Courage and Hope

Broken Angel

This is an excert from my life. It was writen not in an attempt at soliciting sympathy or pity; I am not interested in such emotions. It was writen in an attempt to give others in a similar situation the hope and courage to break the cycle of violence and recover their self confidence, discover their soul, and regain their dignity. YOU ARE NOT ALONE!!!!







I had been married for only eleven months but the abuse and the fear that came with it were increasing rapidly. Tonight he had come home and left for the bar three times already and it was not yet 10:00 p.m. The children were in bed and asleep, thank goodness. I knew what was likely to happen. I paced, chewing my fingernails and lips in anxious expectation of what was to come. I could not go through this waiting alone again! I picked up the phone and called a friend that lived many miles away. I knew she could not help me, but I had to talk to someone. I had to let someone know what was happening.

As I spoke, I kept an eye on the road through the window. I knew he could return at any moment and wanted to be prepared when he walked in the door. Suddenly I saw headlights approaching from town. There was not much traffic on this rural road so I was sure I knew who it was. I quickly said my good byes and hung up the phone. I was determined to keep my mouth shut thereby giving him no reason to hit me.

He stormed into the house in a red rage. He had seen me on the phone and demanded to know whom I was talking to. I explained I had called my girlfriend long distance. As I watched the color intensify in his face, I knew I was in for it. I was not allowed to call anyone but my mother long distance. He was furious that I might have been telling someone that he was in the habit of hitting me and wanted to know what we were talking about. When I said we were just catching up on what had happened in our lives since the last time we spoke, he exploded!

He grabbed the receiver off the phone, gave a sharp yank and ripped the phone off the hook. The phone came flying in my direction. It missed! This made him angrier still. Swinging the phone around his head by the cord, he made sure I would be the target on its flight this time. I quickly lifted my hand to keep the phone from tearing into my face and received a small gash in the back of my hand when it hit. As the blood ran down my hand, he seemed to be satisfied that he had made his point and threw the phone on the floor and stomped off to bed.

I used a tissue to stem the flow of blood from my hand and lay down on the couch. A half-hour later I heard him loudly maneuvering the hallway back to the livingroom. I quickly closed my eyes and feigned sleep. He planted himself clad in just his shorts next to the davenport huffing and puffing like a bear ready to attack. He didn’t say a word. As he stared at me, I lay perfectly still hoping he would accept my attempt at pretended sleep. He started screaming at me to come to bed as he stomped his feet and flailed his arms at thin air. I lay there praying as intensely as I could that he would give up and go back to bed. Finally, my prayers were answered.

I waited until I could hear him snoring and then quietly and swiftly woke my two children and crept out the door. We did not close the car doors completely because I was afraid the sound would wake him. As I started the car, I held my breath and prayed again. "God, please don’t let him follow me!" With eyes on the rear view mirror the entire 50 miles, I ran as fast as I could to the nearest battered women’s shelter!







I had lived with situations such as this without going to a battered women's shelter before. I did not believe I had been hurt badly enough to DESERVE the help and protection of such an organization. Other women had been injured far worse than I. ABUSE IS ABUSE, PEOPLE! Whether that abuse takes the form of physical, verbal, emotional or mental!!! It is still abuse. I started to pick up the pieces of my life during the two week my children and I stayed there. I went on to discover ME!! I even went on to college at the age of 35. There is help out there for anyone that has been abused. And yes, there is help for the abuser also. Seek it out before it is too late. Domestic violence too often ends in death!

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