This is me battling impostor syndrome
This is the big test. Right here. This is the test to see if you will stick with me even when you know everything. There is lameness about me. Not the lameness commenters point out. Not like, I don’t know anything about graduate school. Or I’m not fair to David Dellifield. No. It’s more fundamental than that.
I want you to recall that when I was growing up, the police came to our house pretty frequently. (And, in fact, to our hotel rooms. And you might be interested to know that when rich people trash a hotel room they do not get thrown out of the hotel. But rather, the kids get their own hotel room.) Every time, my dad would tell them that I was fine, that it was only a spanking, that I was exaggerating. He would tell them I have a behavioral problem.
He wasn’t covering anything up as much as expressing how my parents were actually convinced that I was a psychopath. I was the one who went to a psychiatrist my whole childhood. They even had me tested at Northwestern’s neurology lab. But at the same time, my parents were doing things like getting angry enough to leave me as in Arlington Heights, alone on a street corner, while they drove back to Wilmette. (Google Map that: Not good parenting. Probably illegal today.)
Okay. So fast forward to my marriage now, to the Farmer. The odds are that I would be with a man who treats me like my dad did, right? So it should not surprise you that the Farmer pushed me so hard that I fell on the floor. In front of my six-year-old son.
The Farmer would tell you why it’s my fault, and how I deserve it, and that I made him do it. If there were a neurology lab in rural Wisconsin he’d probably send me there because he has told me numerous times, most recently right after he apologized for pushing me, again, that I am emotionally abusive to him.
Two nights ago, I got really scared. He had already pushed me and shoved me and grabbed me and crushed my foot in a door. He would say that I deserved it. That I say crazy things to him. That I never leave him alone. That I am an awful person to live with. For the record.
He had me in a corner, and I was crying and I was scared, and he was telling me how I am a terrible mom, he was saying my youngest son is going to grow up and hit me. So I dialed a number that I thought was a friend, but it was my stepmom, the woman married to my dad
She is totally cool. My dad has very good taste and I really like this stepmom. And she was great to talk to. I can’t complain about one thing she said.
She says, of course, that I am a good mom. And of course, I do not believe her. Someone raised by abusive parents never feels secure in their parenting because they don’t understand what makes kids love parents. So that’s my weak spot. Even if I were a great parent, I’d never believe it.
And of course, she said I need to leave.
I was silent.
Then she suggests sending my dad to come see me. For support. I say okay. Because I can’t say no to support. And, you know what? I can’t say no to my dad. I just want to be loved. He tries really hard. I forgive every transgression, even as his transgressions are huge. Just go read that post. I can’t even bear to write about them again. I can’t because I want to have a dad who loves me in a real way.
I want to have a dad who comes and rescues me when I have a husband who is physically violent.
So my dad drives two hours to see me. He gets here for dinner. I told him not to come any earlier because it’s Sunday, the day my Ex comes to hang out at the house with my sons, and it’s the only day all week that I don’t have kids, so I have to work that day.
Our dinner features my act of childish passive-aggressiveness: I make sure there is no meat in the meal because the Farmer really wants meat in the meal every time.
Maybe that is what he means when he tells me I’m emotionally abusive.
I am alone in the kitchen getting dinner ready. I tell myself not to feel sorry for myself. I tell myself it gets me nowhere. I tell myself that I if I can fix this situation, I will be really good at helping other people to fix their lives.
My dad comes up to me in the kitchen. I am startled.
I tell him I really appreciate that he came, that it makes me feel less alone.
He tells me he wants to help. He tells me he researched women’s shelters in my area.
“Dad. Women’s shelter? Did you say women’s shelter?”
“Yes. I was thinking you could go to one.”
“I can’t go to a women’s shelter, Dad. It’s rural America. A women’s shelter, here?”
I am speechless. I am trying to figure out something to say to him about why I cannot show up to one of those, kids in tow.
“Dad. I’m famous. I’ve signed autographs in grocery stores.”
He said, “Oh. You are?”
I decide we are done. I fluff the bean salad and tell myself he is trying to be helpful.
The Farmer says grace. He needs to thank God before every meal. He wanted to say Jesus also, but we compromised with just God. So he says that. And as he thanks God for this meal, I put my head down and wonder if not allowing him to thank Jesus is emotionally abusive.
The kids eat and run.
And there I am, alone. With the three men in my life.
My dad talks about his stamp collection. There was an auction in Iowa. He was thinking of going, but all the stamps he wanted were too expensive.
The Ex says he had a stamp collection, too. His parents just sent it to him. They are cleaning out their closets.
The Farmer says he had a stamp collection too.
We talk about plate blocks, post card values, and pros and cons of hinges. The hinges are difficult. You never know if it’s better to attach the stamps for security, or if the attachment is so damaging that you risk losing the stamp.
as a writer, absolutely brilliant last two lines. shot through me like fire, because…
as a person abused and neglected as a child, as a mom, as a homeschooler who struggles daily, as a working person who struggles with the loss of that “identity” in the world, as a person who witnessed violent domestic abuse in all of her formative years, as a person who is perfectionistic and remarkably flawed, codependent as all hell and fighting like a mother, as a person who would have called her father (even though he was also her abuser)…there is SO much here that resonates with me, layer by painful layer.
GET OUT. You are worth more, your kids will remember more than you know, and PHYSICAL ABUSE IS NEVER EXCUSABLE. It will not go away. So you must, with your precious kids, and protect all of you. As weak as you may feel, you are stronger than anyone could EVER know. Survival.
i only just got here…i’m sticking around because you are, quixotically, real. (everything in me hopes this is fiction, but i get the feeling it’s not.)
I’m sorry but you need to get out of this. You are still being disrespected by your husband and father if they are putting up with actual physical violence, let alone emotional violence toward you and NOT taking you out of it or helping. Sometimes we can’t do it for ourselves, we ask and need other people to take us away from it. You wouldn’t be alone or the first to do it that way is that is what exactly you are in essence asking for. Do it for yourself. It’s a hard thing to do, especially with children and being a single income earner etc but… keeping secrets is just as bad as normalising behaviour which ENCOURAGES people to keep secrets (or act as if those secrets are normal life and fine to live with). Staying in this sort of environment is teaching you and your kids that this sort of violence toward any of you is normal, something to be put up with and in actual fact what you deserve. None of that is true. ALL of it is wrong. All of it is worth trying to find some other way to live.
Good luck Penelope. I really hope you get some help getting out of this. You might think you deserve this but you don’t.
Penelope, I was in an abusive relationship for nearly nine years. It starts with yelling, then every time you forgive him, it’s like permission for him to raise the bar even higher, to the point of violence. I moved out in 2hrs with a 1.5yr old in tow.. After the first physical violence towards me (there had been violence to objects and verbal/emotional/mental abuse) it took four months to finally realize that I couldn’t excuse him, that there was no forgiveness, and that I was worthy of being happy…. and now I am. You know what you need to do.
If I lived next door to you, and knew this was happening, and knew you were staying in this abusive relationship with your kids, I’d be calling child services. You do not seem in a place to get help for yourself. Your kids need to get help if they are in an abusive family. If you can’t get help for yourself, do it for them.
I’ve only been reading your posts for a few months and I feel like I watching a train wreck in the making. Please take care of your beautiful kids, or get someone else to, if you cannot.
Penelope, I so relate to this blog today. Especially this difficult balancing act of relationships that you have with the men in your life. Most significantly your dad. It is very daunting to parent a child on the spectrum, most especially a girl. I live in this same bizarre boat with my dad. I try to forgive him all of the parenting transgressions, but I still want him to love me and support me. The problem becomes that my dad feels he can love me and support me without actually accepting me the way that I am. (He is still, even after 42 years, waiting for me to wake up and be normal.) I don’t know how you can love and support someone without accepting them.
Let me say here, that I’m pretty impressed with your allowing your ex to be in your house. I don’t know who has the bigger concession to make there, but at my house it would be me. I don’t allow my husband’s exs in my house, one I am okay with and the other I can’t stand. But my ex, I don’t even actually want in the same country and I thank god he lives in a completely different state every day. I thank god my son is an adult and I don’t have to deal with his father’s stunning degree of asshatness every day.
Now, the most important thing about this blog today, is you. I know, in some weird AS way, it is always us, but today it really is about you. You need to start thinking about what is happening in your own brain with this situation. You can separate this in the logical sense and your logical brain tells you that this situation is sometimes unsafe and you are both volatile people and you need to get rid of this insane need to stay on something to the point where the farmer understands that the only thing that you understand is when he physically pushes you rather than emotionally pushes you. We all know that you don’t get that at all.
The other part of this is the part that is happening in your little girl brain with needing to be understood and growing up in this volatile, abusive way that taught you that you can’t be understood and if you are put away, then everything will be better. So, as an adult, you know that you need to go away until you can have a grip on your feelings and can actually handle them again. But….there’s this other part of you that knows that you have communication skills and that you are very good at communicating in every other aspect of your life, just not that part that requires you to actually have more than a 5 minute continuous relationship with someone. So, your instinct is to yell louder because obviously the farmer is stupid and can’t hear what you are trying to say. The farmer, however, just wants you to shut up, because he knows that once your emotions are a little more in perspective, you won’t need to yell at him to be understood because you will be able to look at it in that objective way that you approach everything else because it is so difficult to form a relationship with anyone.
So, you have different needs. I understand this awful way of balancing relationships so well, that it is terrifying to watch someone doing it so badly. I will just tell you what worked for me. I finally realised that I cannot control myself when I am very upset about something that is happening with my husband. So, I tell him that I am going to go and have a crockery moment or he tells me that I need to have a crockery moment. It’s been many years since I’ve actually thrown crockery in our house, but sometimes I need to go into the kitchen and contemplate it and commune with the idea while I yell about what ever problem it is that we are having at the top of my lungs. My husband usually just stands back or in another room, sometimes in the car or another house entirely and lets this happen. And then he tries to come at me again in his logical non-threatening daddy way which usually results in a death threat. By this time, I am usually crying and much more approachable because I am portraying that I don’t want to be approached even though for some reason that one thing that I really want is for him to let me curl up on his lap and cry and scream and for him to say “It’s okay, baby”. He has learned to weather the storm until I get here to this point of wanting but not wanting to be comforted.
I’m sure that I piss him off plenty and he usually walks away from me because he is the saner of the two of us, by far. It is a very difficult dance. But once we learned this dance of bobbing and weaving and sometimes someone even says they are sorry for being the big giant butthead that he is, then life at our house got less volatile.
We still have moments, but I don’t think he’s felt like hitting me for awhile (he never did, but I think he probably considered it a time or two), and I certainly haven’t had a gigantic blow up directed entirely at him for awhile. I am learning to not bottle this frustration that I feel with people in general, up inside of me. He is learning that I can’t be like everyone else and that is why he loves me, not hates me. You have to remember this sometimes. We are infuriating people to live with.
Overall, I learned that my anger at him is usually when I get that daddy feeling. That feeling that he doesn’t accept me for who and what I am so how can he love me and support me? When the little warning light goes off in my head that I am about to step into “play back the really bad emotional experiences” tape, I just try to stop and remember that that is the garbage I brought into the relationship, not his.
Wow, this almost turned into its own little blog, and in fact, I’m considering copying and pasting it into my blog. But I will send it to you first. Just remember that I am not a shrink, I just spent way too much time with them as a kid, like you did. I’m just another lost little autistic girl trying to navigate this universe in a fog. Like you.
Penelope, I so relate to this blog today. Especially this difficult balancing act of relationships that you have with the men in your life. Most significantly your dad. It is very daunting to parent a child on the spectrum, most especially a girl. I live in this same bizarre boat with my dad. I try to forgive him all of the parenting transgressions, but I still want him to love me and support me. The problem becomes that my dad feels he can love me and support me without actually accepting me the way that I am. (He is still, even after 42 years, waiting for me to wake up and be normal.) I don’t know how you can love and support someone without accepting them.
Let me say here, that I’m pretty impressed with your allowing your ex to be in your house. I don’t know who has the bigger concession to make there, but at my house it would be me. I don’t allow my husband’s exs in my house, one I am okay with and the other I can’t stand. But my ex, I don’t even actually want in the same country and I thank god he lives in a completely different state every day. I thank god my son is an adult and I don’t have to deal with his father’s stunning degree of asshatness every day.
Now, the most important thing about this blog today, is you. I know, in some weird AS way, it is always us, but today it really is about you. You need to start thinking about what is happening in your own brain with this situation. You can separate this in the logical sense and your logical brain tells you that this situation is sometimes unsafe and you are both volatile people and you need to get rid of this insane need to stay on something to the point where the farmer understands that the only thing that you understand is when he physically pushes you rather than emotionally pushes you. We all know that you don’t get that at all.
The other part of this is the part that is happening in your little girl brain with needing to be understood and growing up in this volatile, abusive way that taught you that you can’t be understood and if you are put away, then everything will be better. So, as an adult, you know that you need to go away until you can have a grip on your feelings and can actually handle them again. But….there’s this other part of you that knows that you have communication skills and that you are very good at communicating in every other aspect of your life, just not that part that requires you to actually have more than a 5 minute continuous relationship with someone. So, your instinct is to yell louder because obviously the farmer is stupid and can’t hear what you are trying to say. The farmer, however, just wants you to shut up, because he knows that once your emotions are a little more in perspective, you won’t need to yell at him to be understood because you will be able to look at it in that objective way that you approach everything else because it is so difficult to form a relationship with anyone.
So, you have different needs. I understand this awful way of balancing relationships so well, that it is terrifying to watch someone doing it so badly. I will just tell you what worked for me. I finally realised that I cannot control myself when I am very upset about something that is happening with my husband. So, I tell him that I am going to go and have a crockery moment or he tells me that I need to have a crockery moment. It’s been many years since I’ve actually thrown crockery in our house, but sometimes I need to go into the kitchen and contemplate it and commune with the idea while I yell about what ever problem it is that we are having at the top of my lungs. My husband usually just stands back or in another room, sometimes in the car or another house entirely and lets this happen. And then he tries to come at me again in his logical non-threatening daddy way which usually results in a death threat. By this time, I am usually crying and much more approachable because I am portraying that I don’t want to be approached even though for some reason that one thing that I really want is for him to let me curl up on his lap and cry and scream and for him to say “It’s okay, baby”. He has learned to weather the storm until I get here to this point of wanting but not wanting to be comforted.
I’m sure that I piss him off plenty and he usually walks away from me because he is the saner of the two of us, by far. It is a very difficult dance. But once we learned this dance of bobbing and weaving and sometimes someone even says they are sorry for being the big giant butthead that he is, then life at our house got less volatile.
We still have moments, but I don’t think he’s felt like hitting me for awhile (he never did, but I think he probably considered it a time or two), and I certainly haven’t had a gigantic blow up directed entirely at him for awhile. I am learning to not bottle this frustration that I feel with people in general, up inside of me. He is learning that I can’t be like everyone else and that is why he loves me, not hates me. You have to remember this sometimes. We are infuriating people to live with.
Overall, I learned that my anger at him is usually when I get that daddy feeling. That feeling that he doesn’t accept me for who and what I am so how can he love me and support me? When the little warning light goes off in my head that I am about to step into “play back the really bad emotional experiences” tape, I just try to stop and remember that that is the garbage I brought into the relationship, not his.
Wow, this almost turned into its own little blog, and in fact, I’m considering copying and pasting it into my blog. But I will send it to you first. Just remember that I am not a shrink, I just spent way too much time with them as a kid, like you did. I’m just another lost little autistic girl trying to navigate this universe in a fog. Like you.
Penelope, I so relate to this blog today. Especially this difficult balancing act of relationships that you have with the men in your life. Most significantly your dad. It is very daunting to parent a child on the spectrum, most especially a girl. I live in this same bizarre boat with my dad. I try to forgive him all of the parenting transgressions, but I still want him to love me and support me. The problem becomes that my dad feels he can love me and support me without actually accepting me the way that I am. (He is still, even after 42 years, waiting for me to wake up and be normal.) I don’t know how you can love and support someone without accepting them.
Let me say here, that I’m pretty impressed with your allowing your ex to be in your house. I don’t know who has the bigger concession to make there, but at my house it would be me. I don’t allow my husband’s exs in my house, one I am okay with and the other I can’t stand. But my ex, I don’t even actually want in the same country and I thank god he lives in a completely different state every day. I thank god my son is an adult and I don’t have to deal with his father’s stunning degree of asshatness every day.
Now, the most important thing about this blog today, is you. I know, in some weird AS way, it is always us, but today it really is about you. You need to start thinking about what is happening in your own brain with this situation. You can separate this in the logical sense and your logical brain tells you that this situation is sometimes unsafe and you are both volatile people and you need to get rid of this insane need to stay on something to the point where the farmer understands that the only thing that you understand is when he physically pushes you rather than emotionally pushes you. We all know that you don’t get that at all.
The other part of this is the part that is happening in your little girl brain with needing to be understood and growing up in this volatile, abusive way that taught you that you can’t be understood and if you are put away, then everything will be better. So, as an adult, you know that you need to go away until you can have a grip on your feelings and can actually handle them again. But….there’s this other part of you that knows that you have communication skills and that you are very good at communicating in every other aspect of your life, just not that part that requires you to actually have more than a 5 minute continuous relationship with someone. So, your instinct is to yell louder because obviously the farmer is stupid and can’t hear what you are trying to say. The farmer, however, just wants you to shut up, because he knows that once your emotions are a little more in perspective, you won’t need to yell at him to be understood because you will be able to look at it in that objective way that you approach everything else because it is so difficult to form a relationship with anyone.
So, you have different needs. I understand this awful way of balancing relationships so well, that it is terrifying to watch someone doing it so badly. I will just tell you what worked for me. I finally realised that I cannot control myself when I am very upset about something that is happening with my husband. So, I tell him that I am going to go and have a crockery moment or he tells me that I need to have a crockery moment. It’s been many years since I’ve actually thrown crockery in our house, but sometimes I need to go into the kitchen and contemplate it and commune with the idea while I yell about what ever problem it is that we are having at the top of my lungs. My husband usually just stands back or in another room, sometimes in the car or another house entirely and lets this happen. And then he tries to come at me again in his logical non-threatening daddy way which usually results in a death threat. By this time, I am usually crying and much more approachable because I am portraying that I don’t want to be approached even though for some reason that one thing that I really want is for him to let me curl up on his lap and cry and scream and for him to say “It’s okay, baby”. He has learned to weather the storm until I get here to this point of wanting but not wanting to be comforted.
I’m sure that I piss him off plenty and he usually walks away from me because he is the saner of the two of us, by far. It is a very difficult dance. But once we learned this dance of bobbing and weaving and sometimes someone even says they are sorry for being the big giant butthead that he is, then life at our house got less volatile.
We still have moments, but I don’t think he’s felt like hitting me for awhile (he never did, but I think he probably considered it a time or two), and I certainly haven’t had a gigantic blow up directed entirely at him for awhile. I am learning to not bottle this frustration that I feel with people in general, up inside of me. He is learning that I can’t be like everyone else and that is why he loves me, not hates me. You have to remember this sometimes. We are infuriating people to live with.
Overall, I learned that my anger at him is usually when I get that daddy feeling. That feeling that he doesn’t accept me for who and what I am so how can he love me and support me? When the little warning light goes off in my head that I am about to step into “play back the really bad emotional experiences” tape, I just try to stop and remember that that is the garbage I brought into the relationship, not his.
Wow, this almost turned into its own little blog, and in fact, I’m considering copying and pasting it into my blog. But I will send it to you first. Just remember that I am not a shrink, I just spent way too much time with them as a kid, like you did. I’m just another lost little autistic girl trying to navigate this universe in a fog. Like you.
Hi, there!
Where is your blog? You smart woman, you! Smart and wise.
I don’t think I am autistic, but I certainly have PTSD and clinical depression. I am learning a lot from Penelope and would like the opportunity to learn from you.
How do I find your blog?
Hugs, if you want them,
Hi, there!
Where is your blog? You smart woman, you! Smart and wise.
I don’t think I am autistic, but I certainly have PTSD and clinical depression. I am learning a lot from Penelope and would like the opportunity to learn from you.
How do I find your blog?
Hugs, if you want them,
you can leave, you can walk away, you can let the farmer walk away. (which, i am going to guess he was trying to do when he crushed your foot – you put your foot in front of the door to keep him from leaving. right?) You have already repeated this cycle 3 times yet you say your therapist is fantastic. I am thinking, maybe not so much? What does your therapist think of this situation?
you are my sister (only our parents were saints, comparatively) i understand your point of view 100% and why you stay. (not that i think you should, but if i write all that this post will be far too long)
i wish i could hug you and listen to you talk (or IM) about it for hours while you hash it out in your head. you need hours. try to write and, as someone said, research it to death. you cope by analyzing things to the point of unemotional as a coping mechanism. write about it in perhaps a new section. share what you learn and help others like you are doing with the homeschooling section. maybe you will accidentally help yourself along the way (it worked for your career)
you can leave, you can walk away, you can let the farmer walk away. (which, i am going to guess he was trying to do when he crushed your foot – you put your foot in front of the door to keep him from leaving. right?) You have already repeated this cycle 3 times yet you say your therapist is fantastic. I am thinking, maybe not so much? What does your therapist think of this situation?
you are my sister (only our parents were saints, comparatively) i understand your point of view 100% and why you stay. (not that i think you should, but if i write all that this post will be far too long)
i wish i could hug you and listen to you talk (or IM) about it for hours while you hash it out in your head. you need hours. try to write and, as someone said, research it to death. you cope by analyzing things to the point of unemotional as a coping mechanism. write about it in perhaps a new section. share what you learn and help others like you are doing with the homeschooling section. maybe you will accidentally help yourself along the way (it worked for your career)
you can leave, you can walk away, you can let the farmer walk away. (which, i am going to guess he was trying to do when he crushed your foot – you put your foot in front of the door to keep him from leaving. right?) You have already repeated this cycle 3 times yet you say your therapist is fantastic. I am thinking, maybe not so much? What does your therapist think of this situation?
you are my sister (only our parents were saints, comparatively) i understand your point of view 100% and why you stay. (not that i think you should, but if i write all that this post will be far too long)
i wish i could hug you and listen to you talk (or IM) about it for hours while you hash it out in your head. you need hours. try to write and, as someone said, research it to death. you cope by analyzing things to the point of unemotional as a coping mechanism. write about it in perhaps a new section. share what you learn and help others like you are doing with the homeschooling section. maybe you will accidentally help yourself along the way (it worked for your career)
Your dad really, truly sucks. Women’s shelter? What kind of parent doesn’t offer to take his kid in during a crisis, no matter how crazy he believes her to be.
No advice, because I doubt you will leave. Prove me (one of your snarkiest jackass readers) wrong.
Given the history, why would Penelope WANT to stay with her father?
Here’s what I don’t understand: you can’t go to a shelter because you’re famous? What does that have to do with your well-being and that of your children?
Throughout this post you describe highly dysfunctional relationships, but you seem MOST worried about your public and their opinion of you. That does not seem like an appropriate priority under the circumstances.
Everything you do teaches your children. (You know this. It’s why you decided to home school them.) What are they learning from this?
They are learning about conflict, and – in my opinion – they are learning really unhealthy ways of dealing with anger and disagreement and emotional hurt. The commenter above who said that you and the Farmer need to learn how to “fight fair” is absolutely right.
If the two of you cannot learn how to resolve conflict without cruelty and violence, you shouldn’t stay together. It’s bad for you, and bad for your children. If you think there’s little prospect of learning those skills and putting them into practice, or if you even suspect that the physical violence is going to escalate, you need to leave right now.
Worrying about your image and your audience can and should wait.
She brought up being famous to mask how hurt she was he didn’t fly to her rescue. Read it again really carefully. We went from vulnerability to narcissism in 30 seconds. What happened in between? Gut-wrenching pain at daddy’s continued lack of interest in her.
Your dad really, truly sucks. Women’s shelter? What kind of parent doesn’t offer to take his kid in during a crisis, no matter how crazy he believes her to be.
No advice, because I doubt you will leave. Prove me (one of your snarkiest jackass readers) wrong.
Penelope, you’re getting lots of comments, directives, and advice about your relationship. Reading your blog over time, I’ve come to understand that you can and will sort yourself out on that front.
I want to comment about exposing yourself in this way. Your fear of being a fraud, and the concomitant need to out yourself to see how others will react.
A bit more than 10 years ago, I spent a good chunk of time in the Middle East. All over. Lebanon, Israel, Turkey, Palestine, Jordan. All of it. Even lived through a couple of large earthquakes there.
When I came home, I was broken. The work I’d been doing was for an international NGO, and it was draining work in an even more draining environment. The Middle East is a hard place to Be … much less to live.
Anyway, I owed the NGO one last article (kind of pre-blogging) to distribute to their donor base to show the goodness/power of the work they were doing.
The article was about my brokenness. About my desolation. About the fact that I’d been writing for this audience for years as a strong, informed, and talented young woman and that, in truth, I was none of those.
The editor freaked out. He didn’t want to publish it. He said that it would expose me too much to people. I told him to publish it anyway. He did.
It was honesty in the middle of fluff.
That’s what you’ve done here today. Thank you for doing it, whatever may come.
Penelope, you’re getting lots of comments, directives, and advice about your relationship. Reading your blog over time, I’ve come to understand that you can and will sort yourself out on that front.
I want to comment about exposing yourself in this way. Your fear of being a fraud, and the concomitant need to out yourself to see how others will react.
A bit more than 10 years ago, I spent a good chunk of time in the Middle East. All over. Lebanon, Israel, Turkey, Palestine, Jordan. All of it. Even lived through a couple of large earthquakes there.
When I came home, I was broken. The work I’d been doing was for an international NGO, and it was draining work in an even more draining environment. The Middle East is a hard place to Be … much less to live.
Anyway, I owed the NGO one last article (kind of pre-blogging) to distribute to their donor base to show the goodness/power of the work they were doing.
The article was about my brokenness. About my desolation. About the fact that I’d been writing for this audience for years as a strong, informed, and talented young woman and that, in truth, I was none of those.
The editor freaked out. He didn’t want to publish it. He said that it would expose me too much to people. I told him to publish it anyway. He did.
It was honesty in the middle of fluff.
That’s what you’ve done here today. Thank you for doing it, whatever may come.
Penelope: You have kids. You have strength. Model wisely.
Penelope…I’m not going to say anything you don’t already know (you need to leave, etc…). My heart breaks for you. Maybe you are emotionally abusive – I don’t know, I don’t live with you. But even if you are, a marriage shouldn’t be “An eye for an eye” arrangement. No real man would ever push a woman.
I really think you need to look to other people for support and emotional help, though. Not the man who did you wrong first, paving the way for how you feel about yourself deep down.
I don’t even know what to say anymore. It is too much. You need to do something. But I wouldn’t know what to tell you. I wish you the best though, in trying to figure this all out.
I have been telling you for a while now that you DO NOT belong out in rural America. It is not good for you. I was there once. It was bad in all ways except the garden.
You don’t have to go back to NY City. There are other places besides NY. A happy medium between the horrors of rural living (yes I said horrors) and the scariness of living at ground zero. Maybe here in Boston, or San Francisco.
Leave that place already!!!!!!!!!!! There I said it.
Thank you for your honesty. You have taken a quantum leap in disengaging yourself from the Nightmare Your Father started…. Oprah says; “Once We Accept We Never Had a Family Is when We Start to Own ourselves and Leave the Abuse Behind”..
Oprah did it with her Family… It was all too much a nightmare memory.. She detached and found her self and family that is Much More Her…and of course GREW immensely finding her Truth which enabled her to have extreme success.. she earned.. and in the end was reunited with her family but on HER TERMS…. ( your father is not aware of who you really are and never will be. Just like your ex and now husband never will as this is how abusers behave.. They CANNOT see You.. Only Themselves)
It is time to stop gumbytizing Yourself to the Initial Pattern of Abuse that created Your Hell in first Place.. Last Sunday meal was a good requiem in leaving your past behind… Your father, Your Ex and Your now husband…You are going to have to move out of the farmers House… as to stay, all you are doing is ignoring and defending his behavior which will never add up to the fantasy you want…
The only Good Thing about this… A better situation awaits You…
Where You have all you want in Reality not the fantasy you keep trying to contort the Farmer into and your son’s father into… and Especially this ” Dad” into.Yes You can forgive… but you cannot keep these people attached in your life.. It does not matter that your father has a great wife now… and has been in therapy.. Walking away from those who abused you… and accepting YOU NEVER HAD FAMILY.. as none of these people behaved with LOVE…towards You… Acceptance… etc… YOU ARE NOT THE PROBLEM..It is you just keep surrounding yourself with People who cannot comprehend You…
The Farmer needs treatment.. He is extremely immature.. It is not funny anymore.. If he wants to be in your life.. He needs therapy to find himself.. and this is not going to happen with the dynamics of you living there with him… Why people go into rehab.. to block out others from their lives.. etc.. to get clear… YOU ARE NOT THE PROBLEM..THE FARMER IS..Please call Dr. Susan Weitzman 312.444.1777 She is in Chicago and returns calls herself.
She will know places and situations you can go to.. Madison is also very resourceful in educating about Domestic Violence.. Sure there are areas in University dealing with as it . As Domestic Violence is a Mental Health crisis now as behind every addiction, depression, acting out is a History of person being abused… It is the reality…It is BEHAVIORS that have to be addressed.. and you can no longer live with the Behaviors of these men in your life.Making excuses for them as You LOVE Them ??? Great but they do NOT KNOW WHAT LOVE is.. to return it to you.
http://www.theweitzmancenter.org/ She is author of Not to People Like Us – Hidden Abuse in Upscale Marriageswww.nottopeoplelikeus.com/
In her book, Not to People Like Us, Dr. Susan Weitzman explores a heretofore overlooked population of battered wives–the highly-educated and upper-income …It would be great if you and Dr Weitzman can team up to educate on this epidemic.. that effects 99% of woman and children as non of us have the $$’s to live.. and the males who control the $$’s have not have grown up and found themselves use that to control those around them… Here is a whole new platform of writing that will make you much more money !! Amplify the message and of course give you many more topics to write about.. As your readership is not going to accept the Farmer Battering you as this is living with Ignorance and Stupidity… I was a Target who walked away from a lifetime of abuse via family.. which made me only find abusers in my personal life as it is the only world I knew. There is NOTHING LIKE REAL FREEDOM… You and Your sons deserve of dignitygracewithbeauty that is OUR RIGHT as Humans..We are witnessing this Domestic Violence on Wall Street now and witnessed in WI this past year in Madison… It is being exposed now for what it is.. and It is running everyones lives and it is very wrong.. The only way to STOP it is to protest.. and it will be worth every second in leaving this wonderful home you created at the Farmers to STAND Up for Your gorgeous Beauty and the LIFE YOU DESERVE…. and Have the Right to… You OWE nothing to the Farmer, to your EX or to your Family.. Time to take yourselves and your son’s to life the feeds you, nurtures you, loves you.. Not drains You and castrates you..Sacrificing a Dream with Farmer that was NOT REAL to begin with as he is stuck in ignorance..will be Well Worth all you reap in the future, personally, mentally, spiritually, financially from leaving the Fantasy behind for Real Life… You do not have to SEARCH for the nuggets in people.. There are tons of people out there once you push Abuse out of your life that live in the giving of NUGGETS of Joy and Life 24/7 as they surrendered to selves, evolved and live in the PRESENT MOMENT with LOVE.
Penelope, This is the first time I’ve ever commented on a blog or post from someone I didn’t know personally. This post really got to me for several reasons. First, I really like you. You’re smart and gutsy and loyal all wrapped up in one. I’ve wondered about some of the posts about the farmer because they cut close to home for me. I was smart enought to tell my ex-husband when we started dating that if he ever hit me, it would be over. I wasn’t smart enough to add verbal and emotional abuse to that statement. Penelope, a lot of what you write shows the farmer being both emotionally and verbally abusive to you. So many people find physical abuse so appalling that they don’t see the damage emotional and verbal abuse causes. I don’t see both sides, obviously, but I relate to what I read you’ve done as how I would have reacted to my ex. I see you as a smart, competent woman. And I guess the only thing I want to get across to you is that you are worth it. You are worthy of love and respect. You have made a life on your own before and you can do it again. You are worthy of happiness and joy and peace. My thoughts are with you. ~j
Hey Penelope,
I wish we could sit down and talk, instead of me trying to type out something meaningful in a blog comment. Our mutual friend Tina Su first introduced me to you & the blog, and I’ve really enjoyed your writing. I’m a family practice physician, and I’ve had both friends and patients with Aspergers, as well as friends and patients who have struggled with challenging relationships. I’m going to resist giving you advice, because I realize I don’t know your situation well enough to summarily dispense what will surely work for you. We humans are a curious lot: we have great capacity to love & to hurt, both intentionally and unintentionally. Perhaps I can best offer a simple affirmation: you ARE a wonderful person, even with all the things you’d like to change about yourself, you DO make a tremendous positive impact on many, many people (including me), even when you doubt that you can’t do anything right, and you WILL find the right path in this difficult situation. Thank you again so much for being YOU.
Trying to figure out how these three guys can have dinner with you given all the things past and present and that they turn out to all have had stamp collections. What are the odds. Not sure I understand what imposter syndrome is but I can tell this from the post, this is not a good circumstance. You have described so many ordeals in your life, none of which I have ever had, I just don’t know what to say. Your kids seem great, your posts tell me you are dynamic, talented, and savvy. You have to consider changing your circumstance. Surprised you called your dad. You need to try and find some tranquility somewhere. I find myself after reading this giving thanks for my family and my peaceful life. Know you are loved by readers, your kids, God and I am sure others. Find peace in loving others and yourself. And consider living in a place where no one pushes you around.
Oh and PS. If you don’t get out for yourself, then do it for your children.
Penelope, what do you want from the Farmer? Do you want him to completely snap and lose it? Or do you expect endless calm and patience? Do you want a dramatic rollercoaster of a relationship or would you be content with peace and plodding along? While the Farmer of course has to take responsibility for how he handles his frustrations, you also have to acknowledge that your actions have consequences. You are both to blame and both victims. People won’t leave you because your situation is all too common but this doesn’t make it okay. Please stop hurting each other. And remember, psychological abuse can be just as damaging as physical abuse.
Occasionally, someone will link to your blog, and I will read it. You are a very good writer, congratulations for making money with your writing.
However, every time I read one of your posts, I come away thinking that you all have one f++ked up family. The tension in your home must be palpable.
People really should not be taking your advice, because you are too screwed up in how you are living.
This is the worst post I’ve read yet. What kind of masochist are you? You know you should get out – the Farmer will be livid that you have divulged this and could very well be more abusive.
You are fooling yourself. I’ll say a prayer, yes to Jesus, for your safety.
OMG … You said this perfectly!!! THANK YOU
* correction* I meant my comment for Beth… Perfectly said Beth!
Occasionally, someone will link to your blog, and I will read it. You are a very good writer, congratulations for making money with your writing.
However, every time I read one of your posts, I come away thinking that you all have one f++ked up family. The tension in your home must be palpable.
People really should not be taking your advice, because you are too screwed up in how you are living.
This is the worst post I’ve read yet. What kind of masochist are you? You know you should get out – the Farmer will be livid that you have divulged this and could very well be more abusive.
You are fooling yourself. I’ll say a prayer, yes to Jesus, for your safety.
Sometimes the zipper breaks. It’s easy to freak out because you think “HEY! This zipper isn’t supposed to break! What the hell!? I promised people this was a good zipper.” But then you fix the zipper, it costs five bucks and all is well. Or, worse case, you just get a whole new bag and once again, all is well. I know you’ll find your solution. Keep looking for it.
You may feel like you can’t (or don’t need to) go to a shelter, but I’m betting they have a hotline you can call, to talk with trained counselors. And they’ll have other services too, that aren’t just for the women living in the shelter. Start w/ http://www.abuseintervention.org/help.html or http://www.familyadv.org/.
I’m sorry this has happened.
You may feel like you can’t (or don’t need to) go to a shelter, but I’m betting they have a hotline you can call, to talk with trained counselors. And they’ll have other services too, that aren’t just for the women living in the shelter. Start w/ http://www.abuseintervention.org/help.html or http://www.familyadv.org/.
I’m sorry this has happened.
Penelope, you are a talented writer and observer of life.When you stop observing and needing the love of people who seem as though they don’t have it to give,what is it that you would really like to do next? Where do you want to go next? Who do you want to be next? And, what’s with the testing of your readers? Haven’t you had just about enough of testing in your own life?
Love ya
marie
try alanon.
Two things:
Any physical abuse in front of a child, as you describe, is intolerable. It will escalate. Get out!
I hope you don’t have any firearms in your home. Anyone who has read your blog since you have married the farmer knows that this is headed in a dreadful direction. Get out!
If you won’t leave because you don’t think it’s “that bad” and because you love him, please think about your kids. Almost all adults who are abusive have been abused as children or witnessed violence in their home. Is this the future that you want for them?
I worked in a domestic abuse shelter. The women, on average, went back to their husbands 8 times before they left for good. By the time they come to the shelter for good, their kids are either really, really quiet and timid about talking to adults or really unruly because they’ll be punished either way. They expect adults to scream and/or hit them. If you won’t leave because you love the Farmer, have your kids live with your ex. They don’t need to witness physical abuse.
Nobody ever deserves physical abuse.
Please wake up.
You are a very good woman. You need to be with a man who has enough sense and room to retreat into when things get difficult for him or you. His job is to love you and to support you and your boys. Obviously, that means backing off when things get difficult. You deserve a better deal than this; the farmer has to retreat instead of confronting you. I don’t know what you should do. If you can’t leave, try to structure some sort of timeout places for both of you, like neutral corners for boxers in the ring. Again, you are a very good woman, but making a relationship with you and your boys work requires unconventional skills. I never had a stamp collection, and never will.
Peace to you.
Penelope, I think you and the farmer need a timeout.
You have Aspergers. Maybe you need some kind of treatment or help so that you can have better interactions with the farmer. Maybe you don’t realize when he is pissed, or that you do things — not on purpose– that piss him off.
Maybe you need some time away from the farmer to think about things like this.
Why does being famous mean you can’t go to a shelter? Was it just because you expected him to set you up with something fancier, or invite you and the kids to stay with him?
No real advice, except, pay attention to your thoughts, but don’t believe everything you think.
Also, check your Twitter messages.
Sydnew is exactly right. You are emotionally abusive to him. You have cited many examples in your own blog. But that gives him no right to hit you (or shout and break things as you have written about before). One of you needs to leave before something really bad happens. In front of your kids.
I get it. I really really get it. Because my dad used to beat me up; broken bones, concussions & the whole 9 yards. I dodged the sexual abuse bullet by a thread and STILL in my adulthood I took my dad into my appartement when he needed it. I still talked to him after he stole thousands of dollars from me.
The bottom of the barrel for me was when he called my sister, drunk, and left this message on her awnswering machine: “F*** YOU!” And hung up. My sister who’s been looking for his attention all these years while I was making sure all his attention was focused on me and not her for her own safety.
Took me 33 years to figure out that even though it’s not fair and that you love someone, it’s still not up to you to fix someone who doesn’t give a rat’s ass about you except for the power they get from you. For the record, and because I wish someone had told ME way earlier: this isn’t the way people who love each other really behave. Really.
Best of luck and don’t get sucked into the “honeymoon phase” from after a fight.
Maybe you think it’s not that bad because it is better than your childhood.
Maybe you feel that something is wrong if there’s not an incredible intensity between you and the farmer.
I have an idea – you wrote a post about having too many decisions to make, and I am feeling like for whatever reason (ie. your asperger’s, your past abuse, whatever) you are not feeling capable of making the right decisions here. How about if you let a trusted friend make some decisions for you for a little while with regards to the farmer and your living situation. I know it sounds crazy, but I’m serious. Consider it – a true “personal” assistant. If it’s a trusted friend, you can feel confident and certain they will do what’s best for you.
Of course you should leave, but you know that. I beg you to leave for the chidren if you don’t do it for yourself. A child should feel safe in his own home. Your children are probably so afraid for you right now, they’re already being damaged. The neurological make-up of their brain is already being changed by the abuse they’ve witnessed. My father wasn’t abusive, but my parents argued a lot and I’ll never forget the day he threatened my mother. Just the reminder of my fear that ONE day practically gives me a panic attack this very minute. I can’t imagine what it’s like for a child to be on constant high alert from such fear for years. My partner was in an abusive home for the first 10 or so years of his life. He’s still very angry at times out of proportion to what a situation calls for. He’s quick-tempered, has an aggressive nature (easily defensive, road rage), and doesn’t realize there’s anything wrong with the fact he used to get into fist fights constantly as a young man/young adult. It won’t take much for your kids to be damaged. And you certainly don’t want to wait until the farmer starts abusing the children too. Don’t justify keeping your children in this situation by saying that you survived abuse in your childhood and turned out all right – because you’re not. And just because you survived, doesn’t mean your children should have to deal with it too. Please, please, please get them out of that house. I don’t just mean send them to school. They should literally not be living there.
One last thought. The principal of your child’s former school reads your blog. Don’t be surprised if social services is given a heads-up to the abuse in your home. You’re famous. They will get serious heat for not stepping in if/when it becomes appropriate. They will be on alert (as perhaps they should be). I would be so afraid they would take my kids away or afraid of just the mere threat of the possiblity. I know that doesn’t scare you because you don’t believe it would happen. I wish it did scare you just a little to give you something bigger than yourself to consider – your children. Hell, I think the embarrassment alone of my community knowing I’m abused and still living there would be enough to send me packing.
How about if you go buy yourself a small little farmhouse somewhere. You don’t have to work an actual farm (there are plenty of old farm houses in Wisconsin where the old barn has already been torn down). If you can afford it, hire one person (a tutor, nanny, whatever) to engage, tutor, hang out with your kids part-time during the week so you have a little time to get yourself back on your feet in a new home for you and your boys. I know if it were me, I would not want to put them back in school, even if just for a short while, but if you must, then consider it just temporary. Try to stay relatively close to their biological dad if that is feasible (I can’t remember/don’t know how his relationship is with his boys – would it be good for them to be closer to their dad?) If you put them in school for a little while, I assure you you can get them caught up when they start homeschooling again a few years down the road. ANY action that you take RIGHT NOW towards getting yourself and your precious boys out of that house is the right step to take. Once you do that, the details will work themselves out. You’re a survivor. Don’t just survive abuse – THRIVE in a life that you and your boys deserve. All you have to do is walk out that door.
I really do mean to sign off, but I have another idea. If you won’t leave for yourself – leave for the sake of using this as material for your business. Research the hell out of abuse. Lead by example so you can tell your story about how you got out. Break down the barriers to leaving an abuser in your blog so other abused men/women can read and be convinced they don’t have to be afraid of leaving – there are options, there are choices, and they WILL survive on your promise. Too naive? Maybe, but I don’t think so. You have an opportunity to reach a lot of people with a message like this. Maybe not all the abused read your blog, but maybe they have a friend, co-worker, or someone else in their life who does and will give them a link. So, this can be another reason for you to go. I’ll keep thinking up new ones if you need more than just yourself as reason good enough – which you are. You place so much importance on career sucess, but I don’t think you realize that sucess in one’s personal life is so very much more important in life and necessary for true happiness. And that’s life-changing information.
Here’s another – the flip side. If you don’t leave the farmer, I think you surely will lose some readers. For some reason, some people can’t stand to be around people who are abused and who refuse to leave. They can’t stand to see the pain. I would have never believed it until I knew someone who literally walked away from a friend who was being abused but refused to leave. The person I know literally told her friend, if you can’t leave, I can’t stand to sit by and watch, and just like that they were no longer friends. I couldn’t believe she had the gall to do that – turn her back on a friend who needed her. So, I guess, when people feel helpless, they have to just walk away from the pain they can’t to see. Your readers who can’t stand to read your pain will have to leave.
Something else – you staying in an abusive home may very well be something that causes you to lose credibility with your readers. One person in this comment thread already questioned your credibility in giving advice about life when you can’t even leave an abusive relationship and questioned your judgment coming from an abusive past.
Isn’t it true that you and the farmer are not legally married? I thought I read that you had an unofficial ceremony but you didn’t legally get married for financial and family reasons. If that’s truly the case, then you can feel free to leave that farm and never have to look back – even during the 6-month waiting period it takes to get a divorce in Wisconsin. You can tell the boys you’re leaving because it is never acceptable to hit another person. They’ll get it.
This commenter is correct. Some of your readers will leave because they cannot respect an abused person who will not help themselves. I’ve prosecuted hundreds of domestic violence cases from push & shoves up to attempted murder. I know about the cycle of power and control that is a dynamic in so many of these relationships. But I eventually had to change assignments because I simply couldn’t respect the majority of the victims. They recanted in case after case; returning to their abusers as bruises esclatated into broken bones. Too many times I had to incur wrath and hatred to do what they wouldn’t do for themselves by ensuring that the abuser was incapcitated by jail or prison. It was a hard, bitter lesson to learn that if a person doesn’t want to help him or herself, no one else can.
I hope P beats the odds; but absent a change in trajectory, I wouldn’t bet on it.
Penelope, you were sexually abused by the father you ‘love’, and guess what, your kids are now being abused, by you. You are building the foundation for their future ability to have relationships, and they will not be able to have future relationship,s and of course, neither will their children. Yup, it is a circle. I broke the chain in my life. Having AS, I know I cannot have relationships. Save your kids. Too late for no damage at all, but it will help a small bit.
speaking of which – what does melissa say?
can you take a partial step away and leave the immediate situation, separate, and figure things out where you’re physically safe? but then i imagine you are thinking you want to save the boys from a back and forth scenario.
one problem is, i think, that you imagine there is a line in the sand but then you cross that line and think, well, that wasn’t SO bad, and you find a way to rationalize it, and you redraw the line further out.
i know you’ve invested a lot in this relationship, this house, and this country life for the boys with a new father. but those are sunk costs. i am imagining you weighing the trouble of relocating and setting up a new life, new schedule, new routines, new home, etc., and then just accepting the status quo. i hope you don’t. i hope you redraw that line that says you won’t stay if you get physically abused and stick to it.
another thought –
when you’ve experienced abuse as a child, it resets your boundaries. i mean, compared to what you’re familiar with, being shoved across the kitchen might not feel like that big of a deal. everything’s relative. in your mind, you’re thinking – that’s not right. that’s physical abuse. but that old saying is true: what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. and if you’re stronger in the broken places, then when the next guy just pushes you, you don’t just crumple.
The problem is that her boys have already been seriously affected by their mother. You see, the smarter the boy, the plainer it is to him just how whack his mother is. Why is she hiding up on a farm?
“Someone raised by abusive parents never feels secure in their parenting because they don’t understand what makes kids love parents. So that's my weak spot. Even if I were a great parent, I'd never believe it.”
How did I never know this before? This makes so much sense.
Thank you.
Don’t think about what you need to do to fix the situation for you or the Farmer. Think about what you need to do to fix the situation for your kids. That means leaving. Or they leave to stay with your ex-husband while you get this sorted. There’s nothing that makes pushing you down onto the ground in front of your child okay. And you’re complicit in the abuse if you allow them to stay in that home with or without you. See it from a 6-year-old’s perspective. See it from his size and your size at that age. It was too scary seeing my dad try to throw my mom out of a window even though he didn’t do it to me directly.
You can’t fix what your dad did to you. But you can fix what the Farmer is doing to your kids. And you can do it with your dad’s help. That’s as close to fixing what your dad did as you’re ever going to get.
When you ignore doing the obvious because it’s obvious–like leaving a physically abusive and emotionally withholding man–that’s all the more reason to do it. Do the obvious, Penelope.
The Farmer is F**KED UP. It’s not you. It’s him. He’s a loser, a jerk, an asshole, a bastard, a prick, a puke, a pariah. Farmer – if you’re reading this then YOU need to go jump off a silo or a bridge, or into the path of a tractor or bus, or speeding train. Sorry P, but abusers never get better, they just get smarter at finding ways to hurt people. He’s not a Christian. He’s a demon pretending to be a Christian. Big diff.
As the child of a father who abused me, beat me bloody and bruised I know one thing, that you did NOTHING to deserve this. As a former police officer I know that you HAVE to leave. In almost 100% of the cases of domestic abuse ONE or BOTH partners eventually DIE. Yeah. No joke, DIE. And those numbers almost always involve the woman’s death.
He’s a freak. An ABSOLUTE FREAK. The bond between you is strong, but cut it. Leave. If you can’t do it for you, do it for your children.
Ramblings of a crazy woman. First, the use of ALL CAPS shows a SMOLDERING RAGE that is just under the surface.
Furthermore, you’re so far off with your unsubstantiated “In almost 100% of the cases of domestic abuse ONE or BOTH partners eventually DIE.” Please, Matilda.
The number is in single digits. The number I’ve heard from professionals is 1-3%. I used to volunteer in a woman’s shelter, I did it for almost 18 years. I’ll agree that the number of women who do (or should) seek medical treatment is very high.. but death? No way. Not trivializing the terrible nature of physical abuse. But you do so much damage by spewing hyperbole in the manner of a 3rd-grader.
There are many sites which have information & statistics on domestic violence & associated crimes. Just one example is: http://www.aardvarc.org/dv/statistics.shtml
So Ms. Blanton, please leave the lies, sensationalism and drama to the Hollywood script writers. I’m sorry to hear you’re so emotionally invested in spreading mis-information. Maybe you need counseling.
Hi Carla : )
It’s kind of tempting to respond to your post in an equally heartless manner. Yet, I’ve been reading all of these comments, looking over the rest of the site, and honestly trying to get a handle on the story here – it’s my first time to this blog.
It seems like everyone is hoping Penelope is safe and gets help (if she wants it or can access some). That’s a good thing, and she seems to have a lot of online “friends” unlike a lot of women who are isolated when dealing with abuse.
Attacking Ms. Blanton’s comment (1-3% is still one too many – and no one deserves to die like that) took me by surprise. We all have been through something, we all are suppose to help one another – not add to the hurt. Thank you for volunteering in a woman’s shelter – we need more folks to do that, and show up for those of us who have been abused. As a survivor, I thought Ms. Blanton’s post was an honest attempt to encourage Penelope to know she may be in danger, people care and she can leave.
Leaving is sometimes the one thing we aren’t sure we can do – even if we have a place to go.
Thanks for the link as well.
I’m guessing you won’t care what I have to say, and that’s alright, too. Just from this side of the screen, I read your response and thought, “Ouch – you really worked in a shelter? Then why would you throw hurtful words at someone who just publicly admitted they suffered abuse at a child?” I just didn’t get it, but that’s okay, too.
Penelope: I think you are brave to post your truth, brave to allow people to hurl their ideas at you, and it looks like (based on your site here) you are pretty well connected. I read your about page, old posts and more and it seems to me if you posted “I need a police car, a hotel to stay in anonymously and a lead on a relocation for me and my children” hundreds of people would rush in to help you – I hope you let them. . .soon.
Oh goodness…I’m so sorry. If you are asking for advice…..No more men until the kiddos are out of the house.
jana
Long ago, while I was recounting some ugly stuff going on in my life to a friend, she told me in a bored way (she was tired of hearing me go on and on about the same old situation over and over again) that we love drama in our lives, no matter how horrible the drama, because it is how we know we are alive.
Reading this post reminded me of that truth. Why else would a person continue to promote a relationship with a man who dumped her 15 times? Why pursue that relationship after the second dumpage? Well, really, after the first time? And after 15 times of being dumped, during which time there were fights, arguments, battles, and armed conflict, why would a person then marry this man? Triumph of hope over experience?
None of this situation is surprising, given that the writer has told us often that she prefers ‘interesting’ over ‘happy’. Well, that situation sure is interesting. Never a dull and all that.
It will all be OK. Provoking someone into physical action instead of using one’s intelligence to make a situation truly workable and pleasant is a search for drama, not for solutions. It will all be OK.
How about this – fix your life, focus on your life, and keep it out of the blog. I realize that “come read about my train wreck” is a very popular blog theme, but it isn’t a healthy one, and readers will “you go girl!” you regardless of the wisdom of any of your choices, because it’s so much fun to “you go girl” someone else’s risky moves.
Stop the trainwreck, take care of your life, leave it out of the blog.
Life is short. There are no do-overs – that i’m aware of anyway. I believe you know in your heart what you should do. Making the decision and taking the first steps are the hardest part. I recently made the decision after almost 35 years of marriage It was probably the hardest thing i’ve ever done. I don’t look at who was at fault, whether i wasted years staying when i knew i should leave, i focus on today and the possibilities for the future. I have so many thoughts on this post and what you describe – too much to write about in a comment. I think you know you’re not alone, you have a lot of support. No matter how much advice you receive here and from others, only you can decide on where you go from here and that’s the way it should be. I wish you the best.
Oh – and i do have to comment on the post about there being no good life, just life. I think there are many people out there without legs to run with, or who have suffered the loss of a child who would gladly trade places with her and consider hers a very good life. It’s all in how you look at it. Be grateful every day.
Penelope,
Tons of advice here. I am not wise enough to add to the wisdom already in the comments. Two things I have learned:
We are all alone and no one can save us.
We are what we do.
I like the hinges analogy!
Penelope, you already know you need to live. And BECAUSE you’re famous and have signed autographs. You and your life serve as a role model – not just to your kids, but to all of us. You having the strength to leave will hopefully give another person in the same situation the same courage. Also think about what kind of environment you grew up in, your kids are in, and see that you need to leave for them. Please leave safely and let us know.