I really hope that the reading raises people’s consciousness of domestic abuse and sexual assaults on women.

~Allison Funk~

When something is brought to my attention multiple times in a few days, I tend to pay attention. Just recently I have heard domestic violence/abuse referred to in two ways that I would have never expected; as “Domestic Terrorism” and “Murder.”

I still hold to the idea that unless you personally experience something, it is very difficult to fundamentally understand it. What we experience in our own lives makes us who we are, molds our grasp on life, our beliefs, our fears, and our general outlook. Everyone has their own demons and, sometimes, no matter how strong, how educated, or how supported you are, you may struggle with something and not be able to verbalize why or how you got to the place you find yourself in. So, you work each day to move forward, and not back, from that “issue” that you still have not dealt with. It may be a struggle, you may have highs and lows, you may crash and have to dig yourself out again, or you may soar high and never look back. But, no matter where you are in your journey and no matter how much support you have, you may still feel alone.

I guess this is normal. Sometimes we have to face our fears and struggles in a way that only we can, whatever that is. But in order to even begin to do that, we have to understand what it is we are dealing with. That, I believe, is why I found these two descriptions interesting. It put a name on what I went through, what I am still dealing with, that was more on par with my feelings. Even as a victim, I believe we often downplay the experience (at least I do), thinking I survived so it must not have been that bad. Therefore, I should not have the feelings and hurts that I have. Buck up and move on! But maybe it is not that simple. Maybe we have to see it for what it is, accept it for what it is, and face it…head on.

What is abuse?

Taken from A Cry for Justice at http://cryingoutforjustice.wordpress.com/

“Very few people know what abuse really is, though everyone seems quite ready to give advice to its victims. If you believe that abuse is physical battering, you have some learning to do.

Abuse is fundamentally a mentality. It is a mindset of entitlement. The abuser sees himself as entitled. He is the center of the world, and he demands that his victim make him the center of her world. His goal is power and control over others. For him, power and control are his natural right, and he feels quite justified in using whatever means are necessary to obtain that power and control. The abuser is not hampered in these efforts by the pangs of a healthy conscience and indeed often lacks a conscience.

While this mentality of power and control often expresses itself in various forms of physical abuse, it just as frequently employs tactics of verbal, emotional, financial, social, sexual and spiritual abuse. Thus, an abuser may never actually lay a hand on his wife and yet be very actively terrorizing her in incredibly damaging ways.

Abuse in any of its forms destroys the victim’s person. Abuse, in the end, is murder.”