I've almost finished reading a book about a girl who grew up in an abusive household and is now - as a twenty-something-year-old - experiencing an abusive relationship herself. I won't mention the title because readers need to dig into it without having any knowledge of what it's about. In this story the protagonist meets a man who's cool, relatable, successful, rich, and whom she connects with at the first meet. They start off casual but eventually fall in love. Life is perfect; her new business is on a roll, love life is on a role, her mother's happy, her best friend is happy, she's happy, and she's healthy.
One day, she and her man are having a good time at home - until his precious neurosurgeon hand gets injured and her dumb-ass starts laughing, presumably because she's been having too much of a good time for anything to ruin her mood. He tells her to stop laughing but she can't. Obviously, he gets pissed off, and that's the first time he lays a hand on her. What was meant to be a little push results in blood and fear. She wakes up after a brief moment of unconsciousness. The victim card immediately slides towards her. They're both hurt, but he's the only one apologizing while she looks at him in disgust and shock. Did he just push me? Of course, what he's done is way worse than her simple silliness, but in this moment I briefly saw through the eyes of the man. He didn't mean to hurt her, he just got angry because he's hurt the most precious part of his neurosurgeon body: his hand, and all she did was laugh. That's why the line can be blurry sometimes - do his actions already represent abuse at this point? He didn't intend to hurt her. The protagonist then sees her father in him - the man she watched hurt her mother over and over through the years. But she tells herself that this is different - and it is, because her father abused her mother intentionally and cruely, while her man didn't mean to. However, after the second time I couldn't let him slide, because this time he was completely at fault.
Now, from the outside looking in it's simple enough to say "just leave," but put yourself in her shoes. The person you love whom you've spent your best days with, whom you've shared dozens of stories and secrets with, whose kind family you've met, whom you've always seen as absolutely wonderful...hurts you...then looks into your eyes and apologizes and goes back to being the person you fell in love with. You want to forget what happened each time because you can't believe they would do something like this. So you continue making excuses to yourself - he didn't mean to; it was my fault; it'll never happen again; it was just an argument, etc. And you keep going - till you marry him. Deep down you know what he's done is unjustifiable, but you bury that feeling and proceed because you're blinded by love. It's like after you watched Super Size Me you vowed you'd never eat at McDonalds again but a few months later you found yourself at the familiar cashier ordering a double cheeseburger (that was a terrible example). I suppose in some cases women are able to built up the courage to leave, but in most cases they aren't. You've waited for a love like this and want to make it work, because there have been more good moments than bad and you don't want to give him up. He means the world to you.
You get into another fight. He apologizes. You have make-up sex. The protagonist tells herself that marriage requires committment and it wouldn't be right to give up after only a few days. So once again she forgives him and keeps going. Things are back to being hearts and flowers again.
Then one day things escalate. Her high school ex comes back into her life. Her man suspects her of cheating for no valid reason and looks through her stuff. He finds her old high school diaries in which she wrote about a certain guy she loved back in the day - he immediately puts one and one together. Imagine. He hurts you again. You convince him it was all in the past. This man that you love apologizes from the bottom of his heart and tells you he's jealous because he just doesn't want to lose you. You're touched (emotionally) and forgive him. And you blame yourself for making him feel that way. All you care about is for him to understand that you'd never hurt him.
Now that that's settled, there's no reason he'd ever feel the need to physically harm you again...Right?
Wrong! Girl, at this point you should be miles away from this man! I think that the problem is women try to excuse the first incident as a simple fight, argument, or accident. But the fact is that he physically harmed you. He was violent with you. And that should never ever be justified. A good man will express his rage in words, not violence. If he's the kind of man who throws things across the room in frustration, or punches his fist through a wall or glass, I say that's also a warning sign.
But through getting lost in this book, I've learned that it's easier said than done - leaving, I mean. Because it's not easy to draw that line and it's not easy to fall out of love. Also, sometimes he'll threaten to hurt or kill you if you try to tell or leave. And those are just a few out of a hundred reasons why DV is so terrifying.
Shout out to male DV victims too.
The first thing we can do to stay safe is to know - from skin to bone - who we're marrying. Date and later live together for at least two years first.
I'm looking forward to reading the rest of the book.
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