They unleashed the wild dogs inside me who guarded my long-strangled secret. When I could breathe smooth and slow again and my chest didn’t feel as if it would collapse from the weight of my memories, my tears stopped. I could be calm.
The honest answer to his plea for forgiveness, right now at least, must be no. But one day I may look inside and find the anger has burned away to ashes. I will live better, love honestly, learn well from the madness.
“I’m sorry, you know,” he said brusquely once as he dropped off Brendan after an afternoon visitation. He had been gone from the house a few months. He was ordered by the court to stay outside; he came in the house anyway.
I was not able to acquiesce on demand. “It’s not okay. It’s not enough. Are you sorry for hitting me? Are you sorry for ruining our lives? Exactly which part are you sorry for?” My hands were shaking.
“I’m sorry for it all,” he said smugly, as if all he had done was spill a cup of coffee on a white carpet or track mud on the kitchen floor. He was smiling.
I didn’t buy it then; I had grown immune to his apologies because they were followed, always, by new aggression, in whatever form it took. He would retreat in his attacks for weeks, sometimes months, then reappear, unprovoked, with new hostility, another fight, another battle, another twist of truth.
I may eventually forgive him. I am not there yet.
But I do forgive myself.
Forgiving myself for staying with a man who abused me has not been an easy act, an automatic assumption. It has taken every moment of the years since July 7, 1995, when the man I married left our home for the last time under an emergency order of protection. I have had to work hard to convince myself it was all right to stay as long as I did, that I did what I needed to do at the time. I had tried to make it better.
I was vulnerable, naive, blinded. I believed in a man I loved, and I did not believe he would keep hurting me. I stayed with him, and I chose not to see the man I married, the father of my three children, as a batterer who would always be a batterer. I saw each instance as an isolated nightmare, all explained away, all forgiven. I didn’t connect them to see the pattern.
I excused his rage because I could not bear seeing him as he really was. That meant I would see myself as I was, and I refused to be a battered wife. But it was not until I could make that admission that the abuse could possibly end. It was not until I could say out loud what he had done that the carousel of pain would stop, and I could get off the painted horse and walk away.
Now I forgive myself for staying. I try to forgive myself for choosing for my sons a father who battered their mother, though that has been the most difficult. I forgive myself for trying so hard, for believing in something impossible, for having hope. I forgive myself for pretending to be happily married and pretending that a man who abused me just didn’t know how to handle the demons inside him. I forgive myself all the excuses.
I can forgive myself because the game is over and he is gone. I saved myself, and I saved my sons. With only his occasional appearance, we are happy and whole, a family. I forgive myself because I can now fill my children’s lives with new memories and laughter that I pray sustains them. These new memories include ones of a mother who is strong, a mother who loves them beyond measure, a mother who taught them that forgiveness is earned. I taught them, by what I have done, that sometimes you have to leave.
I taught them that it is never all right to hurt anyone; it is wrong to impose your strength on anyone else. I taught them and myself that it is foolish to think you can change another person’s behavior, no matter how hard you try. I taught them to love with kindness, not control.
Forgiveness is a choice, always a choice. It is not a forced requirement.
Yes, I forgive myself, and writing this book has initiated the process. In speaking the unspeakable, in writing and witnessing the truth, the power of the secret is diminshed. I no longer carry the ghosts of domestic violence with me in every conversation, every act, every movement. I don’t feel that I wear a scarlet letter V for violence.
I can be someone more than a once-battered wife. I have exorcised the terror of spousal abuse by writing it down. Jarring memories reclaim me at times of their own volition, and I know they are there. I respect them and the lessons they have taught me. I acknowledge their power. I am thankful sometimes for those memories because they keep me humble and remind me to be sensitive. On paper now, it seems so clear. It never did when I was living it. My eyes are open. I will not close them again, look away, or deny what is right in front of me. I am conscious. I will not distill the truth and spin it so it no longer shames me. No longer crippled by my wish for a happily ever after or deluded by my self-deceit, I see what is there.
I have won because I have won myself back.
I claim me.
Acknowledgments
I could not write this book or even breathe freely without the help of my family and my good friends. My mother, who passed away in 2002, helped me in every way imaginable, as a guide, a safety net, a source of inspiration. My sisters, Mary Pat, Maureen, and Madeleine, are consistently centers for hope and laughter, as well as concrete help. They have done everything for me whenever I have needed it— physically, financially, emotionally, spiritually.
My brothers, Paul and Bill, teach my boys through their example that fathers can be good and kind as well as gentle. Paul, especially, helps me and my sons in so many ways every day that I can never thank him enough. He is my closest friend.
Though my father passed away before any of my sons were born, I know that Papa Bill would be proud of me. I feel his presence every day and I know we have his blessings.
My dear friends have done more for me than I could have ever hoped. Dana Halsted, my former college roommate and soul mate, helped me to heal, as I was emerging from hiding, as I began to tell the truth. My close friends Caryn Brooks and Sue Schmidt always listened.
Though my writing group began in 2001, after the initial publication of this book, I am a better and more honest writer because of Elizabeth Berg, Veronica Chapa, Nancy Horan, Arlene Malinowski, Marja Mills and Pamela Todd. Writing about oneself honestly is a most difficult task.
To the staff at Sarah’s Inn in Oak Park, where I went with my three children for six months in 1995 to sort through the ordeal of leaving a violent relationship, I am exceptionally thankful. I am attempting to give back as often as I can to that wonderful organization. I felt some nights that just by driving to Sarah’s Inn, my boys and I would be okay. I have begun to work on the advisory council for Between Friends, a Chicago domestic violence services agency, that is committed and courageous, thanks to Kathy Doherty.
To all the students at Medill who have come to me and thanked me for writing this book and giving them encouragement to speak their own truths aloud, I am grateful. To all the women and men I have met through my writing as well as speaking engagements, writing workshops and virtual spaces, I thank you all for your soothing words of comfort. I thank you for your applause and your shared laughter. I understand your tears, and I thank you for trusting me with your secrets. To those of you who have shared your similar stories, I thank you for your honesty.
This book could only happen because of the people in my life who helped me to finally open my eyes, see the truth, and live honestly: my friends, too far-reaching to name them all, my family, and my children. Some friends’ names I have changed to protect their privacy, though their support is ubiquitous.
This book is also for all the women I can never know. I pray they will read these words and know they are not alone. I pray they know they can not only survive, but live their dreams. All things are possible.
Card received on our fourth anniversary, August 23, 1990
Dear M,
My notion of love is swallowing the impulse to attack for the sake of what you might need. This love is not concerned