First of all I have to say that my on line persona doesn't even compare to my real time personality. Writing never has been my thing, I can never get the words from my brain to my typing fingers while conveying the same compassion I am feeling. People who have never met me in real time and only know me on line, they laugh the first time they meet me. My writing style simply does not show my real time personality. So if I come off as being a harda@@, honestly I don't mean it that way.
Domestic violence, I don't get it. I'm one of those who believe that we can never really understand and relate to a handful of scenarios unless we experience them first hand. My parents were both alcoholics, I firmly believe one cannot understand alcoholism unless one IS an alcoholic. We can certainly have empathy and even sympathy for certain problems but can we *really* honestly relate and understand unless we walk in those same shoes?
Domestic violence. This has been something that I have never been able to get a grasp on. I have worked ER, Trauma, ICU/CCU, the works. I've been a nurse for over 20 years. While I can feel empathy with these folks I still don't get it. Why in the world would a woman (or man) want to stay with an abusive spouse? Financial issues only go so far. There is welfare, Medicaid, various forms of financial help. What about children? How can someone justify allowing their children to watch abusive parents for the sake of finances? Sure, it's easy for me to talk, I have no children. I never thought I would make a fantastic parent so I never had them. That's the most important job in the WHOLE WIDE WORLD! How can someone screw it up??? Teaching children what marriage is by beating the crap out of one or the other... what kind of role model is that?
If you stick your hand on a hot stove and it hurts, DON'T DO THAT ANYMORE! If your spouse is pounding the crap out of you, DON'T LET HIM/HER DO THAT ANYMORE! Why is this such a difficult concept? Yes, I know... finances, stability, home, .... but what is worth your life? Obviously, something. How many men and women die annually because of having the ever lov'en crap beat out of them by their spouse? It isn't like it's the first time it has happened.
What makes any person believe they are loved when they are being pounded on? Obviously, this is NOT a matter of common sense but something very different. What *is* that very different thing?
There is a thread about why some nurses stay after their shift is over and a few have discussed abusive home lives. That got me to thinking about this issue again. This is something I have simply never been able to wrap my brain around and I'm hoping someone can explain it.
Is there anyone out there that has been in such a relationship and since gotten out? Can you explain this to me? Honestly, I'm not a heartless big 'ol meanie, I just don't get it, but I want to understand. On COPS recently there was a clip where a man was pounding on another man. His justification... "He ain't married to my sister and nobody who isn't married to her hits her." ??????????????????
Maybe the more important question is... is there anyone out there that is IN an abusive relationship that wants out? While you are MORE than welcome to live in my home to escape your relationship, I hope you explain to me why you have permitted this for "X" amount of time. And I sincerely mean this, if any abused medical person wants out and needs a place to stay, Arizona has open arms. More specifically, my home is yours. Just please explain to me why you stayed as long as you did.
Seriously, can someone open my eyes to this issue? I really don't get it. I'm willing to be a solution to the problem, I just want to understand the problem.
Specializes in Geriatrics/Oncology/Psych/College Health.
My mother married my father 41 years ago this month. He is bipolar, a mean manic mostly, untreated for about 40 of those years, and tremendously verbally, emotionally, and occasionally physically abusive. He had a breakdown when I was a toddler for which he was in the hospital for about three months, but which I don't recall and only heard about in hushed whispers from my mother later after he had a delusional breakdown last year. He was on his needed med regimen for a couple of months, but in typical fashion started picking and choosing which pills and how much he would take. He goes in for the farce of his q3month medication management appointment with his psychiatrist, and tells him everything is going well. My mother sits quiely, knowing that if she dares say anything about how well it's NOT going, she had better be prepared for death or something worse.
I resent my father tremendously for his failure to treat his mental illness (pointless, I realize), and the emotional abuse he inflicted upon myself and my siblings growing up. My brother still has no concept of how to be a decent man and husband and father. My sister suffered years of abuse because she thought that's what you did in a relationship. I briefly started down that path, but managed to pull away - insight comes but you have to be in a position to accept it.
I had resented my mother for not doing _something_ to prevent her children from being exposed to this. It took some time to realize she can no more conceive of being in a different life than one can imagine how to live without oxygen. It's not even in the realm of possibilities for her. Of course, her father cheated and abused her mother, so why would _she_ think there was any other way. My mother did what she could to shield us, and I know my father has always been hardest on her as a result.
Somehow, these thoughts seem appropriate on a day when many folks will be with their families. My birth family is close enough that a trip home for the holiday is not out of the question, but we're here, ready to go to the home of friends - the family we've made as opposed to the one society dictates we should be spending the holiday with. I realize I can't control what goes on between my parents and by extension what my siblings choose to do in their relationships, and what my brother will be teaching his two children about what to expect from a "normal" life.
I realize not all or even most cases of abuse stem from mental illness, and it throws in a whole host of different issues, but like Bipley, even though I have eventually some to an understanding of the logic employed by my mother in staying with that man for 41 years, there remains a small part of me that will always be perplexed. When I see the picture of my mother at 18 and wonder what was in her mind then and the things she has seen and endured to get to where she is now...
First I don't agree with the poster who states that Bipley is blaming the victims here. I believe she's showing compassion by trying to understand the why, what goes thru our minds when we do stay. Maybe I'm wrong here and Bipley you can correct me if I am - but I get the feeling that you want to know why so you can try to figure out a way to help other women.
I swore I would never stay with a man who hit me. I watched my uncle beat my aunt for years and never understood why she stayed with him. I don't know that there is a set personality type that becomes the abused or even the abuser for that matter. My ex came from a good home and was never abused himself. It started with the psychological/emotional abuse but I didn't realize what was happening. He was so convincing, he would back up his statements of my worthlessness with "evidence".
The first time he hit me, we were in a huge fight, I can't remember exactly what I said to him but it was one of those really viscious comments that is said in anger (I'm not blaming myself for this anymore, just giving you some background), and he smacked me across the face. He was immediately sorry, he shouldn't have hit me, but I made him so angry with my comment. It made sense to me, after all when I got smart mouthed with my mom she would smack me across the face too. I didn't see it as him blaming me - I thought I was honestly at fault. Abusers know how to manipulate, know exactly how to twist everything around so you really do believe that everything is your fault not theirs. They are so convincing in their arguments.
No one can ever know exactly why an abused person stays, it's so hard to explain even when I was the abused. I often look back and wonder why I didn't leave before I did.
Bipley, I think you really do understand more than you realize. You were a freshman in high school before you realized that your home life wasn't "normal". Then it took you several years before you could leave. I know that was because you were a kid at the time and couldn't do anything. You spent those years preparing to leave. It really is similar. No, I didn't think it was normal the first time he hit me, but he was really sorry. It took over a year before it escalated into more regular abuse. It slowly became the norm in our relationship. Once I realized that things weren't right and that I wanted out, it took time to prepare to leave. I would pray every day that I would live long enough to make it out of there. It took about 2 months before I could leave, the longest 2 months of my life.
I know this post is getting long but I want to say to everyone who has also shared their story - THANK YOU!!!!! You all are a blessing to me (and to others I'm sure) - I know now that I'm not alone. Even today DV is a stigma that isn't talked about and I sometimes feel like I'm the only one who has been thru this.
... Be THANKFUL if you were raised with the support and praise to believe in yourself and not settle! Some were not and have either had to grow and change the hard way... or possibly still finding themselves a slave to what they got sucked into at one time by a smooth-talking (yet controlling) guy.
Actually, I wasn't raised that way at all. While it was far from Beaver Cleaver's family (I believe I am dating myself LOL) I wouldn't change a moment of the way I was raised. I learned some tough lessons that turned into interesting and useful skills today. I can spot manipulation coming from quite a distance. I can usually read people quickly and well. My childhood wasn't easy but really, whose is? Being a kid is tough business, not at all what some people make childhood out to be (carefree, not a worry in the world, blah blah blah).
Maybe this is why I don't get this whole thing. I can read about it, I can hear the stories of others, but maybe the reason I can't fully wrap my brain around what is going on inside the mind of the abused is because it's not in my personality make up to be an abused person in that way. We all have our weak points and our strong points. I don't know, maybe one of my strong points is such that I couldn't allow such abuse.
I could have quite easily been the child version of an abused spouse. The setting was right, the abuse was there, but I didn't put up with it. I would fight back. I'm the youngest of three girls. My older sisters, to this day, will say that I was my parents biggest nightmare. I called them on their actions and behaviors and I had the ovaries to retaliate. (going to the police, etc.)
I don't know if I am explaining myself well. A good example for me is when I was old enough to learn to read. My Mom gave me a book by Frances Farmer called, "Will There Really Be A Morning?" For anyone not familiar, FF was an actress with mental illness in the 1930s or so. It was likely quite mild mental illness. Her parents were able to control her by the constant threats of putting her back in the "insane asylum." That is before mental health units and people were treated horribly. Ice baths, insulin overdoses, straight jackets, rat infested cement living areas, basically... torture. Medical students would practice procedures on these folks because it was believed mentally ill people didn't experience pain. Mom loved FF enough to put her in a place of torture for "help." It was emtional rape and emotional control.
My Mom had me read this book as soon as I was old enough to read such a book (10? 11?) and then after having read it, we discussed it. After that point if I didn't clean my room she would tell me that only mentally ill children don't clean their rooms and she would have to get me "help" like a good mother should. Then she would remind me of Frances Farmer. For each bad deed on my part the subtle threats of an old fashoined insane asylum were used.
This stuff worked on my older sisters but it never really worked with me. The initial shock value was effective, but I quickly figured out what was going on and it backfired on her. Today my sisters believe that the reason this didn't work was because I was more intelligent than my parents. I'm not so sure about that. I don't really know why similar techniques worked soooo well on my sisters and not me. I would stand up to my parents. I paid for it, but I still continued to do it. I recall one time my Mom was screaming at me telling me what a little B**** I was. It stung! She really meant it! I refused to let it show that she was getting to me. So I smiled sweetly and reminded her that she always did say I was just like her.
Maybe some people aren't hard wired for this type of manipulation. Maybe it's a source of personality traits, individual strengths and weaknesses, I don't know. I really don't think I am (or ever have been) a person that this kind of manipulation would work with. Yet there are other scenarios that I would absolutely cave and submit to "X" consequences where others would fly right on by.
This OP is blaming the victim. Hopefully this doesn't affect your nursing care of abused persons. If you don't even have the sense to be compassionate of a person's basic suffering, I don't see why I should be compassionate of your intolerance. No way.
Maybe you could be mad at a society that allows men like the lawyer in a previous post to keep visitation rights or a legal system that only issues spineless restraint orders that don't protect an abused woman. Or unsupportive families that don't provide safe places for abused wives to go. There are plenty of more deserving objects of your contempt than the victim.
I am the OP and I can assure you I do not blame the victim. If coming here and asking sincere questions is a bad thing, so be it. But please don't make assumptions such as you have. You have no clue what you are talking about.
One reason that DV is such a pervasive problem is that it is so hard to identify common features that exist for EVERYONE in the situation. There are a few shared features, but they don't hold true for everyone. There are more contributing factors than we know about.
I was not raised in a violent home, my parents were about as white bread normal as exists, no ETOH or drug abuse, no divorce no nada...
Somewhere I developed the idea that I was a worthless person. I didn't know how to make that come from INSIDE of me...how to value myself.
This OP is blaming the victim. Hopefully this doesn't affect your nursing care of abused persons. If you don't even have the sense to be compassionate of a person's basic suffering, I don't see why I should be compassionate of your intolerance. No way.
Maybe you could be mad at a society that allows men like the lawyer in a previous post to keep visitation rights or a legal system that only issues spineless restraint orders that don't protect an abused woman. Or unsupportive families that don't provide safe places for abused wives to go. There are plenty of more deserving objects of your contempt than the victim.
:yeahthat:
While the OP went out of her way to state that her "online" personality is not all like her "real" personality, her words are her thoughts. She is saying "why do these people choose this life?" When it often isn't a choice per se. In her last post, I sensed a definite thread that she feels that she is somehow superior to the victims of domestic abuse; maybe it is somehow r/t her childhood. Sometimes when people survive an abusive childhood and come out fairly balanced and 'normal'-maybe even strong from it, they sometimes wear it as a badge; kind of a "I survived my childhood and am therefore tough, and the rest of you wimps aren't" badge; it is a way to take something bad and make it positive. I know about that.
I don't think that it is a matter of understanding as much as it a matter of judging. You don't have to understand, and despite the fact that many posters here have explained the reasons quite well, the OP just keeps coming back to 'explain' why she doesn't get it; I don't think that she wants to "get it" because of some issues with judging these people. She could just choose to say, "Okay, I don't completely understand why people are in these situations, but I do see that there are many compex reasons, and it isn't that the victims want or deserve abuse." but she doesn't, she just keeps coming back and saying "well, I wouldn't tolerate it, so therefore I can't excuse their behavior" BTW I come from a similar background, with some later h/o abuse So I feel like I have some credibility in my above statements.
I think that this topic should be closed, because the OP is never going to "get it" and we'll all just keep posting examples and explanantions that will not change her mind......
Specializes in Specializes in L/D, newborn, GYN, LTC, Dialysis.
For those that have been in, or are in abusive relationships, do you think there is a certain personality type that is more apt to be abused? What are the common denominators? What do abused folks share in common?
Please, re-read the posts and you will probably see there is no "personality Type"---to box anyone in that way does us a disservice. We come from all backgrounds and have all kinds of personalities. If there is one common thread we can find, it may lie in self-esteem issues or having suffered abuse ourselves as kids. There is no set "personality type" the sets us apart otherwise.
So to answer your question (again if you read the stories carefully--you will see this) You will see some very common denomintors:
Prior abuse as children at the hands of family, relatives or other trusted people.
Low self-esteem issues, lack of self-worth.
There are others, I imagine, but personality type, intelligence, socio-economic status, race or other such things are NOT among them.
Now, I am not going to join others in slamming the OP. I appreciate the fact the OP is trying to learn something here, and will therefore, give benefit of doubt. Also, it's my hope this thread MAY benefit someone out there---someone in need--- even it may not be the OP.
While the OP went out of her way to state that her "online" personality is not all like her "real" personality, her words are her thoughts. She is saying "why do these people choose this life?" When it often isn't a choice per se. In her last post, I sensed a definite thread that she feels that she is somehow superior to the victims of domestic abuse; maybe it is somehow r/t her childhood. Sometimes when people survive an abusive childhood and come out fairly balanced and 'normal'-maybe even strong from it, they sometimes wear it as a badge; kind of a "I survived my childhood and am therefore tough, and the rest of you wimps aren't" badge; it is a way to take something bad and make it positive. I know about that.
I don't think that it is a matter of understanding as much as it a matter of judging. You don't have to understand, and despite the fact that many posters here have explained the reasons quite well, the OP just keeps coming back to 'explain' why she doesn't get it; I don't think that she wants to "get it" because of some issues with judging these people. She could just choose to say, "Okay, I don't completely understand why people are in these situations, but I do see that there are many compex reasons, and it isn't that the victims want or deserve abuse." but she doesn't, she just keeps coming back and saying "well, I wouldn't tolerate it, so therefore I can't excuse their behavior" BTW I come from a similar background, with some later h/o abuse So I feel like I have some credibility in my above statements.
I think that this topic should be closed, because the OP is never going to "get it" and we'll all just keep posting examples and explanantions that will not change her mind......
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With all due respect, go have one of your own topics closed. I am here to ask questions and learn. If you choose not to offer, so be it. This is an important issue that needs to be addressed for a variety of reasons.
I have NEVER said anything remotely close to not being able to excuse the choice to stay in such a relationship. That's not my call. I have explained my stance. I do understand the general theme, I'm not a complete idiot. My point that you seem to be ignoring is that I am realizing more now than at the beginning of the thread that someone simply has to walk in the shoes of another to RELATE to and fully understand the issues. It has absolutely nothing to do with an attitude of superiority, I can only assume you choose to ignore the other statements I made such as... I would cave in certain circumstances where others would fly right by and never think twice. I have explained that I was merely throwing out thoughts.
It is one thing to have compassion and concern for someone going through such an event. It is quite another to fully RELATE to where they are coming from and why they stay. I have tried my best to explain where I am coming from, clearly that is not enough for you. Sorry... but I can't help you more than I have.
Perhaps instead of suggesting threads be closed when you don't like them, another suggestion might be to simply not read them.
"Maybe this is why I don't get this whole thing. I can read about it, I can hear the stories of others, but maybe the reason I can't fully wrap my brain around what is going on inside the mind of the abused is because it's not in my personality make up to be an abused person in that way. We all have our weak points and our strong points. I don't know, maybe one of my strong points is such that I couldn't allow such abuse."
And with equal respect; You don't have to cop such an attitude. I was merely making an observation-You still don't 'get it', as you yourself state. I wasn't slamming you, as your defensive post would imply. my post was based on your most recent reply; after many posters explaining, telling you, you still state "I don't get this whole thing"-that is my point.
And with equal respect; You don't have to cop such an attitude. I was merely making an observation-You still don't 'get it', as you yourself state. I wasn't slamming you, as your defensive post would imply. my post was based on your most recent reply; after many posters explaining, telling you, you still state "I don't get this whole thing"-that is my point.
You weren't slamming me? I have a feeling of superiority? I am judging those that are in abused relationships? I don't WANT to 'get it'? Claiming I can't "excuse" their behavior as though it is up to me to excuse any such thing?
What the heck do you say when you ARE slamming someone?
Thanks for sharing.
Spidey's mom, ADN, BSN, RN
11,305 Posts
gauge . . . . your story broke my heart.
A very graphic way to describe domestic abuse.
Thank you.
steph