I’ve been Free and Safe for eleven years, and yes, you can clap your hands!
Instead of wasting my remaining years in hate, sitting alone and bewailing my fate – and was savagely beaten, shot, stabbed, strangled and suffocated, and then spat in my face, humiliation, rape and other psychological wounds – I have little by little rebuilt my life.
Yes, I believe in a higher power. No, I do not attribute my recovery to being “born again,” as I have known my Creator since I was born. That is a beautiful transformation that can remove all your self-hatred, but my experience was uniquely mine.
Mine was not an instant occurrence, I spent as much time fixing myself as he spent brutalizing me and breaking me. Along my way I learned a lot, who I am, who he was, why and how to break the chains of that codependent relationship syndrome.
For the most part, the word “abuser” is an anathema, a mental image of a hulking beast waiting for an opportunity to pounce, and that’s a pretty accurate image!
We know that women fall for the tricks of these men due to low self-esteem, Shadow Women wanting to be loved and praised. However, when we look honestly and openly at abusers, our perspective changes. It’s not enough to stop us from fearing and hating them, but a deeper understanding of why they abuse.
My abuser was a child born in abject poverty to a single woman in West Virginia. As the eldest of her six brothers and sisters, she relied on him as provider and ‘man of the house’, a heavy burden for a six or seven year old. There was no welfare system in those days and most people would have preferred to do without them rather than ask their “superiors” for help. So my abuser walked six miles to a country store to “get” canned milk for his little brother. Of course, the man in the store knew he was stealing, but he was sympathetic to the situation.
So here we have a child who is forced to be an adult instead of being able to play and have fun. Here, too, is a small boy of malleable age who is taught to steal. How do I imagine that? His mother taught him by complicity. She knew those milk cans were stolen, but she had a fragile baby to feed. Instead of learning that stealing is wrong, it became a noble duty for him. Add in the silent teachings of a grocery store clerk who looked the other way, and you have the seed of a thief.
The people of that region, the working people who had nothing, were often hard-hearted. Hit that kid on the head and show him something! Yes, teach him to suppress his rage inside, teach him that passing that fist of rage to another person makes him feel better. They didn’t teach him that violence is wrong. And this applies to children everywhere in the US, in the ghettos, in the inner city, even in the upscale neighborhoods. Then we have to keep in mind that in the 1950s era and back, women were not a prized package and many considered a smack to the face to be nothing more than disciplining your dog for littering.
Yes, there have been gigantic advances in women’s rights and equality, but there is still that vague “value system”, especially in poor and uneducated people.
The Shadow Men are insecure, they think they are nothing. So, for a relationship to work, they have overcome the will of the woman until she is submissive, then he sees her as an equal. He has drugged her to slime with him.
Abusers are ignorant, self-absorbed, ego-oriented to the point where all they care about is the instant gratification of their wants and needs. Abusers never learn love and devotion. If a woman fights back, she is replaced with a more accommodating model.
To an abuser, “love” is: a woman who does whatever it takes to make her man happy. She has nothing to do with oneself, only selfishness. My abuser would get angry and deny me his attention, look at me with hate (which was a trigger for my abusive relationship with my father), and I would give up. He wanted him to be nice to me so much that he would agree to anything just to be in his favor.
They may not really understand how they manipulate, but their instinct is perfect. Shadow Women yearn for heroes who will take them far and make an entire fantasy world.
Thus we come to violence. I was so abused as a child that I didn’t think about the first slaps and shoves. That was the pattern ingrained in me to accept. Things that a healthy woman would have ended the relationship for, were things that I thought were “normal.”
I was blind to the fact that I was smarter than him, stronger than him. That I actually did the relationship work, got him out of jail, bailed him out, and made sure we had what we needed. I was blind to the fact that he had a medical degree and was making eleven dollars an hour, and 14 years ago that was a good salary for someone with my education.
He was blind to the fact that I was the owner of the car, the duplex, I gave him money. . . and for those of you who shake your head, it’s just a fact. The Shadow Women want love so much that they cry tears of joy and brag about the flowers he gave her, blind to the knowledge that she had given them the money in the first place.
Abusers are disgusting. Abusers are broken and discarded young children who have no life skills. An abuser who acts like a pile driver at home will cringe at a police officer or jail employee. “Yes, sir, boss” is a familiar phrase in prisons and jails.
BULLIES BULLY WHO THEY CAN. My father-in-law was a bully and mistreated my mother-in-law. Those were the days when I was up against men of any size. Bill would be drunk at Christmas dinners. One day I accidentally saw him squeezing his arm for some infraction of his universe. The grip was so tight that flesh bulged around his fingers.
He would make a sloppy mess, devouring his food, some of it always hanging out of his mouth. He didn’t want us there, violating his home, he was the stepfather of his wife’s children. Long before the others finished eating, he would get up and clear away their plates. The second dinner, when he took my plate, I rapped his knuckles with my butter knife and told him that he wasn’t finished. It was unpleasant, but he backed away, as he would have with any of them strong enough to set boundaries.
We are who we are taught to be. For men it is a stronger teaching because they crave love and acceptance, but they push people away from them, never understanding why.
I have no sympathy for abusers, but I feel it is healthy to understand what makes them who they are. Until women are aware and educated, the abuse will continue its ugly cycle.