Cycle of Abuse

I know how abuse affects children because I grew up with it. I’m 50 and I still remember vividly when my dad and mother would fight. It always took place in the kitchen in front of the refrigerator; why, I don’t know. My mother would be frustrated trying to communicate with my father and he would be threatening her with anything and everything then it would always end with the lunge and him choking her. My sister and I would always be standing behind my mother screaming for them to stop, but our cries were never heard. We would run into the living room and go the window on the left side of the fireplace; open it and both in sync on a 1, 2, 3, count we’d scream over and over until we couldn’t scream anymore. I don’t know how many times a week it happened, because it always began and ended the same except for the one time when my dad through a glass at my mom; she ducked and it hit me in the forehead; I still bear the memory just like the scar. I always remember the hurt, pain, and humiliation my mother felt with his affairs; which he didn’t even try to hide. One time we were having a barbeque at our house with neighbors and friends; his latest woman came to our home in a taxi; she sent in one of her two children to get my dad; he went out to the street with the boy and got into the taxi and left with her. My mom hid her pain until after the barbecue and continued on like the trooper she was. He didn’t come back until the next day; he never had remorse or even an apology for humiliating her like that.

I always swore I’d never marry someone like my father and I didn’t. I married someone far worse. My dad was overt with his abuse; it was easy to see and identify, but my ex was covert; I didn’t realize what I was in until I was too deep; emotionally, financially, and time. I didn’t always understand why my mom tolerated it; why she married him; why she hated him, but after 15 ½ years of walking in her shoes I understood exactly what emotional, verbal, and physical abuse feels like. I never thought I’d ever be in my mom’s shoes, because I was too smart, but the imprint from childhood already marked me for my future relationship.

My daughter has witnessed and reacted just as I did as a child at seeing her mother being abused. On July 11th, 2004 my ex and I were arguing about his porn addiction. I had a glass of water in my hand and held it to my head; when you lived with a narcissistic personality disorder trying to communicate makes your head feel like it’s going to explode. The glass slipped out of my hand and broke and that sent my ex into a blind rage. I was standing in our family room near the kitchen door and when he got up from our futon couch he came at me full force; shoving me so hard that I landed in the kitchen. I had just gotten off crutches a few days before after a knee surgery, so protecting my knee was in my mind. I landed on the ceramic tile floor; my head hitting the tile first and my left hand tucked under my left knee. I ended up having a fractured head and broken hand. The worst part was my daughter watched the whole thing. She saw me screaming in pain and when she went to try to help me up off the kitchen floor; her dad still in a rage yelled at her to get away from your mom she’s just f@%king faking. Most of the abuse to this point was physical intimidation; he would throw me, raise his fist to punch me, and corner me in the bathroom and not allow me to exit. Abuse can escalate and it did in my case. Once I got up still in shock and hysterical; I went into our spare bedroom and called my sister, but she wasn’t home, so I called my father in tears and told him what he did. This scared my ex because if I was telling family who else would I tell. He went into self-preservation mode and begged me not tell anyone else; worried about his career not me; saying how it was an accident and he would never do anything to hurt me again. I didn’t go to the doctor until the next day for my hand and head and lied to the physician saying I slipped, because military doctors don’t have to follow the same protocol as civilian in the sense of patient confidentiality. I also scheduled an intake appointment with the local domestic violence support system. That week he was so kind and nice, so I cancelled my intake appointment. Things were good for a while; the honeymoon period, but it was sliding right back to the way it always was. My daughter had just started the 2nd grade and we were called in to her school by her teacher; she was having behavioral problems, hitting, talking back, not listening, and anger issues; something that was not the norm for her. I thought maybe it was ADD/ADHD, no, it was seeing what happened to me and I didn’t realize how it had traumatized her. How I could I see; I didn’t realize how what I witnessed as a child affected me until I was in my 40’s. I found my daughter a therapist to help her with the trauma and I made another intake appointment with the DV support system and this opened many new doors for me; in understanding how his behavior was affecting my daughter and myself; it also gave me a vocabulary to describe and define his abusive behavior. From that point I outlined a plan to get away safely. That plan took me longer than I wanted; 5 years, but my daughter and I got out and I have never regretted leaving; I just wish I would have had the strength to do it sooner.

I carry a lot of guilt and shame for what I tolerated in my marriage; just like my mother. Although, the difference between my mother and I is that I had more education and support systems to help me survive than she had. I also, don’t want to hold onto the pain and hurt, because that’s something that imprisoned my mother; it froze her emotionally. I want to be the last generation of abused women in my family. I’m giving my daughter the tools that I didn’t have growing up, so she can end this cycle.