My mother was the first person I told about being abused by my partner. I’d never said the words out loud before that morning in my parents’ kitchen. I don’t know if it felt easier in that moment because she was focused on something else — her back was facing me as she fiddled with the coffee pot, half listening to my flimsy excuse for showing up on her doorstep so early on a Saturday morning — when I blurted out the truth.
“He hurt me,” I half-whispered to the back of her robe, aiming my confession towards her shoulder blades.
It’s been more than a decade since that moment in their kitchen, but I can still remember how quickly my mother spun around, and the mixture of anger and sadness on her face when I finally managed to meet her eyes. We both cried as the horrific details suddenly came tumbling out of my mouth.
I explained how the abuse had happened gradually. It didn’t begin with a slap, but with a word: “Whore,” he called me.
Things continued to escalate over the next few months until that morning — when I had to beg him to let me leave the house with my cats in a laundry basket — my neck still aching from being strangled the night before. After I finally told them the truth, my parents responded swiftly and lovingly, helping me to come up with a plan for getting away. Then, a few months later, when I admitted that I had taken him back, they helped me get away again. This time for good.
It’s been close to 13 years since the last time I saw my abuser. I’ve found unbelievable happiness since those dark days. Today, I’ve been with the love of my life for nine years, and we share two beautiful daughters together. One of our favorite pastimes is imagining who our kids will be when they grow up; most days, our oldest tells us how she wants to be a police officer, while our youngest can’t quite articulate her dreams yet, so we project our own dreams onto her. But sometimes, the memories of my own past overshadow the lives I hope my daughters will lead, and I worry about the types of relationships they may one day find.
Those memories seep unwanted into my current life, and they influence the way I parent my daughters. If I had never known the cruelty and pain that I knew with my ex, I may have had a more carefree approach to parenting. Instead, I try and use those experiences to prepare my girls for a variety of things.
Consent is a major focus in our house. We always remind them to ask before they give someone a hug, and reinforce the idea that people may change their mind mid-embrace. We talk about the flip-side of that as well, and make sure they understand that they also have the power to say no to being touched. And that nobody should ever make them feel bad, ashamed, or scared about saying no. But that’s an easy thing to teach, it’s more black and white, and something we can already work on.
The nuances of abuse will be harder to explain. We’ll have to teach them how it doesn’t look the same for everyone, and that there are many different forms it can take. Just because something doesn’t fit the version they’ve seen in movies or on TV, doesn’t mean it’s any less real or any less dangerous.
I’ll have to tell them that domestic violence thrives in secrecy, because it’s an “ugly” thing, and society tries to sweep “ugly” things under the rug. Whether that’s a bug or a feature, it’s a thing that allows abusers to continue to abuse.
There are red flags, which I now know about and will let them know to watch out for, like partners who are controlling and jealous or those who are quick to anger but slow to forgive. I’ll tell them to be especially wary of anyone who tries to separate them from their friends and their family, because they are trying to become all that they have.
I’ll remind them over the years that if they ever find themselves in that impossible and horrible situation, their father and I will be there to help them find a way out. They can and should tell us the moment they feel unsafe in their relationship, because nobody should ever feel unsafe in their relationship.
I need to make sure that they understand that if they are ever the victims of domestic violence, it won’t be because of something that they did. Abuse is about the abuser, not the abused. I’ll tell them this again and again and again, because the shame of feeling like you did something wrong keeps so many victims from reaching out.
Perhaps most importantly of all though, I will make sure that they understand that knowing all of this won’t somehow protect them from it. There is no vaccine against violence. If there were, parents everywhere would be lined up with their children for miles. There is no trick to avoiding abusers, because they aren’t all the same. Abuse can be found across all social classes and races, and throughout generations around the world. It’s one in four women, after all. And although we as a society never talk about it, I’ll talk about it. I’ll talk about it with them and with their friends and with anyone else who needs to hear it.
I will make sure my daughters know all of this — not because I think knowing it would have saved me, but because I need to believe that knowing it will save them.
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