Domestic Violence

Domestic violence should not happen to anybody, ever, period, but it does. Maybe you have lived with abuse, maybe it happened just once or twice, maybe you work or live next to someone who is being abused right now, or maybe YOU yourself are the abuser.

During the courtship period, everyone is on their best behavior. The verbal abuse is slight and probably few and far between. Since women want to believe the best of their lovers, they overlook obvious verbal abuse. Chemistry adds to the capability women have to overlook the first subtle signs of abuse.

Then they marry or rent the U-Haul and move in together, and then, “all hell breaks loose.”

My last ex is a prime example of one being on their best behavior in public. To the outside she was funny, charming and her world revolved around me and making me happy, but nothing was further from the truth.

To me she was a controlling, verbally, mentally abusive, insecure, jealous, self centered bully, and she was only a liar when her lips were moving. She is a truck driver and one would think that I would have been more relaxed when she was gone, but I wasn’t because she constantly called me on the phone to check on what I was doing.

What was mine was hers and what was hers was hers. She controlled the majority of the money, she blew her paychecks, so basically my entire paychecks went to the bills, I have an eleven year old daughter and I needed to keep a roof over her head and food in her belly, and I did.

She was resentful towards me when I started writing for West Virginia Queer News, she wanted my column to be a “co-authored column.”  Have you ever tried to write something with someone who has to have words larger than two syllables explained to them? I remember her words clearly when she found out I was asked to write this diversity column, she said, “I THOUGHT this was something WE were going to do TOGETHER!”

As writers, we are not censored by Terry but my articles were continually censored by her, so I had to watch what I wrote about. She suggested several times that I should tell you all how wonderful and loving she was, and when I didn’t she would pout and throw tantrums like a five year old. 

She was jealous when I enrolled into college, she was jealous of and hated most of my friends and when I was at work, and I was supposedly sleeping with everyone because, she wasn’t getting anything at home, when she started behaving badly what little sexual attraction I had left for her went out the window and the mere thought of having sex with her physically sickened me.

She worked hard at taking away any individuality I had left, she wanted to be involved in ALL areas of my life, there wasn’t an “I” anymore, it was “WE”, I didn’t exist anymore, I was dead.

She also had huge jealousy issues towards my daughter and my daughter hated her. When she was home from work Jenna stayed locked up in her bedroom 24/7 and when she left to go back to work this little girl would literally do the happy dance of joy because when she wasn’t home it was just me and her, she had her mom back.

The jealousy didn’t happen right away but there were gradual red flags which obviously I chose to ignore because in the beginning she charmed me just like she did everyone else around us.

Towards the end of the relationship when she knew that I had enough of her bullshit and was looking for my own apartment, she started taking the keys away to the car she had bought me. Once she changed the locks and barricade me out of my own home while I was out with friends, she actually had furniture blocked up against the doors.

She thought it would leave me stranded and dependent on her, it would make me NEED her, but I have wonderful friends so that “plan of action” backfired on her and she wasn’t smart enough to lock all of the windows so I got back in (thanks Jenn Lynn).

Victims of domestic abuse or domestic violence may be men or women, although women are more commonly victimized,  “men don’t tell.” This abuse happens among heterosexual couples and in same-sex partnerships. Except for the gender difference, domestic abuse doesn’t discriminate.

It happens within all age ranges, ethnic backgrounds, and financial levels. The abuse may occur during a relationship, while the couple is breaking up, or after the relationship has ended.

Despite what many people believe, domestic violence is not due to the abuser’s loss of control over his or her behavior. In fact, violence is a deliberate choice made by the abuser in order to take control over his wife or partner.

Personally I believe that verbal and mental abuse is the absolute worst. My physical injuries eventually healed but the hurtful words and mental tactics used to inflict damage on me, will always remain embedded in my brain, forever seared there like a permanent tattoo.

Often a verbal abuser is quite sensitive to outsiders finding out about the abuse and is very careful to save these scenes for the home environment only. Many verbal abusers are delightful and charming in public. They treat their spouse or girlfriend with such respect that people often think they “are the perfect couple.” They save their cruelty for a private audience of one.

Every day four women die in this country as a result of domestic violence, the result of murders and assaults by their partners. That’s approximately 1,400 women a year, according to the FBI. The number of women who have been murdered by their intimate partners is greater than the number of soldiers killed in the Vietnam War, can you imagine seeing all of those names on a granite monument like the Vietnam War memorial?

Although only 572,000 reports of assault by intimates are officially reported to federal officials each year, the most conservative estimates indicate two to four million women of all races and classes are battered each year. At least 170,000 of those violent incidents are serious enough to require hospitalization, emergency room care or a doctor’s attention.

Every year approximately 132,000 women report that they have been victims of rape or attempted rape, and more than half of them knew their attackers. It’s estimated that two to six times that many women are raped, but do not report it. Every year 1.2 million women are forcibly raped by their current or former male or female partners, some more than once.

I have had it happen to me more than a few times by my ex Karen and I didn’t report it either. Who was I going to tell? I felt like I would be ridiculed if I spoke the words out loud, “my girlfriend raped me”. to this day, if you asked me why I stayed, I wouldn’t have an answer for you because I do not know.

Women are 10 times more likely than men to be victimized by an intimate. Young women, women who are separated, divorced or single, low- income women and African-American women are disproportionately victims of assault and rape. Domestic violence rates are five times higher among families below poverty levels, and severe spouse abuse is twice as likely to be committed by unemployed men as by those working full time. Violent attacks on lesbians and gay men have become two to three times more common than they were prior to 1988.

Violent juvenile offenders are four times more likely to have grown up in homes where they saw violence. Children who have witnessed violence at home are also five times more likely to commit or suffer violence when they become adults.

Women who are battered have more than twice the health care needs and costs than those who are never battered. Approximately 17 percent of pregnant women report having been battered, and the results include miscarriages, stillbirths and a two to four times greater likelihood of bearing a low birth weight baby. Abused women are disproportionately represented among the homeless and suicide victims. Victims of domestic violence are being denied insurance in some states because they are considered to have a “pre-existing condition.”

All of you know how much needs to be done to take meaningful steps to end domestic violence and sexual assault. We need tough law enforcement, aggressive prosecutions, effective prevention programs and available shelters for families in distress. Most importantly, we need to insure that more people know and understand that domestic violence is not a private matter. It is a critical national problem that affects us all, in every community, in every work place and in every school.

Maybe that saying  “Sticks and Stones” should be revised to say, “Sticks and Stones WILL break my bones and words WILL scar my soul”.

National Domestic Violence Hotline 

1-800-799-SAFE (7233) or 1-800-787-3224.

I hope you all have a wonderfully safe and prosperous week!

~Cee~

———————————————————————-

True friends pay it forward”

When you give someone the chance to know you, really know you, you expose the most inner being of whom you really are. You allow them to see the good, bad and indifferent side of you. I am sure you have all heard the catch phrase; “true friends are one in a million”. When you can connect with someone on that level, it is almost like bearing your soul completely.

I vividly remember when my oldest brother passed away I felt like I had been abandoned. I was lost, depressed, lonely. I felt as if a part of me had died right along with him. I sank into such a deep depression that I did not want to exist anymore. I fantasized about wrapping my car around a tree or running off of one of the cliffs at McConnell Mill’s state park. I had two daughters who desperately needed me but at that time all I wanted was self gratification, I wanted to stop hurting and no one else mattered to me.

When I was at my worst God sent me an angel named Amy. My oldest daughter at that time was a “Goose bump” fanatic and had begged me to take her down to the local book store so that she could get the new issue. Although I didn’t feel like dragging myself out of bed, I did and it was that day that Amy and I met and instantly connected.

Unbeknownst to me Amy also had been experiencing difficulties in her life and was feeling hopeless as well. She saved my life and for that I will always be grateful to her. We became the best of friends and shared everything with one another. She forced me take a good look at myself. We taught one another how to “live again”.

Over the years our friendship grew to be more than, we are “sisters” now and even though she lives in another state we still regularly keep in touch with one another and I can still tell her everything. I will always love her with all of my heart, that will never change.

Have you ever given someone the best of you? Have you been a shoulder to lean on? To cry on? Have you lent an unbiased ear to someone in need? Have you ever given advice to someone knowing that you were the only person they could turn to?  Have you offered someone a place to lay their head knowing that they had nowhere else to lay? Have you unselfishly given?  You should because it is one of the most rewarding feelings you will have ever experienced.

This is a cruel and biased world, but have you ever let yourself go long enough to take the jump to enjoy the better things it has to offer? Have you ever looked into the eyes of a person in need and let go of your own insecurities to try and fix the problems that plague them?

When I was employed at Wal Mart there was a homeless woman named April who would come in at night to get out of the bitter cold. She would sit on a bench towards the back of the store, out of everyone’s way and read.

The majority of my co workers would make snide remarks to one another about her because her clothes were tattered and dirty. The night manager wanted to have her thrown out of the store because she was worried what the other customers might think. I at one point put my job on the line to protect her because all that they were willing to see was her immediate outside appearance.

But that “outside appearance” was not who April was, and I was drawn to her, I wanted to get to know her so I did. I saw a woman who carried all that she owned in a paper bag, yet her hair was always brushed, her nails were nicely painted and she wore perfume. Despite not having nice clothes or a warm jacket to wear, she tried to preserve what little dignity she had left and I respected her for that.

I started taking my hour lunches with her, sharing what I had for my lunch. Night after night I sat on that bench with her and listened to her pour her heart out. She was my age and hadn’t always been the woman she had become. I remember the first time I brought her extra clothes, and a warm winter jacket, she looked into my eyes, thanked me and then cried, all that April really wanted was a friend and I was able to give her that.

At one point, April was married, had two beautiful children, a great job, a nice house and then one day for no particular rhyme or reason her husband picked up with their two children and left the state. She fell into a deep depression and never recovered.

The nights that I did not work, I would still bring April something to eat, if she wasn’t there yet I would just leave it on “her bench” and the next evening she would have my container there waiting for me, washed with a thank you note inside of it.

Eventually I lost touch with her after I resigned my position but one of my co workers to this day still runs into her from time to time and he says that she asks about me every time they see one another.

Take a good look at the life you’ve lived. Are the people around you better off having known you? Have  you impacted someone else’s life on any level?  Can you laugh at yourself and not at others? Only when this is true, can you say that you have truly lived, and lived to the fullest that life has offered you. So take a good look in the mirror, do you like the person that is staring back at you.

 Most people live very meaningless lives that revolve around the preconceived views of what society thinks we should be. Most people are only interested in their own “self gratification”. So remember this phrase,  “pay it forward“ and be prepared to sit back and watch the rippling effect and how powerful and positive this  phrase can be if brought to life.

Maybe it will help make 2008 a better year for someone, maybe that someone is you. I  can guarantee that it be the most rewarding selfless act that you will have ever experienced in your life, “start living by giving”.

I hope you all have a wonderfully prosperous week!!

~Cee~

———————————————————————-

It’s never too late

We all have those people in our lives that we love to hate, but by the same token, we admire them and wish that we could fall into shit just as often and come out smelling like a rose as they do.  It seems that my entire life has consisted of having to fight for what I want.  I had a really hard childhood and, believe me when I tell you that we had it rough. 

My grandmother always taught me that if I wanted something bad enough I could achieve it with determination and perseverance and she was right.  By the beginning of my senior year I had a full time job at Burger King, my own vehicle and my own apartment…I was 17 years old.  Now my family and my closest friends will tell you that if they ever need me I am there for them, I would give them the last dollar I have and the heart out of my chest if they needed it.  I appreciate them and never once do I end a conversation or visit with them without telling them I love them, because I do, the one thing I learned when my oldest brother Chuckie passed away was that life is way too short and you should never leave anything unsaid.

Now, when it comes to myself, I am a terrible procrastinator.  Even though, I know what I want for myself I will make it my absolute last goal…and I do not know why.  Over the years I have thought a lot about why I am the way I am when it comes to myself, I mean I am not that overweight, self-conscious, little girl anymore. So why do I still occasionally feel like I am? Why does change scare me so bad?

With time, we all change and I guess we are all guilty of doing things to make other people happy, while all that we succeed in doing is making ourselves miserable. With me it was maintaining a fifteen year marriage to a man, even though, I have known since I was 15 years old that I was gay, but to make my mother and grandmother proud of me, I put on that beautiful white gown and walked down the aisle even ,though I knew that I was not being true to myself.

But, I do have two beautiful well adjusted daughters from that marriage, so it wasn’t a complete farce per say. It is my belief that something good comes out of everything and those young ladies have made me very proud many times.

So I decided that it was time to make amends to myself and pursue the college education I tossed away after high school. So I  recently enrolled into Everest University online.  My major is Criminal Justice, but my true love, other than my beautiful girlfriend Laura, is Journalism.  I love to write. Ever since I was a child, I have been able to pour words onto paper like water from a spigot. Maybe I will pursue both. 

She works for a fortune 500 company and recently she had to take classes for her job,  it is her companies way of determining wage increase eligibility.  She was asked about a personal goal and her response was “learning to become a mother”, although she has no children of her own she has taken my youngest daughter under her wing and into her heart and has been a wonderful mother to Jenna.  They adore one another and I absolutely adore them. We have decided that in the fall of 2008 she is going to conceive and we are both very excited.

So, now that my personal life has fallen into place, I am trying very hard to not procrastinate anymore when it comes to myself.  Going back to school hasn’t been easy, but I know that in the long run it will all be worth it.  I want to be a role model for my daughters and my grand daughter. 

I want them to know that it is never too late to better themselves.  Just like my mother, I do not regret any self-sacrifices that I have had to make so that they didn’t have to do without.  My five minutes of fame will come the day that I walk across that stage and receive my degree.

     I hope you all have a wonderful week…

     ~Tig~

Tiggerific2722@aol.com