My Last-Ditch Bid to Break Free from Coercive Control
It is no secret that I have dealt with significant and long-standing abuse in my lifetime. I have come through most of it with a good head on my shoulders, a heart that still delights in everyday beauty and a soul at peace with how I got here.
What I have only shared with those closest to me is that for almost four years now, I have endured ongoing abuse - a course of conduct that has caused catastrophic and permanent damage in every area of my life. This year, the physical threats have intensified to the point I grapple with ongoing emotional distress and fear for my life/physical well-being. The only reason I don’t live in a visibly frantic, panicked state is that I have had no choice but to acclimate to the stress of being terrorized, frightened, intimidated, threatened and harassed.
This is not healthy. My patience and my silence have gained me nothing but more of the same. As the saying goes, when the pain of same overtakes the pain of change, we change.
So here, I speak.
2023 has taught me:
When one of your security cameras captures images of your abuser on your property, your blood runs cold.
When you take him to court, he testifies, ‘I know she believes these things are happening to her.’
When you get a phone call months later that someone has been hired to follow you and place cameras on your property, your head spins for days as you repeatedly ask, why?
Months later, the first of two break-ins to your house occurs. Nothing is taken or damaged; just a very real threat of harm landing square in your psyche. You thank God many times that you were asleep elsewhere when calls from the alarm company and police came.
When you call into your local police dispatch and state your address, they don’t have to ask your name. Most cops who come to your house say some version of, ‘yeah, I’ve been out here before’ or ‘I’ve heard about this place and the problems you’ve had’.
When you are told by multiple officers to never stay alone in your house again, you, though very frustrated, comply.
Living alone in a house you own is no guarantee that you won’t end up taking emergency shelter at a domestic violence safehouse. The cop who escorts you home to pack a bag will eventually offer a hug to help calm you so you can complete the task. (Even then, all you’ll pack will be protein powder, sports bras and GORUCK leggings not knowing you’re about to miss a month’s worth of training.)
When you’re in that safehouse, you’ll think of the absent men who once pledged their protection with their love for you. Then, you realize with ironic curiosity that one never mentioned protecting you at all.
When you request a meeting with two of your church congregation’s leaders, one responds that he will send you a date and time. Six weeks later, you’ll still have heard nothing. Considering that your earlier requests to make church attendance safer for you were categorically denied, this comes as no surprise. You’re clearly one who’s not worth leaving the 99 to assist.
When the state presents programs to help you execute an emergency move-out and live in hiding, you sign up.
It is at this point you must finally inform your kids about the realities of what you’re going through. Then, you lay in a twin-sized bed in your assigned cinderblock room and wonder why ever you thought you could shield them from this.
When some of your closest friends (who’ve watched in disgust and dismay as all of it has played out) offer to help you pack the kitchen you’ve fed your family from for 24 years, you accept and let them make you laugh through the injustice.
When your brother and sister show up to help you pack up your children’s rooms - the ones that have held you rooted in this dangerous place - seeing their deep love for your kids is what gets you though the day.
Then you spend every day that you’re in the shelter driving great distances in a small car over and over and over and over to move yourself to a new, hastily-chosen home in a city you don’t want to be in.
When you finally admit the defeat of someone else choosing the last night you’ll ever spend in the home you raised your babies in, you get angry. Not vengeful but a good healthy anger that fuels your drive to save your own life.
And when you get to where you’re going and you feel what it feels like to not be watched and monitored, you don’t count the cost of all the hell you’ve been through. Instead, you breathe deeply and experience a peace you’ve never known.
You know you’ll eventually be found in your new home but that’s a problem for another day so you sleep soundly, run outside again and try, try, try to recalibrate your nervous system to a better baseline.
That’s when you get threatened with another meritless lawsuit. You learned from the last one so you push back repeatedly for the document the threat is based on. You don’t receive it.
Instead, the second and similar break-in happens. This time, the cops show up in pairs.
Despite truly countless pleas for help, police officers, lawyers and judges have not freed me from this torment. I will not and cannot live on the run for the rest of my life.
I do not have wealth, a ‘don’t-you-know-who-I-am?!’ job or a big ego that spurs me forward.
All I have is this moment and the voice God gave me. I have done everything I can possibly think of to survive this in silence. The truth is, I no longer believe I will survive this at all.
For days, I have prayed over publishing this. For months, I have quelled my anger. For years, I have unwillingly submitted my desires, goals and well-being to intentional, well-executed terror. For decades, I have suffered in silence.
No more. The only part of this I have any power to change is the silence part.
So today, I speak.