My Verbally Abusive Marriage

Written November 2009 while still married to my husband:

Abuse is wildly twisted and warps the minds and hearts of everyone it touches. The ones who we call abusers are as tortured as the ones we call victims. There is no excuse for any abuse one person afflicts upon another. It is not noble or okay to hurt anyone, but to end abuse we must realize that demons have both the abuser and the victim tightly by the throat.

I, an abuse victim, am at a double-disadvantage because I am clear-minded enough to acknowledge that, by nature, I have my own set of problems and sins to conquer. Therefore, I acknowledge that at least in this one way, Will and I are the same. I am willing to forgive Will his sins committed against me because I want him to forgive my sins against him.

One difference between us is that I am willing to say “I fucked up,” and seek forgiveness. If he says, “I fucked up,” he seeks silence; he doesn’t want to think or talk about it ever again, and a true apology is the source of much pain. Apologizing admits fault; he cannot be at fault.

The demons in him demand perfection. He measures his self-worth by the imaginary yardsticks he’s placed in their hands. I look to him to tell me my value, but he looks at every other soul in the world to validate him. When he chokes me or demands my allegiance, it is because I am the one person he can control when he truly wants to choke the shit out of every other person looking at him, judging him.

And he is okay with this because he believes I let him down. In the beginning, he wanted what I had to offer, and set about taking it from me. Like the farmer who killed the goose laying golden eggs, his greed quickly smothered my fire. Probably as the farmer did after cutting open the goose, he desperately sought to find another source of fire. He didn’t check inside of himself because he never once thought there was a fire inside of himself; instead, he sought the fire in another woman or dug at my entrails, hoping for a spark.

In the story, the goose is undoubtedly dead. It is different when a person figuratively dies. The spark of life within us dies only when the body dies; Will has not physically murdered me, so my spark has never completely vanished. Over time, the tiny spark tries to become a fire again.

When Will sees this happening, he is at first overjoyed. He thinks there is hope for him; he feels in love and happy. Or maybe simply secure. But he has a bad habit in greed. It is never long before he wants my spark for his own. It is never long before he seeks to take it. It is not long before he abuses again.

On one level, my participation in the abusive cycle is one I do not wish to stop. I do not want my fire to go out; I do not want to die. Naturally, when I feel the spark roar into a flame, I do not wish to douse it, I want to let it burn. That desire is not a mistake, it is life itself.

The problem is that I want to make Will happy. I know I have something that he wants, and I want to share it with him. I gingerly expose my roaring flame to Will, thinking, “I want to share myself with him; I want to live with him.”

Intuitively, I hope that an ember from inside of me will jump inside of him, igniting his own spark so he will realize he doesn’t have to take mine. This is my mistake. I am trying to share my life with the wrong person. I will not accept the fact that Will must resurrect his fire on his own, just as I have done a thousand times for myself. I dare to think one thing easy in this life: I know how to resurrect the fire within myself. The hardest thing for me is to not share it with Will.

So where does this leave me and what will happen to my marriage? I want to share my life with him. I want to share everything I am with this man who cannot live on his own. His habitual taking of what is good is killing me and his habitual refusal to find the spark of life within himself is dooming him to a life of failure.

If I am able to learn to not give of myself to Will, if I am able to keep my fire from him, will he learn to look inside for his own fire? Or will he crack and finally kill me so he can once and for all take the spark of life from me to implant inside his own belly?

Can anyone say “Murder-Suicide”? Men kill their wives and then themselves because once she is finally dead and motionless on the floor, he realizes that the life spark was hers and hers alone. In killing her, he sought to absorb her; now that All is gone from her, he realizes he will never ever and had never ever been able to use her life spark for his own. Overwhelmed with true grief because he feels unable to live without leaching from her, he turns the weapon upon himself.

He truly loved her life force. His mistake was thinking he could ever take it from her and use it as fuel for himself.

Maribel described her abusive relationship with the words threatened, scared, hopeless and hurt. She found out she was being abused when her partner threatened to slap her.

She writes:

It all started when he said for me to bring him his phone from the room. He did not say it in a polite fashion, although I dismissed that and the following conversation proceeded:

Me: “Wasn’t it just here on the table?”
Him: “Why the hell would I be asking you to bring me the phone if it was on the table?”

I also dismissed this and brought him his phone. I tossed it so it would land right next to him.

Me: “You’re not welcome.”
Him: “I wasn’t going to say thank you.”
Me: “I know you weren’t. That’s why I said you’re not welcome.”

Read the rest of this story at “Maribel’s Story of Abuse” and then please add your comments for Maribel below.

Share your story of abuse at Stories of Abuse.

I am 14. I have opened my window, rotating it out just enough to see his headlights reflect in it when he turns down his driveway. I want him to return home, want him to come tapping on my window. I want to be his girlfriend.

He is the boy who raped me, on his couch, in only a few minutes, weeks before. But I didn’t want to call it rape. I wanted to call it love.

I wanted to have sex with him over and over and over again until I convinced myself that he was my first true love. For a few weeks that summer, I succeeded in doing that – at least most of the time.

But the tapping at the window and my subsequent hopping out of bed to glance out that window to see his face belied my true feelings. I was not Bess, the landlord’s daughter. He was not the bad boy Highwayman for whom I spent hours plaiting love knots into my long, dark hair.

Shame, dread, revulsion, … those feelings welled inside of me in between the taps on the window. The feelings’ poisonous nature sloshed around in my guts, eating and corroding my belly from the inside. Hyper-alert, unable to sleep, almost obsessive, I felt compelled to avenge my rape by pretending to control its circumstances; I couldn’t go back and control, re-do, what happened on the couch, but I could control whether it happened again, or again, or again. Continue reading

When I met Mr. Abuser he very quickly wanted to spend all his free time with me. I work 7 days a week so it was a little challenging. I did like him, so I worked it into my schedule.

When I didn’t see him, he “needed” to talk at least once or twice a day; would send numerous texts throughout the day which I wouldn’t respond to because my jobs require my full attention. I was dating someone else at the time I met him so, in all fairness, my availability was not exactly up to par with his. Continue reading

Have you been given bad advice by a member of the clergy? Did you feel blamed for the abuse in your relationship instead of helped? Have you been told to carry the water and serve the one who abused you?

If so, then you know that some clergy must be better educated about the dynamics of abuse.

Doug and Cindy Burrell’s ministry is about to take a giant, positive leap forward. They are speaking at a church about the harm done to abuse victims by clergy attempting to follow “God’s Word” but overlooking key scriptures in support of ending abuse.

Your experience will benefit their ministry and change someone’s life for the better.

If you would like to be a part of the story and positively impact the ways in which the church counsels domestic abuse victims, please contact them via the form at Cindy Burrell’s website, Hurt By Love.

Your anonymity will be protected.

This month, so far, I’ve received three stories from brave women. Two of them speak to financial abuse also, and Sarah has a blog.

These are their stories:

Rose Felt Worthless, Stuck, and Crazy

Laura Felt Devastated, Frustrated, and Shocked

Sarah Felt Betrayed, Sorrow, Brokenhearted (Sarah’s Blog: Sarah Found Her Voice)

Insisting on a commitment early in a relationship is a red flag marking a possible abuser. Commitments range from having sex to proclaiming love at first sight! Some commitments are implied, some are coerced, and others are demanded. Continue reading

So…last weekend there was a touching scene between my son and his father on my front porch. There was a hug and Will said ”You look good, son!” Will looked genuinely happy to see Marc, and vise-verse.

Fast forward to today when I, in my brilliance, decide to call Will. I tell him that Marc feels depressed and it is a good time to run over to my house and ask Marc if he’d like to go out and get some sunshine. The scene on the porch encouraged my suggestion.

(La dee da, Kellie hums to herself, I’m doing a good thing for my boy by communicating with my horrible – oops, I mean, Marc’s father, la dee da la dee da!) Hey – don’t knock it. It was a nice fantasy while it lasted. Continue reading

I like how Katheryn Lee-Ryder named her radio series “Roadmap to Freedom”. It’s the perfect name for people stuck in abusive relationships! Sometimes victims stay because there’s no direction on how to free themselves.

Abuse diminishes our ability to see our way free. We victims become reliant on the most unreliable source in the world (our abuser!) for help and how-to-almost anything.

Your abuser isn’t going to give you a map to freedom, but I think Ms. Lee-Ryder will.

If you’re interested in learning more about her program, Click Here!

This past summer’s testimonials came from several brave people who reached out to share their experiences. Doing so was good for them and good for us. Those of us still in abusive relationships can find validation in their experience, to know we’re not alone. Those of us out of abusive relationships can remember why we left and reflect on the chaos we once called our lives compared to the serenity and empowerment we now feel.

My heartfelt wishes of peace are with all of you. Thank you for sharing your stories of abuse.

• Steve - Sad, angry and confused
• Linda - Sadness, frustration, sense of unreality
• Courtney – Sadness, failure, frustration
• Kacy – Depression, guilt, failure
• Marla – Crazy, insane, useless
• Gina – Confusion, despair, hurt
• Alyssa – Anger, numbness, despair
• Ann – Shame, guilt, fear