Well, I can say this was expected. It was really just a question of when. Ladies and gentleman, the show is over, and life has returned to normal. Further, albeit sufficiently verified, proof that people really need to think before they speak.
How do you react when someone who is supposed to be supportive of what you are going through and the extremely dangerous situation you were trapped in implies with one sentence that it happened because it was you who chose to stay? How do you react when they all but call you stupid in public and laugh about it about it afterward? In front of people. And the other people who should have your back don’t speak up.
It felt like him again. He might as well have been there. I may not always make perfect choices, but to come out and tell me, in front of others, no less, that I deserved what I got from him because I was stupid enough to stay…
So she says, “You finally got some common sense.” Yeah, that’s right. I had nothing better to do with four years of my life then get beat up every time I turned around, because I was stupid. Ignorant. Naive. Because I deserved it. Because I asked for it. Because I stayed. Believe me, it was no more voluntary on my part than your capacity for compassion and tact. Reason being, you have none.
It wasn’t voluntary when he tore the bedroom apart beating me up to get the money from my 401K so he could go out and smoke his face off. It wasn’t voluntary when he threw me on my back on the kitchen floor, stood over me with a butcher knife raised in his right hand, and began swinging his arm down. It wasn’t voluntary when YOU picked a fight with him despite me asking you not do, because I would get beat when we got home. For you opening your mouth. And I did. It wasn’t voluntary when I went to work on two separate occasions with black eyes. Walking with a cane for two winters wasn’t voluntary. You heard me! Metal bars, wood, cans, knives, stereos, lights, fists, slaps, kicks…
There is nothing I could do or say that would justify the torment I endured. And for you to sit there and tell me it happened because I was stupid, and I let it? It took everything I had not to reach across that table. No, I opted to be respectful and pull everything into the pit of my stomach and absorb it like a sponge. And you sat there and laughed. You laughed.
Picking Up the Pieces 