Quote Originally Posted by BayouMotownMan View Post
OK, I think I can speak on the marital abuse from experience. My mother was a battered woman. I watched it helplessly for 12 years. Not only is there emotional damage done to the wife but to the children as well and in my 20s I had extensive therapy in order to process the events that led up and caused this situation.

It's never an easy answer as to why the woman stays in that situation. I didn't get up the nerve to talk to my mother about this until long after my father died and I was grown. I might add, my father's death was a relief to all of us, including him. She was really the only one who grieved for him

In most situations, the man whittles down the woman's self-confidence and self-respect so that she feels she has no alternative but to stay. That was my mom's situation. She was dependent on my father for income as she was a stay at home mom. The abuse starts small and then grows when the man sees just how much he can get away with, leading up to beating the woman to a pulp as it did with Mary or even killing the woman in extreme circumstances as it did with OJ. [[And yes, I believe he did it.) Luckily in my family it never got that drastic. My father died young however, at 45. But my biggest fear was that he would one day kill my mother. A child should never have to live with that kind of fear.

So the woman just accepts that she is the blame and the cause for the violence. The woman justifies the man's abuse and walks on egg shells trying not to arouse that violence again. Just when she thinks she had learned to please him and live peacefully, at her own expense of course, something usually inconsequential will result in yet another beating.

Then I had to learn as an adult, what caused my father to go off. He was an alcoholic, also common in such situations. There are usually some kind of chemical dependency. Many wives drink with the husband in an effort to make him feel he has company. In my dad's case he went into WWII as a quiet, soft-spoken young man. He fought in Normandy and saw atrocities I won't even go into. Can you imagine giving a cute little German 5 year old a nickle for some candy and then the kid detonates in front of you? Just one of many things he saw. He was wounded and left for dead, he crawled back to his boat barely making it in time. My mother met him at a hospital in Memphis and nursed him for weeks before bringing him back home. Slowly, ever so gradually, the abuse started.

This may shed some light on why Mary stayed with Pedro. Also we know nothing about Pedro's childhood and the many things that may have led to his abusive behavior.

We are in a different world now. There are shelters for homeless woman everywhere. Protection they didn't feel they had. That wasn't available to my mom or to Mary. Or Florence. It was just the plight of women I guess. It was accepted. Even family members accept it.

I remember being at a funeral for my father's brother about ten years ago. I only had two aunts left, my daddy's sisters. Somehow we got on the subject of my daddy and I made the comment about how difficult it was watching him beat my mother. Those two women looked at each other and laughed. I was absolutely livid and had to walk out of the funeral parlor to hold my tongue. So I learned yet another aspect of husbandry abuse; Many saw it as a sign of masculinity. It was virile.

I never married. I never trusted myself with partners or children. I too have a temper. I just wasn't going to take that chance. That was the fallout from my experience with spousal abuse.
Thank you for sharing such a painful and personal part of your life. I do appreciate you posting this as we more we talk about spousal abuse the more awareness we bring to it. Men who beat women are weak bullies and scum IMO. I hope and pray you heal from what you went through and find peace. God bless you.