by Susan
I saw a T-shirt that other day that said, "Domestic violence only ends when you leave."
If only that were true.
It's easy to think that the woman is free to leave at any time, and therefore she is choosing to be abused by staying. The reality is quite different. Ending an abusive relationship is only the first round of a boxing match with a blind referee against a heavyweight whose appetite for inflicting pain is never satisfied.
The woman risks everything, even her life and the custody of her children, when she leaves. She'll never stop looking over her shoulder. She alone knows what he is capable of because she's seen the ruthless violence that he saves for when they are behind closed doors. In public, he is very charming and no one will believe he is capable of doing what she says he's done. She'll look crazy.
The abuser will make the woman pay a steep price for her freedom. When she leaves, he will escalate the violence and abuse. He will call her night and day. He will tell lies to her family and friends. He will destroy her possessions. He will talk to her about all the ways he can take revenge, how no one will believe her, and how he always wins.
What she does after she leaves will not be based solely on protecting her rights or doing what is right for her. Rather, every single decision she makes will be agonizingly weighed against what the retribution will be from him. If I file for divorce, will he kill me? If I file for custody because he's abusing the children, will he try to get sole custody or falsely accuse me of child abuse? If I file for a protection from abuse order, will it only enrage him more?
He'll use the courts to continue his abuse. Instead of fearing being beaten when she gets home, she'll be afraid of being hit with more court motions. Our judicial system will allow him to make the divorce or custody process a living nightmare. He will delay the process, or bring frivolous motions. He won't answer her lawyer's letters, and he'll send dozens of his own. He will force her to use up what little money she may have fighting him in court over the simplest matters while the referee stands idly by doing nothing.
Or, worst of all, he will take her children away despite overwhelming evidence of his abuse toward them.
Is it any wonder she is having a difficult time leaving?
Now imagine a society that holds him accountable for his abuse. The referee doesn't just cry foul, but prevents the boxing match from even taking place. The abuser is arrested and prosecuted every time he violates a protection from abuse order or doesn't uphold his end of a custody agreement. Custody evaluators and judges believe disclosures of abuse from children, and she isn't afraid of losing custody for protecting her children. She doesn't lose everything she owns to break free; marital assets are split fairly. He is ordered to an abuser program for at least one year, and preferably longer.
It's time to stop blaming women for staying, because we as a society are the ones who let the domestic violence continue long after she's walked out the door. Instead, we need to start truly protecting women and their children after the relationship is over.
One of the interesting flyers created around the SlutWalks movement was one reversing the traditional ways in which women are told to protect themselves: e.g. Use the Buddy system - if you're afraid you might accidentally assault someone, ask a buddy to stay with you and stop you. Carry a whistle with you at all times, and blow it if you're overcome with the urge to assault someone.
ReplyDeleteIt was amusing, but not. It really highlighting the way in which our society blames the victim for being weak enough to "incite" attack. Or after enduring years of verbal and often physical abuse, blaming the victim not being strong-enough and clear-headed enough to combat additional further legal or other attacks "the right way."
OCPD - Scattered Thoughts from the Front Lines
Lundy, this post brought to mind a recent phone conversation I had with an older brother from whom I've been estranged for many years. It was one of those unavoidable conversations about a gravely ill parent ... and my brother attacked me from the outset, while claiming he was 'trying to help' me.
ReplyDelete"... every single decision she makes will be agonizingly weighed against what the retribution will be from him." -- I had to think fast, fast, faster through each sentence, each thought, each word that I spoke -- Even so, he badgered, scoffed, and threatened me without pause -- unless I spoke a direct and irrefutable truth. Then he went silent ... only to fire back again. I find it impossible to share conversation with him beyond 'Hello' -- It seems to be his way to attack someone or something with almost everything he says.
I purchased your book to help me make sense of my then-husband's behaviour ... and now I find sanity and sense in it again regarding my brother.
Your post's headline breaks my heart with its relevance not only to marital / spousal abuse, but to the people in our original families who bullied and terrorized those younger or (perceived to be) less powerful than themselves ... and continue to do it now, long past our childhoods.
Thank you, a second time over, for your wise book. You have helped me to recognize what is real.
Legal abuse and control is allowed to go on year after year after year. In my case, my ex was not physically violent except for some more mild instances that were chalked up to situational anger from the divorce process. He then kept me in court for six years and was successful in finding me in contempt, getting legal fees against me that are near $20,000, and the custody evaluator who is supposed to be the best for abusive situations told me, "He's just 'a guy'." I'm still reeling from what I went through. He continues to attempt to control me, and our children suffer through visitation (not battering, but emotional stuff and neglect). I'm blessed I retained custody, but the process has nearly destroyed me. I was routinely humiliated, controlled, experienced financial devastation and loss of stature, peace, and the right to pursue my own life.
ReplyDeleteIt isn't right. It shouldn't be this way because "this way" is going to keep people in abusive relationships for fear of how abusers use the legal system later on. We have to do something. I think often, I have to do something. I'm so worn out from what I went through, I don't know that I have it in me to fight back and the whole system seems so large and crazy that I don't know where to start.
Thank you for this post that explains what so many go through. I hope my story will add a piece to it, that not only are there threats to family, etc., but legal battles and abuse that sometimes stretch out until the children are grown.
My ex tried to put me through hell and high water. Thank God the judge stopped him from taking me to court for the ninth time long after the seperation and divorce. Shame on him because he is now remarried and still a miserable abuser. After we leave abusers we need to rally a good support system around us (family, friends, spiritual leaders, co workers etc...)to weather the storms our ex's bring.
ReplyDeleteIt is a miserable person who rallies their own children to isolate the other parent because they finally had the courage to leave and stand up for themselves. Looking over your shoulder and defending yourself as a person and mother is a miserable way to live your life. Finding someone who loves you enough to stand by you through all of this is rare and finding the strength to love again is risky, frightening but rewarding. Why a person can cause such misery in your life for years, talk demeaningly at you all the time even in front of the children, flirt with young women in your face even at church and have affairs can put you through such hell when you finally get the courage to leave is unbelievable to me in so many ways. I chalk it up to being chemically unbalanced and therefore unable to even recognize what they are doing to a woman they once loved and bared their children with and more so what they are currently doing to their own kids. I pray for the women who never have the courage to leave for it is truely a lifetime battle and I pray that people causing all this pain will see the need to seek help for most of them see themselves as doing no wrong.
ReplyDeleteReading your book was so empowering! There's a label for all these behaviors and I am not crazy! Although I did step up and and finally divorced, the abuse continues through the court system and I am finally understanding all this. I also have a friend who I'm trying to help who is trying to get custody back of her children and currently trying to defend a restraining order vacate while her 6 yr-old daughter is being treated for herpes and no one seems to be helping her at all! I AM SO MAD!!! The mother has already had everything stolen from her including the children and now pleading to get the judge to believe her and not the charming ex who has everyone on his side. He is something else I've never seen anything like this. I wish you were here Lundy to help us in CA!! Thank you for your work and fight for justice!
ReplyDeleteI recently separated from my husband. He was arrested for domestic violence. He went to jail and there is a no-contact order, which he has violated repeatedly. There are witnesses that have seen him break the order. The police has been notfied and still he is unaffected by all of it.
ReplyDeleteHe contacted me last night offering to help and blaming me for the relationship being "toxic". This is while he is going to therapy.
The trial is a month away and meanwhile, he is free and happy to continue to do as he pleases. It feels like Im being ignored and, in a way, victimized again, by those people who are there to "serve and protect" me. The legal system is definitely not geared towards helping women.
Your book gave me answers no one else seemed able to provide. I know now why he did the things he did and somehow this gave me the strength to finally stand up for my self and leave the relationship.
I also understand now how "therapy" does not address the real issues and why the legal system is failing me this way. However, I have to say that this is a painful realization. It's an uphill battle that people like me have to face. The obstacles are many and very hard to overcome.
Thank you for writing this book, I needed real answers and your book provided me with those.
It took me 7 years to make he decision to leave and I lost everything. He got the house, the furniture, the vehicles, all the money (which was substantial), primary custody of our daughter and I walked out with less than I went in with after 15 years. My family was furious with me and disowned me for not fighting for what I was entitled to (even though I was facing daily threats of having my throat slit, or waking up in a ditch with my face or wrists slashed which resulted in my sleeping in parking lots in the car every night), my friends stopped returning my calls and my lawyer (the best I could afford on the little money I could borrow) turned out to be a "yes man" for my x-husband's lawyer, agreeing to very demand they made and even trying to convince me I was getting a good deal and I was to scared to try to stop it.
ReplyDeleteI moved out almost 5 years ago, but, the abuse has continued and even gotten worse - all except the sexual, as I am no longer "required" to perform my "wifely duties". Every encounter, I am belittled, ridiculed, criticized, shoved, pinched, yelled at and worse, he takes me to court at least twice a year trying to get full custody, which depletes what little money I may have and forcing me to borrow more. I am now bankrupt, completely broke, unemployed, and soon to be homeless. My daughter is now almost 12 now and constantly tells me she doesn't want to go back over there when it's time for him to pick her up. She tells me what he says and does over there - everything short of punching and kicking her.
Truthfully, I regret leaving. Our lives are a living hell, we have nowhere to turn (I've gone to the police, social services and every agency I could find, but I'm constantly told there's nothing they can do until he physically beats her up), just when I think I've hit rock-bottom, the bottom falls out yet again, and now I can no longer be there to take the brunt of his abuse to protect her. I've gone through the safety pan with her several times and I make sure she always has a bus pass and some money to escape if she needs to, but he finds it and takes it away from her, then takes the phone offline, so she can't call out. He keeps her isolated and confined. If I knew then what I know now, I would have stayed and just kept praying that he would have a fatal accident at work.
Lundy I totally agree with what you've said. My abuse only ended when all contact ceased between me and my ex-husband, but that only happened because he did more stuff that caused me to withhold our child from visiting him every fortnight.
ReplyDeleteI remained in violation of the Family Court Visitation Order until our daughter turned 18, but thankfully my ex never took me back to court (which points, I believe, to the face that he knew he would never be able to prove his innocence to the Family Court.)
It was a dreadful thing that caused me to withhold visitation, but it was a God-send in the end, because once contact with him ceased, our lives (mine and my daughter's) gradually became normal. We had never had a normal live before then, we were always living in crisis mode because of his abuse tactics.
BTW, anyone who is looking for resources for domestic abuse in a Christian context might like to go to my site (click on my name) as I have heaps of material on my blog and my main website.
Barb Roberts (author of Not Under Bondage: Biblical Divorce for Abuse, Adultery and Desertion)
1/29/12 Been through extremely abusive marriage and divorce.Finalized in 1997, but kept filing 101 motions hoping to get full custody and deem me an unfit Mom ending in 2008.(he did not win) Have had a breather and there has been a lull,but is now re-engaging the abuse indirectly, although my kids are in their 20's. I'm happily remarried, but becoming increasingly alarmed at the growing attempts by the ex at the re-engagement in setting up situations and vulnerability to more abuse. The process is accelerating and I need an opinion of what is going on and what should I do. The restraining orders are ignored. I'm becoming scared at what his end game is, and having been so abused for so long I'm trying not to over react. Should I stay and try to stand my ground or get out and move to where family is. This may be a no brainer for most, but I very tired, exhausted and beattened down. Could some one give me some help? S
ReplyDeletePolice and clergy have been no help at all. Hundreds of incidents of physical abuse, thousands of verbal. (His other 4 short marriages were also violent). Once, he choked me, scratched my face, shoved me and shook me hard. Later I discovered that when he bent my thumb back, he broke it. When I finally locked myself in the bedroom, I called the police and when thy arrived and saw my cuts, bruises, scratches and blood, he told them I did it to myself. They said he was acting crazy but it was my word against his and they left. The advice to call the police...why bother?
ReplyDelete