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information, ideas, feelings, problems and solutions on a personal
level.
At today's f2f meeting an elder al anon member spoke of her work with batterers and the similarities (sometimes connected to A) with alcoholism.
After the meeting we talked of levels of safety - I feel that if I was ever in danger of physical violence, I would leave immediatly. Perhaps, all feel that way but it can change, I don't know.
But the other levels of safety that we can downplay are not so obvious and we can be so sick with the family disease that we are unaware or use fantasy type excuses. Like I can not go to sleep until the ah does as I don't trust that things are safe for the family - ie logs have rolled out of the fireplace. The lack of sleep does me in often and affects my progress of recovery.
Another stated her ex vet ah had a gun he'd get out when drinking but knew he'd never shoot her and if he did it was not intentional. She realized much later how that was not a good way to think.
My AH's brakes went out in his car today, no injury, no kids in car but lack of judgement re: buying a reliable car & he can afford it. Kind of a stand off because I got a car out of turn but I refuse to drive an unreliable car with family or mutiple kids riding. I do most of the driving and all night driving.
The attitude of gratitude helped me stay in the moment and not go crazy or get angry with what could have happened. Thank you al anon~
Are there other levels of safety issues you can all share that might be a wake up call to newer al anoners like me who don't even see the dangers?
this was an eye opener for me
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"Choices are the hinges of destiny." Pythagoras You can't change the past, but you can change the future.
my worry about safety around my A stems from how quickly his mood changes, how suddenly he moves faster and violently, voice raising to a scream as the swearing and insults come in, slamming doors, slamming his hand onto things loudly, sometimes near me. i freak out about how he can go from zero to violence in two seconds! he hasn't taken this violence out on me or my child, other than getting verbally insulting very loudly with me (not in the presence of my child, which i am thankful for). but i have never been with a man who wasn't violent and eventually snapped and hit or punched me, or twisted my arms behind my back, or blocked my way, or threatened me into a corner. i find myself waiting for the other shoe to drop, as they say.
long story short, the danger i watch for is for him to snap and turn into an abuser. yet i pray that he'll be the first man i've met who *isn't* abusive. he's gruff and hard to deal with, he goes to extremes, but so far me and my child are safe ... my guess is that some people have a "switch" inside them that allows them to abuse, and some people are aware of that point, and stop before they get to it.
i watch my A very, very carefully for signs that he could turn into an abuser. i have a safety plan of my own, to get away if i need to, or to throw him out of the house if need to. i have little safety plans for when unexpected things happen, situations like you describe. when i have my safety plans, i feel more relaxed and much safer. i hope any of what i've said helps. {{{ddub}}}
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To know the darkness is to love the light, to welcome dawn and fear the coming night.
I've just read your reply to a very serious topic. What concerns me is the fact that you don't seem to realize violence that comes in the form of verbal abuse and aggresive cruelty are abuse all the same. You ARE being abused, in those manners. Sadly many use denial by saying, but he hasn't hit us. Sadly many wait until it does cross from verbal to physical, only to find themselves making more excuses. "Well he only did that once" "Well we healed from that" all the while not realizing or refusing to see the real damage is you are knee deep in fear with your mind and body constantly on fight or flight mode. Please find a sponsor to talk this out. Contact a local safety house and hear what abuse is and how it begins. Learn to protect yourself and your children so they don't take these life lessons into their relationships. Believing this is the norm. Pretending they aren't being already in a very dangerous and abusive relationship. Bodies often times heal quickly, minds, hearts, souls and self esteem are destroyed for a life time. Ask yourself, if a friend told you her story and it sounded like yours, what would you suggest for them? If you care nothing for yourself to leave this already abusive situation, please care enough for your children. We are their voices, if they have none...they do not feel safe. If they live in fear, they grow with shame, low self esteem. Ask yourself do I want my children to be in this situation one day?
Very good post. Sounds like it was an excellent meeting. To me I like to be emotionally safe. AH was never a nasty drunk (unless I decided to pick a fight with him while he was drinking! Talk about dumb!), but I was always afraid to come home to. I never knew if he would be sober or drunk. If I was coming home to a house that would be trashed because he stumbled around with his bad feet or if he mixed his meds or didn't take them. All that caused huge amounts of stress and worry for me while I was at work. I seldom ever went out with friends. I felt like sometimes I needed to protect him from himself. Of course there are those A that are verbally abusive. Sometimes that hurts worse than being hit. A slap heals, but the emotional scars can last forever. I am blessed I have never had that in my life. Emotional safety has become a big issue with me both at work and at home. I am finding the more I work my program, the stronger I become, the less I let all these stressors get to me. It helps me to stay in the moment. It helps me to deal with nasty customers, bosses, employees. It helps me deal with whatever comes my way. Love and blessings to you and your family.
Live strong, Karilynn & Pipers Kitty
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It's your life. Take no prisoners. You will have it your way.
Just a little from me, 'cos this subject is really painful and so difficult for me to talk about and I have not recovered from it because I find it so hard to address.
While the bruises disappear and the broken bones mend the psychological damage does NOT and the emotions are wrecked.
I found it really hard to engage in sex with my AH when he could just as easily physically abuse me as well as emotionally scar me, and how could I engage in something that is supposed to be a loving mutual act of the highest order when the person I was lying with had terrified me either into it or simply scared me so that I had to engage in the act for fear of retribution.
It left me unable to even consider another man in my life, which has been a really difficult thing for me to come to term with.
I do NOT consider verbal abuse any worse than physical abuse, however I can say, in my experience physical abuse is always accompanied by verbal abuse too. And there's the double whammy.
Today I run a mile from aggression or confrontation or a drunk, even though I have worked time and time again, year after year with the Christmas Shelter Projects. It was my way of trying to face my fears in a safe environment and helped me with the compassion I now have for anyone who has a drink problem and is abusive.
Heartbroken - and still very scared.
This is a pandora's box for me and I will have to address it at some stage.
-- Edited by Heartbroken at 11:27, 2008-01-21
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"The highest form of wisdom is kindness." The Talmund
My denile stems from my family of origin. There was every single kind of abuse (emotional, mental, physical, verbal and sexual). My ex was all of the above. For many years I countered it with being as abusive as I could be right back. Which would esclate things and he would snap and get very, very violent. In the aftermath I would talk myself into believeing that it wasn't so bad, it wouldn't happen again, I made my bed and now I had to lie in it, I was biding my time for revenge, I was different, WE were different, I knew it was abuse but I wasn't an abused wife......Oh my denile gave me many, many excuses to stay. I called the police countless times. I had bruises and a couple of times a slightly crushed windpipe. I don't know what I was waiting for. He would get back into AA and I would feel a level of safety. I have heard so many times people say "Well, if he hit me, That would be it. I would walk." and then those same people say "Well, if he hits me one more time...." I don't know what it takes for people to put away their denile and take care of themselves. For me, it was my kids. When I saw what his addiction was doing to my kids (and it took years of this program to recognize this) I knew I had to get out.
Looking back, I see how in danger I was. I can't imagine that I stayed for so long. Reading about the woman whose husband gets out the gun when drinking and she thinks he won't shoot her. But I thought that if I were holding our newborn, he WOULDN"T hit me. Not only did he hit me, he tried to hit the baby and much much more. There is no telling what an A will do. I always felt like I was overreacting when I would tell others of the horrors. Now days, I know that I wasn't and even if I was it is far, far better to over react and run with my life and my sanity then it is to sit and tell myself it isn't so bad and be dead.
I would bet that every single person who is the victim of a homicide or rape by a family member thought "it's not so bad, I can deal with this." at one point. The point right before they lost thier lives. I need validation from others (healthy people, program people) that I didn't have to take it, it really was that bad and I was putting myself and my children in harm's way. And for what? To not hurt his feelings, not set him off, fear of being alone? I am worth more than that.
I have gone through survivors classes (for DV) and done quite a bit of work through therapists, etc. To be honest, it was al-anon that made it all come together for me. If it were not for al-anon, I do not think I could have "connected the dots" and really seen, understood and dealt with they cycle of violence I was in with my AH.
My therapist once asked me point blank: "why would you ever want to spend time with someone who treated you that way? Why would you ever want to get into a car with that person? Why would you ever want to get onto an airplane with that person?" If you could only look at yourself as another woman, see that this other woman is being subjected to this, would you do something, go to her and hug her? Go and tell that guy to take a hike and sit down and have a chat with that poor woman who is about to have a nervous break down from all the yelling, the tantrums, the blame being foisted upon her hourly, daily, monthly, yearly?! Why would anyone want to spend a single second with someone like that?
I found that when I really started to put myself first, started to really love myself, that was when I realized that no, I will not place myself into any unsafe situations. I had friends who were afraid for me. My sister was, my girlfriends were. They were subconsiously waiting to hear about my disappearance. THEY NEVER TOLD ME THIS until I left him. I do not know, if they had, I might not have been able to listen or hear them. I do not know, I was so far down, so hating on myself and so desperate for his love or affection (which was few and far between, believe me). I was deep in my disease and its insanity. He would punch a hole into the wall right next to where my head was. All I thought was- how considerate of him that he punched the wall and not my head...(groan)!
He never became friends with any of my friends. He never became friends with my family. He always held back. This made them suspicious, eventually. My mother (a non-drinking A who is not in recovery) regrets ever saying yes to him when he asked her if he could marry me. She feels bad about it but thought everything was OK, In fact, no one really knew him. I did not either. But how could I when I did not even know myself or care enough about myself not to tolerate such behavior?!
The key is to CARE ABOUT YOURSELF.
We expect the best in people, we want things to be good. We cannot walk around in a total state of paranoia not trusting anyone. We have to take risks. Safety is relative. Everyone has different levels of what they can and will tolerate. Here, where I live, a young man high on ice took a 2 year old and threw him over one of those overpass pathways over the highway. The boy dropped 24 feet to his death and was then run over by traffic. Safety seems to be there (I am sure that mother left her child with family members and thought her son was safe that day) and then suddenly it is not (she gets the call that this horrible thing happened to her son).
I now do my best to invest time and energy into positive safe people instead of negative, depressed, unsafe people.
. But I thought that if I were holding our newborn, he WOULDN"T hit me. Not only did he hit me, he tried to hit the baby and much much more. There is no telling what an A will do. I always felt like I was overreacting when I would tell others of the horrors. Now days, I know that I wasn't and even if I was it is far, far better to over react and run with my life and my sanity then it is to sit and tell myself it isn't so bad and be dead.