Domestic Abuse

I have never wanted to admit to myself that I am in an abusive relationship. I mean, I always thought of domestic abuse and envisioned this dumb, white trash woman. No, it can happen to anyone. Perhaps people in higher social classes are better at hiding it, or people are less likely to assume they are being abused. I mean we look like the average American family with a wonderful, loving life, but that's because I'm a fabulous actress. I always thought appearances were more important than the truth. If we appeared to be a strong, happy family, and no one saw what happened behind closed doors, everything would be okay. Well, as shocked as everyone around us will be, I'm standing up. I'm not living with this shit anymore. I'm better than this. I used to be a strong woman who didn't take shit from anyone. Guess what? I'm back.

So you're all wondering, did he beat me? No, not really, but he has used physical force, restrained me while screaming in my face that he wanted to "beat the fuck out of me," left bruises, choked me, and bit me, not to mention threats with guns. We literally have somewhere around 20 guns in this house, most of them loaded. Most of the abuse has been emotional though, and I'm in the middle of psychological warfare right now. He scared the shit out of me trying to kill himself, and I told him that was really fucked up and not at all okay. So I woke up to flowers, a note going on about how sorry he is, and how if I just give him one more chance he can make me happy. That it will never happen again. Do you know how many "one more chances" he's had? 5 1/2 years worth. He was doing this from the beginning, and this time I'm not falling for it. I've seen it a million times before.

So what makes an intelligent, attractive woman like me stay with someone like that? He's really good at what he does. An expert at psychological warfare. He has convinced me over and over that I did somethimg wrong that put him in a rage, but he was sorry, and it would never happen again. It's easier to keep telling yourself to believe than it is to convince yourself to leave. You start to believe it all. I can't really even explain it that well, but it happens, and let me tell you, it is hard to escape from. There's an edless cycle that consumes you.
It goes like this:

Emotional abuse (also called psychological abuse or mental abuse) can include humiliating the victim privately or publicly, controlling what the victim can and cannot do, withholding information from the victim, deliberately doing something to make the victim feel diminished or embarrassed, isolating the victim from friends and family, implicitly blackmailing the victim by harming others when the victim expresses independence or happiness, or denying the victim access to money or other basic resources and necessities.

Emotional/verbal abuse is defined as any behavior that threatens, intimidates, undermines the victim’s self-worth or self-esteem, or controls the victim’s freedom. This can include threatening the victim with injury or harm, telling the victim that they will be killed if they ever leave the relationship, and public humiliation. Constant criticism, name-calling, and making statements that damage the victim’s self-esteem are also common forms of emotional abuse. Often perpetrators will use children to engage in emotional abuse by teaching them to harshly criticize the victim as well. Emotional abuse includes conflicting actions or statements which are designed to confuse and create insecurity in the victim. These behaviors also lead the victim to question themselves, causing them to believe that they are making up the abuse or that the abuse is their fault.

Emotional abuse includes forceful efforts to isolate the victim, keeping them from contacting friends or family. This is intended to eliminate those who might try to help the victim leave the relationship and to create a lack of resources for them to rely on if they were to leave. Isolation results in damaging the victim’s sense of internal strength, leaving them feeling helpless and unable to escape from the situation.

People who are being emotionally abused often feel as if they do not own themselves; rather, they may feel that their significant other has nearly total control over them. Women or men undergoing emotional abuse often suffer from depression, which puts them at increased risk for suicide, eating disorders, and drug and alcohol abuse.


Physical abuse is abuse involving contact intended to cause feelings of intimidation, pain, injury, or other physical suffering or bodily harm.

Physical abuse includes hitting, slapping, punching, choking, pushing, and other types of contact that result in physical injury to the victim. Physical abuse can also include behaviors such as denying the victim of medical care when needed, depriving the victim of sleep or other functions necessary to live, or forcing the victim to engage in drug/alcohol use against his/her will. It can also include inflicting physical injury onto other targets, such as children or pets, in order to cause psychological harm to the victim.

The Cycle of Abuse has three phases: tension building, explosion and honeymoon. Each phase might be as short as a few seconds, or as long as several years. Over time, the honeymoon phase may get smaller and shorter as the explosions become more violent and dangerous. Relationships often start in the honeymoon phase. This can make it especially confusing and scary when the explosion phase happens for the first time.

Explosion There is an outburst of abuse that can include physical, sexual, verbal and/or emotional abuse. The abuser may: • Physically abuse you by hitting, kicking, pushing, choking, etc. • Scream and yell in a way that scares or humiliates you. • Rape or force you to go further sexually than you want to. • Threaten to hurt you.
Tension Building Things start to get tense in the relationship. You may feel like: •You have to tip-toe around your boyfriend or girlfriend so you don’t make them mad. • You can’t do anything right and that you’re getting blamed for things. • The person you’re with is always trying to start arguments or fights with you.		Honeymoon During this stage, the abuser will try and make you forgive and forget whatever just happened in the Explosion phase. They might do this by: • Saying “I love you.” • Apologizing and promising that it will never happen again. • Buying you flowers or other gifts. • Saying that you did something to cause the abuse or blames the explosion on other things, like being drunk or stressed out.

So, yeah, this is how my marriage has went. I mean, exactly. There's no denying it now. I've been stuck in an abusive relationship, and I'm still there, getting flowers and all the bullshit. I can only plan my escape now. It's not easy. I can't just go. He won't let me. I've told him I don't love him anymore, that I don't want to be with him anymore, that I don't want this life, that I want a divorce, but he still thinks he can convince me to stay and he'll do anything he can to try. This makes the situation a bit scary because if he finds that nothing he tries in order to get me to stay works, then I can't say what he might resort to. So I'm carefully planning with this in mind. He can't be here when I go. That's how crimes of passion happen. That's how women like me get killed. Think I'm being over dramatic about it? You're not here. You have no idea the living nightmares I've endured throughout the years. You have no idea how scared I have been of this man.

If there was ever a time to stand up and be strong, now is the time, and I'm keeping that in mind. His mind games are not working this time. Every effort he makes just reaffirms the fact that I am in an abusive relationship. The flowers make me sick. The whole thing does.

I have an appointment with my divorce attorney. As much as I hate it there, I'm going to have to temporarily move back to the town where I went to high school. It's 2 hours from here, and my mom, stepdad and sister live there, along with my in-laws. I wanted to stay around here to keep everything as normal as possible for my son, but under these circumstances, I don't believe it's safe to stay in this area alone. I have been so isolated, I don't know anyone, and it's in the middle of nowhere, so 911 response time is at least a half hour, if not an hour. I could be dead by then. So my mom is looking for a house for me, and I'm just trying to figure out how to leave here with my boy safely.

Wish me luck.