyed. Now, however, those feelings are gone. I understand that I have a responsibility to more than myself; there were other women who came before me, whom he hurt – he admitted this to me. There are other women who will come after me. If my willingness to tell the truth about his behavior saves even one person from harm, then it will have been worthwhile.
Bottom line – if you read these checklists and if you answered yes to some of these questions, take a long, honest look at your relationship. Believe me, you deserve to have healthy boundaries. You deserve to be treated with kindness, not with violence. No one should have to live in fear. Get help – talk to the police, a trusted friend, or a family member. You are worth saving.
Domestic Violence Checklist. Turning Point Services. Retrieved online from http://www.turningpointservices.org/domesticviolence.htm on 6-12-2010.
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