Total pages in book: 187
Estimated words: 174623 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 873(@200wpm)___ 698(@250wpm)___ 582(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 174623 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 873(@200wpm)___ 698(@250wpm)___ 582(@300wpm)
She's quiet at first, her eyes locked on the hand rubbing a spot on her belly.
"There's this voice in my head," she whispers. "It wants to argue that my husband isn't like all these other men. I mean, like, he isn't as bad as what the other women were saying about their partners."
"There are levels of abuse," I say. "And although your husband may have never hospitalized you as a result of his abuse—"
My words freeze when she looks up at me, confirming that her husband has, in fact, contributed to a hospitalization.
"It was dehydration," she says, a hint of an excuse for his role in it in her tone.
"How did you get dehydrated?" I ask.
She looks away, her eyes welling with tears and with the slightest shake of her head.
"I grew up in a very religious family," she whispers, accepting a tissue from the box when I offer it to her. "We were taught that women were supposed to listen to their husbands. They are the ones who shoulder the burden. It's their job. God gave them authority over the family. That's just how it was."
"I can see how hard it would be in that situation. Conditioning can be taught at an early age, long before an abusive man steps into someone's path. If your mom was a pious woman, it's only natural for you to have been taught to be one as well."
"I volunteered to help another member in the church," she says, dabbing at her eyes with the tissue. "It conflicted with something in his schedule that I didn't know about. The sin, according to him, was rebellion. Eve had acted independently of her husband, and it brought sin into the world."
"And the punishment?" I ask, wanting her to put some distance between her and the religious scripture he used against her so easily.
"Fasting," she says, her eyes once again locked on her hands as she manipulates the tissue. "He said Jesus lasted forty days and that sometimes the flesh has to suffer before the soul can heal."
I sit in silence, but my head is full of all the things I'd never tell this woman.
I'm positive that people have been using religion to abuse for as long as the world has been spinning.
Abusers of it use it to hide racism, nationalism, and persecution. They use it for coercive control, financial exploitation, and to control someone's sexuality. The list is endless, and I bet it has been used against Traci in more ways than she can count on both hands, despite the likelihood that she can fully separate her religion from the ways she was abused.
If she's generations deep in religious control, having seen her mother and possibly her grandmother act according to how her husband demands, fearful of going to hell for speaking up or refusing to submit to abuse, then it's a wonder the woman is sitting in front of me right now.
"I was denied food and water," she continues. "His plan was two weeks, but I lost consciousness after five days."
"Meaning what?" I prod, needing her to work through his actions in her own head rather than explaining cause and effect.
She pulls in a deep breath as she lifts her eyes to mine.
"He's responsible for my hospitalization," she whispers, her bottom lip quivering as she speaks.
"What did the doctors say?"
Another deep breath, another dart of her eyes as if she can't bear to say bad things about him, even now.
"If he had waited another day to take me for treatment, I would've died."
"Right," I whisper. "Abuse isn't always a physical attack. What you suffered was horrific, Traci, but even if he controlled you without there being outward signs of abuse, it doesn't make the abuse any less relevant. Words can hit as hard as fists. Control can be just as damaging as a slap to the face."
"I know," she whispers.
"I think it's important to focus on what you experienced, pick it apart. Have the courage to understand the abuse you suffered, even if you can't verbalize it. Don't compare what you've suffered against what others have been through. It doesn't have to be as bad to still be bad. Even coming from a religious background, you have the right to be safe and loved by the man sworn to protect you. You have the right to be free from punishment if you make a mistake, and you have the right to make plans to help someone without the threat of death."
She sighs as if she has a task list a mile long, and I just added a thousand things to it.
"I never planned to be a single mom," she whispers, switching gears.
I don't argue with the deflection. We've said some heavy stuff in here today, and sometimes you just have to move on.
"I'm not going to say it's going to be easy, and of course it takes a lot more planning than if you had two people working together to make it happen, but you have the full support of Juniper House and several more agencies in the community to ease a lot of the burden."