Is Someone Hurting You?

Maybe you are suspicious that a friend is being abused.  You see some signs and you have a funny feeling.  You want to help but you don't know what to say.  Maybe you pretend you don't know because it makes you uncomfortable.  Maybe you are afraid to get involved because you are not a trained counselor and wouldn't know what to do.

Did you know that Domestic Violence affects 1 in 4 women in the United States?  This statistic is mind blowing to me.  This means we all know women who are affected by Domestic Violence. 

If you want to help, all you have to do is two things.  First, ask the question: "Is someone hurting you?"  She may have been waiting and waiting for someone to ask.

She may deny it.  That's her choice and she may have several reasons for not telling you.  But at least she will know you care and are concerned.

She may think you are crazy for asking if she is not being abused, but I don't think she would be angry about it.  She would probably thank you for caring about her well being. 

She might confide in you that yes, in fact she is being abused.  Here comes the second part.  It is very simple.  Give her a phone number.  You can give her your local domestic violence center's number, your state's hot line number, or the National Domestic Violence number.  Encourage her to talk to someone who can help her.  She doesn't have to make a decision right then and there to leave her partner.  She can get advice about what to do or maybe just have a trained volunteer to talk to.



So, that's all there is to it.  Don't be afraid to ask: "Is someone hurting you?"

The National Domestic Violence Hot Line

1 800 799 SAFE (7233)

Lines are open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week

Can an abuser ever really change?

I know a woman who was married to an abusive man and separated from him for a period of time. She gave him time and space to make some changes. Ultimately, he wanted to stay married but she was not willing to stay married until he got some serious help. Everyone is different. This was what was right for her.  Luckily, her husband pulled through and changed the way he dealt with his problems.  Their first few years were rough, but they have enjoyed many happy years together since reuniting. They have two beautiful children and are happy.  The children are being raised in a safe, loving environment.

I think this might be rare, but it is possible.  I think the important key to this success story is that the wife left while the husband worked on things.  She worked on things too.  If a couple is not functioning while they are together, it is sometimes necessary to separate. 

How do you know if you should leave or stay?

Everyone is different.  Every abuse is different.  What many women would accept as normal treatment may be another woman's definition of abuse.  Verbal and emotional abuse is a grey area.  Physical abuse is more obvious.  But all abuse is abuse.  It doesn't matter if your partner leaves scars and wounds on your body or just in your soul.

Abused women tend to be optimistic care takers.  They grasp on to a hope that tomorrow will be better.  They feel every time they were put down or slapped around will be the last time.  They feel if maybe they can change and become better lovers, better women, better housewives, better mothers, that their partners will finally be happy with them.  Sometimes the honeymoon period following a violent or hurtful episode clouds their reality.  I know it often clouded mine.

If you are asking the question whether you should leave or stay, I suspect you know your answer.  To even be asking it tells me several things.   

1. It tells me that you can admit you are being abused.
2. It tells me that you have seriously considered what it might be like if you left.
3. It tells me that you wish you could stay if he would stop hurting you and frightening you.

When I first started asking myself this question, I thought I should stay.  I told myself things like: It's not that bad.  I need to honor my wedding vows for better and for worse.  If I leave, I am scared he will come after me.  My children will grow up in a broken home. I don't want them to be alone with their father.  If I stay, at least I can watch over them. 

When I talked myself into leaving, I told myself things like: It really is that bad.  I believe in honoring vows but I don't think God would want me to be abused.  If I stay, I will die.  If he doesn't kill me, I am still dying and losing pieces of myself every time he hurts me.  If I leave, I will do whatever I can to fight for my children.  I will go to the ends of the earth to protect them.  They are already growing up in a very broken home.

Leaving is the most dangerous time for a battered woman.  Your answer may wash over you like an epiphany but that doesn't mean you need to rush right out the door.  You may have to wait until you can develop a safety plan with a person who is trained to help you.  The HELP IS FREE!  You can call the national domestic violence hot line and ask for help.   

No one will pressure you.  For a woman who has been stripped of all her power by her abuser, this may be the first time you have a say.  It may be hard for you to make a choice.  It may take a long time for you to decide what is best.  If you need time, you can have time.  You have the power.  You get to choose.  If you want to stay, there is still help available for you.  Many domestic violence center offer amazing support groups.  No one but you can decide if you should stay or go.

Whatever you decide, don't judge yourself.  I know you are doing the best you can.

The National Domestic Violence Hot Line

1 800 799 SAFE (7233)

Lines are open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week

Please support your local Women's Shelter

How does a victim ever find peace when it's over?

Well, first of all, it is never "over."  Whatever you've been through as a domestic violence victim, your wounds will never fully heal.  Now, don't get mad that I just said that.  It doesn't mean you won't find peace and a "happily ever after." 

There are many wounds we will have in our life that will never heal.  Losing a loved one is a prime example.  I think people get in big trouble when they hold on to an ideal that life should be pain free.  Who has told you you are entitled to a perfect life?  Why do so many people fruitlessly spend all their time, money, and energy on attempting to make their life happy and pain free? 

Pain and sorrow are only "bad" for you if you turn it into bitterness, hate, and anger.

But what if you can turn all that pain and sorrow into peace, love, hope, and joy?

Your wounds have left an opening into your heart!  You can fill that opening with self pity.  You may fill that hole with medication or drugs and alcohol.  You may nurse your wounds with anger at your abuser. You may fill that hole with more dysfunctional relationships.  If you stuff your wounds, you will eventually become a closed up woman.

Or, you may see your wounds as an opening to a relationship with your higher power.  You may see that now you have a greater capacity to receive and give love.  You may see yourself stripped away of  pride and left a humble, weak, broken woman who has the unique opportunity to build herself back together piece by piece.  That is a special position to be in.  Kind of makes you feel sorry for those who have had boring lives without pain and suffering.  They don't get to have as big a hole in their hearts.  They won't get to have the opportunity to fill their hearts with as much beauty as you do.

I leave my wounds open now.  I accept them.  I embrace them.  For years, I tried to close them with shame, guilt, embarrassment, and resentments.  I like being open better.  Beautiful things have an easier time going straight into my heart now.

So, you'll never get over domestic violence.  And what you can't get over in life, you must go through.  It can be a very rewarding, uplifting journey.  It can be difficult and trying at times too.  But the process is special if you let your higher power walk with you on your journey.  Along the way, you can find forgiveness which is not a prize for your abuser, but a gift for you to move on in a positive way.  And once you can openly share your story to another victim in hopes of helping them, then you will have reached a peace you could only ever imagine.

**Please support your local domestic violence center.  No amount is too small.  Even non profit organizations have to buy printer ink and paper.  $20.00 can help make a difference in the lives of the women they support.**

There is enough denial to go around for everyone

"William and I had a stand-off in his driveway.  He was yelling for my keys and I was shaking my head no.  I tried to reason with him but he became more and more irate the more I talked.  I tried to go inside the house but he kept blocking the way.  The next thing I knew, Wham!  His fist went through my face.  Again and again.  Blood was pouring out of my nose.  There was a ringing in my ears.  I saw black and I got slammed into the hood of my car which left a dent that looked like my small body.  I slid off the car and landed on the driveway when he started kicking me over and over again.  His driveway was on an incline and I remember when he would kick me, I would roll up the driveway and then roll back down and he would kick me again.  I couldn't get up and I lost my voice just like in a dream when you want to scream but you can't.

Eventually, some people came outside of the next door neighbor's house and they saw us or heard William.  I could barely make out the shapes of the men and it took them a few minutes to realize what they were looking at.  Once it all clicked that I was being beaten, they started screaming at William to stop.  It took four men and William's father to get him off of me.  They took him inside and beat the crap out of him.  William's step mother helped me get up and remove the gravel which had embedded into my skin and she got me bags of ice to put on my face.  No one called the police in case you are wondering."  (Finding Hope, the Journey of a Battered Wife pages 54-55.)

If you had been there, what would you have done?  Would you have called 911?  Domestic violence is a familial disease in my opinion and it affects every single member of the family and even friends.  Good, law abiding citizens who know right from wrong will sometimes deny the truth even if they see it with their own two eyes.

Somebody should have called the police that night.  This episode was the first time William really beat me.  We were just dating.  I was only 18 years old. 

Weeks and months afterwards, when his family would see me, I felt like I was the bad guy.  His step mother just thought I was a moron to stay with William and I suppose she thought that if I stayed, I deserved what I got.  I know his father felt that way.  He told me exactly how he felt more than once.

What I am trying to tell you is that if you know someone who is living this nightmare, you must speak up.  Do the right thing.  It doesn't get better with time on its own.  Maybe you are afraid calling the police will make things worse.  What is worse in the long run?  A dead girl? 

Not calling the police when you see abuse happening is just fueling the abuser's power.  He knows everyone is scared of him and that is why he will keep doing what he is doing.  Domestic Violence training for law enforcement workers has come a long way.  These professionals know what they are doing.  They can whisk the victim and her children to safety.  They can lock the abuser in jail where he deserves to be.  Domestic Violence Centers not only hide the victim and her children, they can offer her hope and help her develop a really good long- term plan for her future.  She will receive legal aid, counseling, and daily support.  By taking a stand, you can save a life.

*Support you local women's shelter. No amount is too small.*

What does she believe?

"I picked up Jolie, escaped the dirty look my mother was giving me, and returned to my life in hell.  I suffered more abuse than I thought humanly possible.  A part of me believed every time he beat me was the last time.  A part of me trusted the promises he made not to touch me again.  Pieces of me believed I deserved it.  I knew what to do and say to make him do it and sometimes I would go ahead and say the magic words to make his rage come out just to get it over with and move on with the rest of my week.  Pieces of me believed it wasn't that bad.  Parts of my heart loved him enough to deny it.  But the biggest piece of me was too scared to leave.  Scared he would kill me.  Scared he would kill my parents.  Scared I would be nothing either way."  Page 86 (Finding Hope, the Journey of a Battered Wife)

Why Me?

I made a tremendous mistake after I escaped my nightmare and landed safely hundreds of miles away with my two daughters.  My mistake was that I closed the door on all the things I left behind in New Mexico.  I was a shattered woman who pretended it never happened.  I believed that I was magically healed since I was far, far away from the man who abused me and was finally legally divorced. 

Denial can make you delusional. 

I was euphoric when I came home.  I felt so free and strong.  I felt courageous and brave.  I was cured.  Fine.  Happy.  Safe.  It lasted a little while.  Then all the things I left behind began following me around everywhere I went.  Fear.  Despair.  Sadness.  Hurt.  Pain. 

I needed counseling.  I was a mess for three or four years after the nightmare was "over." 

I was a mess because I kept trying to shut the door on all those feelings.  I did not talk about the past to anyone.  I pretended it never happened.  It was embarrassing.  If I told someone, they would see what a complete idiot I was.  They would see I was a bad mother who knowingly brought two little girls into a bad situation.  They would know I "allowed" myself to be a victim of terrible abuse.  They would know my secret that I felt so unworthy of being loved that I married a man who hit me, verbally abused me, controlled me, raped me, threatened my life with a gun to my head, and did cruel things to me for 7 years.  I couldn't let anyone know.

And for those who already knew, like my family members, I kept a lid on my feelings so they would see how happy I was.  They wouldn't have to worry about me any more.

It left me confused for a long time.  Why me?  Why did I live that way?  Aren't I smarter than that?  How could I have ever been with a man like him?  I am not the same person.

Delusional.  I AM the same person.  It was me.  It is me.

It wasn't until four years after my plane landed safely far, far away from my ex-husband that I finally reached out for help.  I was remarried by then.  I finally started facing all the things I thought I had left behind which were jepordizing my future and making my present life exhausting.

If you were or are currently in an abusive relationship, IT IS NOT YOUR FAULT.  No one chooses to be abused.  Your abuser has slowly taken away all your power.  However, this does not mean that you are not emotionally dysfunctional to have fallen in love with someone who wanted to control you.  Sometimes domestic violence blindsides the victim and they honestly didn't see it coming, but in my case, I saw red flags all the way.  There were reasons I was attracted to my partner and I needed to face them head on with a trained counselor to find out what was missing in my heart.  I needed help to find my own personal answers to the question: "Why me?"

Every one's answer is different and complex.  There are a hundred reasons why you are with your partner and there are a hundred reasons why you stay with your partner.  I encourage you to take a personal inventory and discover some of those reasons.  It will be your fourth step in healing and it is a BIG step. 

Many domestic violence centers offer free counseling and group therapy.  You may think it is just an emergency shelter, but it is much more.  If you need to talk to someone, contact your local Women's Shelter and find out what is available on your journey to un-break your heart.  If you have been blessed to live your life without violence, please donate to your local women's shelter and support the programs that help women like me.

The National Domestic Violence Hot Line

1 800 799 SAFE (7233)

Lines are open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week