Safe/Not Safe: If These Walls Could Talk

Janet: On my walk this morning, I took a different route through our new neighborhood.  We have a rather small, neat house that’s on a street of new homes with small trees attached to stakes and smooth wide streets. I turned a corner and saw huge houses with large trees, landscaped yards with newly planted spring flowers, and circular drives. It took my breath away, the statuesque beauty and elegance said money, wealth, and… happiness? With all that well ordered structure were the people happy? I wondered “if their walls could talk, what would they say?”

Marie:  It’s a myth that well educated and wealthy people are happier, and unaffected by violence. It’s like saying blondes have more fun – we don’t buy that at all. In fact, victims are more isolated in the suburbs – no one can hear or witness the abuse.

Victims in affluent areas sometimes ARE the lawyers, the judges, the professionals, and for this reason, less likely to report. Some of your friends and neighbors want to be blind to the issue, and fall away when support is needed most.

Why do they stay?

In most cases, leaving is the most dangerous time in the relationship, because fear and anxiety is escalated, and the abuser is unpredictable. Seventy percent of deaths by domestic violence cases occur after the partner leaves – or makes the attempt to leave.

-Marie

https://www.womendeservebetter.com/when-you-need-to-call-for-help-domestic-violence

https://www.helpguide.org/articles/abuse/help-for-men-who-are-being-abused.htm

Janet: I looked up options for people who need help. I read a book years ago about a group that had an elaborate underground rescue operation for saving and changing the identities of wives and children who found themselves in abusive relationships.

In our blog Coercive Control: Is This Love? I wrote about the controlling behavior that began during the day-to-day life of my young marriage.

In 1967 I’d taken a break from college to get our “life organized.”  Organized meant, provide whatever he wanted, whenever he wanted. He became obsessed with dust or a piece of lint on the front mat, leaves falling in October, creases in his white starched shirts and food. I was in a swirl of disbelief. Our college life was fun, we agreed on everything and in the snap of a wedding, things changed.  

I got on with my walk, thankful to be out of that marriage, and said a prayer for those people caught between walls that will never talk.

I thought about how hard it was to get away…

How I kept going back because he promised…

it would never happen again...

-Janet

Marie: Many people stay because they believe the abuser will change. Or, sometimes there’s financial dependence on the abuser, or guilt over the failure of the relationship, lack of emotional support or even death threats.

Can we become better, more perceptive neighbors? Can we be mindful and make eye contact?

Covid certainly exacerbated all of this, but now that restrictions are being lifted, and our awareness of this issue is heightened – will we change?