Spousal Abuse,domestic
violence; those two phrases were
never heard of (at least by me) in the
mid-sixties. As a matter of fact, I don't recall
ever hearing about them until the early eighties.
And even then, I seldom heard it mentioned
anywhere. Another big one was Alcoholism,<
i> I had no idea what an alcoholic was suppose
to look or act like. But today, I can tell
you that spousal abuse and alcoholism go hand in
hand. In my case, I was sure they were related,
except for after years of drinking, he sobered up
for a few months and abused me and the kids
again, and again.... I used to think that if I
was real sweet and got his dinner ready when he
came home from work, layed out his clothes in the
morning, even warmed up his truck in the winter,
he wouldn't beat me up anymore. Well, I got news
for you, it did NOT make a bit of
difference. After many years of putting up with
it, I started calling the police. Since most of
his drinking was done on weekends, they'd tell me
to go to the prosecutor's office on Monday, and
press charges against him. By then he was back to
work and very "sorry", so I wouldn't do anything about it.
In the early to the mid-eighties, I found out that I
could have pressed charges on him at anytime by
requesting that the cops bring the papers with
them, when I called. So, I finally did it.
He swore revenge as they loaded him up in the
police car. Of course, he got out the next
morning, after he was found not guilty. The
last time I pressed charges, he spent 2 weeks in
the County jail. He was soooo "sorry", he was
crying. Well I'm sure you guessed it, he did it
again. He never stopped beating me up, until the
day he died; that is after going to 3 different
Alcoholic treatment centers, and a psychiatric
ward. Today, I am reliving it through my
daughter. It's a vicious circle that has to be
stopped. I hope this story of my life helps some of you that are
being abused, and believe that you did something
wrong to deserve that kind of abuse from a
spouse, and think he or she will change if you
are a nicer person. Just leave now before it's too late. The chance is that it will only
get worse. Nicole
I will be adding other chapters as I get them done, so please come back and check later.
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