Egads, trauma tapes can be stubborn.
It's all the same junk, stuck on a convoluted loop. Coming back around again and again. Each time like a child dressed in a different ill-fitting and unconvincing costume pieced together from a box of tattered hand-me-downs, the garish cast-offs from a community theater production, and grandmother's old costume jewelry.
I'm a domestic violence survivor.
The moment I try to claim the identity, even in the privacy of my own thoughts, in the quiet of my own healing process, it starts with a condescending scoff.
Who am I, claiming to have survived domestic violence? Surely I don't even know what that means.
I had no right to be afraid of him when he came at me in anger. He was only a foot taller than me and he only ever punched the walls. He'd told me a dozen times he'd never hit me. Didn't I know? Didn't I understand he was a good man?
It was my fault. I made him angry in the first place. I made him angrier when I was afraid of his anger. Clearly, I had no right to feel that fear. He'd never hit me. He already told me that. Why couldn't I get it? I must have been too stupid.
It was my fault because I'm damaged from my childhood. He shouldn't be responsible for my damage - it's mine, after all. I should have taken care of it myself, before he met me, before he had to put up with it, before he had to put up with me. He should be able to have his authentic emotional experience. He shouldn't have to sensor himself for me. I need to be responsible for my own emotional reactions.
But somehow I'm also responsible for having made him angry. And then angrier. I was supposed to pretend that I wasn't afraid because I already knew my fear made things worse. It was my fault. Didn't I know? If I didn't duck, he wouldn't swing.
It was my fault. I was supposed to always show him my true emotions, as long as they were the emotions I was supposed to be having. How could he know how to respond lovingly to me if I wasn't totally vulnerable? If I wasn't showing him how I was feeling? If I wasn't feeling the way I was supposed to. If I was too stupid to figure out how I was supposed to be feeling in order to earn his sympathy.
I should have known what to say to make him feel better. If I was better, smarter, more compassionate and understanding, more worthy of love and kindness, then surely I'd never say anything that made it worse. And if I hadn't said something that made it worse, he wouldn't have to slam doors and kick walls. If I'd just managed his feelings like I was supposed to, he wouldn't have to drive recklessly while I sit frozen, helpless in the front seat. I wouldn't have to hold my voice steady despite my dry mouth when I ask him to slow down. And besides, that's a favor I don't deserve after I've failed to fix his anxiety and anger.
Come on. It wasn't that bad. He told me he'd never hit me, and he didn't. So many other people have it so much worse. That's not real violence. That's not real abuse. Other people experience real violence and abuse. I just experience what I deserve.
