bag lady chat

So, you think that you still love your abuser?
Really?
You think that you can work it out with patience and kindness?
Or maybe you think that you can handle it, until it gets better.

Counseling might help.
Forgiveness might work.

Or not.

If today were the day that he killed you
would you wonder why you stayed?

I am in favor of the “get out while you can” strategy, rather than that “try again” claptrap that is preached and prodded and counseled by the best of the educated but uninitiated. If you go back, or keep trying to fix the thing, you could end up dead. Or worse. (And yes, I can assure you that there are worse things than being dead.)

Our baby son died in his crib just before he was five months old.
“You must have walked in your sleep and smothered him.”

He was such a happy baby, he had great big belly laugh and he loved to bounce on a knee, anybody’s knee. His sisters adored him. At two and four, [...]

Below is the message I posted in the SafeHorizon site this morning. This was Christmas morning. Holidays can be difficult for all of us, but finding yourself alone on Christmas can be especially hard.
Happy Sunday! The sun is shining (whether we can see it or not) and the world is still [...]

(Photo courtesy of Pink Saris.)
Sampat Pal speaks volumes with few words in Pink Saris. I can add nothing to her wisdom:

Women have nothing but their tears, what else do they have?

If a woman tries to do anything, its a struggle.

We were starving on the streets, no one cared.

People only love you for money.

Perhaps education is the key. Perhaps learning the truth and offering what help we can will make a difference. I believe that Middle School is the best place to address young people about personal violence – before they start dating, before the become just a piece of “property” in the sexual violence world. Help them if you can. Write a check. Offer your services. Teach your children to respect one another. Do something. Do anything you can. Nothing will change until we change it.

Excuse me, but battered women function at a very high level. They manage to dance between death and its expectation every day of their lives. They shop, cook, clean, and clean, and clean, do laundry, take the kids to school and back, and humbly serve their “master” while planning, privately, to open the earth under him, or some other especially violent retribution for their pain and humiliation.

If you have suggestions or ideas, please follow the link below and make your comments. We plan to invite everyone, every site, every person we can locate, who is currently working with or for the battered and abused, to join us. We also plan to present it to Legislators and ask for specific changes in laws that deal with domestic abuse. JOIN US. USE YOUR VOICE FOR CHANGE. ACTION NOW NETWORK: COMMUNITY VOICES

My story is all over this site. My two little girls told me that we had to leave, “before he kills you.” – I could no longer pretend they didn’t know after that. So, we walked out the door one lovely morning, headed for their school, and never went back. A [...]