When I was a freshman in highschool, I started going out with a boy two grades ahead of me named Ken. He was the concert master in our highschool orchestra; I met him through a mutual friend. He was also the first serious boyfriend I ever had. He also turned out to be the worst boyfriend I ever had, as well.
When the relationship started, he was fun-loving, generally nice to me, a little overprotective of me, maybe; but I took that as a sign that he was devoted to me, and since I really really hoped someone would care for me enough to dote on me, I didn't mind. I didn't even know something was wrong when he made fun of his former girlfriends, or took immense pride in being arrogant -- I thought it was normal. His cockiness was embarrassing, sometimes, but I didn't want to make a fuss; so I usually laughed it off. After all, who was I to say anything?
Thus began a fourteen-month brainwashing, and the total destruction of what little self-esteem I possessed at the time (which, admittedly, wasn't very much). He started beating me, first on an occasional basis, then more and more often, until he was battering me every day, over and over and over again. But he never actually laid a hand on me at all: he did it all with words.
There is a playground chant that goes:
Sticks and stones/May break my bones/But words will never hurt me.Charming, isn't it. Well, it's a lie. Researchers have found that just about all physical abuse begins with verbal battering; survivors of physical and sexual abuse often relate that it isn't the physical parts of the abuse that do the most damage: it's the emotional abuse that is so devastating. I didn't care about any research at the time, and I didn't know of anyone else who had gone through what I was going through at the time. So I had no idea what was going on, except that something was terribly wrong, and it was all my fault.
I realize that average, non-abusive people can sometimes be abusive -- people call each other names, or swear at one another in traffic. But this was a pattern, with definite cycles and formulas.
I don't remember the first time Ken actually abused me, but I don't think it's important. It was more like a gradually increasing onslaught. Every time I had a project I wanted to share with Ken, he'd discount it. "Well, I don't think you can do that. It'll be too hard for you," he'd say. He was down on everything I found enjoyable. I loved history; he accused me of being obsessed with the past. "Why are you always looking back into the past? Why can't you look towards the future, like me?" He took no interest whatsoever in my accomplishments in Latin, or in my art. If I talked about them, he blew me off with a patronizing, "That's nice," and abruptly changed the subject. Eventually, I didn't want to share with him anymore -- and after awhile, I didn't even want to paint or draw at all. So I gave up most of my hobbies, just to gain his approval.
It didn't work, of course. The next thing he attacked were my friends. (I didn't realize until years later that this was an isolation tactic -- he was trying to separate me from people who really cared.) "I don't like J------," he'd say. "She's bad news." "But she's my friend," I'd protest. He'd grow more annoyed. "Why do you hang out with her? I don't like her at all! She's a bad influence!" Or, even worse, "She's evil! You shouldn't hang out with her." And that was just for my girlfriends. Having male friends was absolutely forbidden.
One incident I remember in particular happened one afternoon at school. I was wearing a sweatshirt that had something written on the back of it with silver glitter. One of my classmates, a flamboyant young actor, thought my shirt was really cool, and on the way out the door, he spontaneously rubbed his head on the back of my shirt so that some of the glitter would stick in his hair. I wasn't offended by this -- I'm not sure if it was because I basically had no personal boundaries, or if I just realized that this guy wasn't really trying to make me uncomfortable, he was just really a silly guy -- but I immediately felt afraid at what Ken would think. And when Ken found out, he threw a fit. He became furiously angry that I would do such a thing to him, he accused me of liking it, he accused me of liking this guy (who actually turned out to be gay, for Pete's sake), and when I tried to explain what had really happened, he only grew angrier. Eventually, he wrote me a threatening letter, asking me whether or not I tried to stop the guy, telling me I was a bitch if I hadn't, and demanding that I stop hurting him and be a "good girl" or it would all "land on" me. I was so afraid that I apologized as soon as could -- and he begrudgingly accepted.
I thought this was normal. I knew I was afraid, but I didn't know there was any other way to be. I spent a lot of my childhood being afraid, and here was life as usual. I didn't like it, but there it was.
There were other incidents, most of which are blocked out, but not all. I remember that whenever we got into an argument or discussion, things came out the same: if I brought up my feelings or thoughts about something, he would accuse me of "hurting" him by feeling or thinking that way. He'd ask me how I could be so cruel to him. The rest of the conversation consisted of him telling me how awful I was -- sometimes overtly, often covertly -- criticizing my emotions, criticizing the way I thought, criticizing everything I said; and at the end, I always believed him, and I'd apologize. For things I never did, or for things that weren't wrong at all, like being tired or upset. After I apologized, he would begrudgingly accept, but he'd take his time about it (probably just so he could watch me grovel), and he'd make sure I knew that I really didn't deserve it. He considered it a favor that he loved me, because I was so awful. The only difference between our arguments and our discussions was that Ken wasn't yelling during the discussions.
Another incident I remember was one day during lunch. I have no frame of reference for these events -- I can't tell you if they happened during the winter, or in the month of November, I can only tell you that they happened sometime while we were going out. When school was in session, however, Ken and I used to spend lunch together, sometimes eating, but usually making out in one of the music center practice rooms (that, at any rate, was what he always wanted to do). On this particular day, I didn't want to spend lunch that way -- I was hungry, and I hadn't brought lunch, so I wanted to go to a grocery store a few blocks away and buy myself some lunch, then come back and eat it with him. "Hon, I want to go buy lunch today, so let's go to the store and then come back, okay?" I asked.
Apparently, it wasn't okay. "What?!" he said, "Lunch is our time. It's the only time we have to spend together during the day," he said sternly. "But I'm hungry!" I said. "I want to go get some lunch!" "I can't believe you're being so selfish," he replied. "That's really mean." And he folded his arms, and looked at me with disgust.
I went hungry that day.
A few months before we finally broke up, the shit really hit the fan. I had gone to summer camp, and in a vengeful mood, I cheated on Ken. In retrospect, it was really innocent -- mostly I just hung out with this really nice guy named Tom (this name has been changed to protect the innocent), and I kissed him towards the end of the camp session. Mostly, he and I were just friends. Tom and I kept in touch periodically after camp was over, calling each other once in awhile. And one day, Ken called my house, and found the line busy, because I was talking to Tom.
"So," he asked, "why was your line busy?" "Oh," I replied, "I was talking to a friend." Of course, by this time, I didn't have many friends - I had given most of them up, remember? So Ken asked: "Really? Which friend?" "Oh...uh...Tom," I said. Bad move. It was the only move I could have made, but it was still a bad move. Ken knew I'd cheated on him, with Tom. He had been furious when he found out, but it had blown over. (Ironically enough, Ken cheated on me repeatedly, but somehow the situation was never the same -- he seemed to feel it was his right to do so, and always asked me why I was making such a big deal out of it?)
"YOU'D BETTER NOT HAVE CALLED TOM," he said. But of course, I had. It was too late. And Ken flipped out. I hardly even remember what he said. But he demanded that I meet him at a local park, and bring Tom's phone number, "AND DON'T TELL ME YOU CAN'T REMEMBER IT!" Then he hung up.
I met him at the park 15 minutes later. He forced me to call Tom, then he commandeered the phone. I have no idea what he said to Tom, but I think Tom understood what was going on, because when Ken gave me back the phone, Tom said: "Wow, your boyfriend has a real problem!" And Tom was right. As I hastily finished up the conversation, Ken loomed physically over me, demanding that I get off the phone. "Now! NOW!!" he screamed. That was the only time I actually thought he was going to hit me. I kept expecting his fist to meet my gut, or his open palm to smack my face, but it didn't. The onslaught of words never stopped, though. And the aftermath was even worse.
Ken set himself up as a wounded lover, a martyr of sorts, and I was the perpetrator. From here on out, he required me to confess to him every single thought, word, deed, and emotion that I'd ever had "against" him, from the beginning of the relationship up to the present time, and for the remainder of the relationship. I was so terrified of him that I didn't refuse; I got the feeling that he would actually assault me if I did, but even more than that, I was terrified of being abandoned. And so I went along, just to get along. And as the months passed, I would remember something, confess it to him, try to explain, and apologize; and he would fall into silence with a look of disgust and indignation on his face. I would beg and plead -- it was like begging to a wall -- and at last, he would forgive me... over and over and over and over this process happened.
A few months later, he dumped me for another girl. I remember when he dumped me; it was a week after Valentine's Day. It was completely unexpected. Things had been going the way they always had -- unhealthily, but there was no break in the pattern. And suddenly, he dumped me. I asked him why. Every reason he gave blamed me. "You hurt me too much." "You're too young for me." (His new girlfriend was fully a year younger than I was.) "You're not mature enough." I think the real reason he dumped me was that he had finally succeeded in winning total control over me. I had submitted completely: he controlled my movements, my relationships with other people, my time, and at last, he controlled my mind. I simply wasn't a challenge to him anymore, so he went looking for someone else to dominate. And that was that.
It's taken me years to realize what was really going on. For a long time, I hated myself, and despised myself, and wondered what was wrong with me that I couldn't get over it. The most frustrating thing about it, too, was that it wasn't like being physically hit. When someone hits you, it leaves a bruise or a mark, something tangible (although I've heard that there are batterers so skilled in denial that they can beat a woman without leaving a single externally visible mark). This was abuse without a trace of evidence, nothing but my memory to tell me that something had happened; and my mind had been discounted and ridiculed so often that I didn't even trust my own perceptions of things. So for years, I wondered how come I couldn't get over it -- why wasn't I over it? He didn't really hit me or anything, it wasn't real abuse, so what was wrong with me?
Nothing was wrong with me. I finally realized that. I had a lot of problems, this much is true. But there was nothing wrong with me at all. I learned how to adapt to a situation I didn't understand in the best way I knew how. I was only 14 at the time, ill-trained in handling nasty people, with no self-esteem and no strong models for healthy relationships. And regardless of any disagreements Ken and I might have had, I didn't deserve to be treated that way.
Some people are going to read this and go, "Dang, that guy was a total asshole." Yeah, you're right, he was. And the last time he contacted me, he still was. Breaking up wasn't the end of it, anyway. For months he kept calling my house and harrassing me. Yeah, he was an asshole.
Some people are going to read this and wonder why I didn't leave. The implications behind that question are that there were no barriers to me leaving him; a further implication is that I should have left him but didn't, so what was wrong with me? Usually I bitch out people who demonstrate such a lack of understanding by asking this question; but since it mostly comes from a lack of understanding, I can only ask you to understand. I was not taught what a normal relationship was like, I was not emotionally or psychologically equipped to leave, and hey, I was totally terrified of this guy -- I think he would have killed me if I'd tried to leave him. Chew on that, and then go read a few statistics on battered women. One for the road: out of all the women who are murdered by their batterers, 75% of them (that's 3 women out of 4, folks) are murdered while in the process of leaving. A good number manage to leave, but are later hunted down and killed. So I can't say that the chances were in my favor.
Some of you, too, are going to read this and say, "So what was wrong with the way he treated her? She deserved it anyway, stupid bitch." In other words, you're either going to empathize with Ken, or totally blast me for being stupid. Well, if you feel empathy for Ken, you have a real problem. If you treat people in your life the way he treated me, and think it's okay, you're screwed up. Get into therapy, if you have any ounce of humanity about you, and deal with the issues that compel you to treat people like shit -- and then STOP. It's hard, but some men (and women, too, although stats are sketchier on that one) manage to stop abusing -- and I have real admiration for anyone who's able to face up to the damage they've done and start treating people with kindness.
Some of you are going to read this -- women in particular -- and recognize yourself in my role. Maybe you'll say, "Oh, my god, my husband/boyfriend/father treats me that way!" My hope is that you will realize that emotional abuse is very real, and extremely damaging. I also hope that you will realize that it isn't your fault by any means -- maybe people get angry with each other, but in an abuse situation, there isn't any conflict. Conflict requires two parties disagreeing about something. Abuse isn't conflict, it's just one person controlling the other as completely as possible. Abusers don't care about any actual argument at all. They just want control. And it isn't your fault. A healthy, non-abusive person wouldn't treat you that way. So if you are in an emotionally abusive relationship, do what you can to get support -- call a battered women's shelter and ask for references to therapists or support groups. Remember that physical battering often begins with verbal battering, and you may be in danger if he really senses that he's losing control. If you have to, GET OUT. Take the kids, take the dog, and RUN -- run to someone who will help you. As soon as I find enough resources, I intend to create some links to helpful bulletin boards and web resources on battering. There are a few books out there, too; check out "Verbal Abuse: How to Recognize it and How to Respond" and "Verbal Abuse Survivors Speak Out" by Patricia Evans. Both are quite good. And hang in there as best you can!