The Man Who Never Hit Me
In the summer of 2016, I began to contemplate divorcing my husband. It was about economics, and my survival. I’d had to unofficially shut my life down for him. As I sat in my rose room and thought about the consequences of what I was thinking of doing, I had hard questions to answer.
I needed to work. My work enlivened me and brought me fulfillment. I needed to work because we could use the money. I needed to work because I missed seeing people and helping them to explore their lives.
He couldn’t deal with not having me in a constant support role. I was wilting on the vine, and it didn’t feel good. Once again, the narcissism of bipolar was rearing its ugly head.
So, why did I stay? I suppose you might say I stayed because I knew how sick he was, and what could happen if I left. I could have left and returned to the US and begun a new life. I stayed because my bottom line for remaining in the marriage was physical abuse.
Creepy? Yes, and no. He never hit me, but he had thrown things at walls and screamed at me. I had the emotional black-and-blue bruises to show for it; I had the environmental depression to show for it. But—he never hit me. I lived with a charged phone and a credit card that could be used at a moment’s notice to escape the marriage. I could grab my fully loaded purse and walk out the front door of the house never looking back. Like so many women, I’d leave with the clothes on my back.
He told me that he’d commit suicide before he would hit me. On August 28th of that year, he made his exit, and I didn’t need to return to the question of leaving him. And after twenty-two years of being together, he’d never hit me.
And yet, he did. I just didn’t have the photos of the physical bruises to show for it. He’d hit my soul, and my heart. Sometimes, the only way to see the damage is to see it from a distance. That view came after several years of being a widow, and before I returned to the work I love.
Now, eight years later, I know what it looks like, sounds like, and feels like to hear the words spoken by someone. I get the hesitancy to leave. And yet, the urgency to do so is present. It isn’t until you’re out that you fully understand the scope of the damage.
Well-meaning friends and family often judge and urge the person to leave—to get free of that lousy, no- good-person. It isn’t that easy. It’s super complex.
Most abuse victims do try to leave, and wind up going back because they haven’t got a plan of successful escape. Unless they’re fortunate enough to have a strong support system, leaving fails. They return because it is better to have shelter than to live in the uncertainty of the “what if and what will I do” type of thinking. Sometimes nice things look better than the one bedroom or studio flat that you have to take to escape. A homeless shelter isn’t very appealing either.
How do people really leave for good, and how do they start over? I’ll offer up one starting point: https://www.womenshealth.gov/relationships-and-safety/domestic-violence/leaving-abusive-relationship.
A Google search turns up many resources. Local women’s organizations are also a good place to begin to learn.
I’m not going to tell you how to leave. I am going to state that the bruises on the inside show through just as much as those on the outside. The makeup for the inner concealment tends to not work because it comes out in how one behaves.
I think back on the work I’ve done to heal my soul. It’s been a long, winding road of a soul journey to stare at the new woman in the mirror.
