Zero tolerance for domestic violence is wrong
It’s been four days since I documented my own domestic violence, in almost real-time, between me and the Farmer. The most common response I’ve heard is some variation of: “Zero tolerance for domestic abuse!”
And you know what? I have zero tolerance for things I am not prone to tolerate as well. That’s easy, isn’t it?
It’s much harder to see the issue from the person’s perspective who has the issue.
I’ve spent days reading the 500 comments on my blog and the comments about my situation on other blogs, and I’m absolutely shocked by the collective hatred and disdain for women who are in violent relationships.
Here’s what someone said on my blog: “Victims of domestic abuse suck at pressing charges.”
Yes. It’s true. Women don’t like to press charges. Because they love the guy. You, maybe, are unable to fall in love with a guy who is violent. Good for you. But do you have to hate women who aren’t like you?
For some reason, people feel it is honorable to rip a woman to shreds if she is living with domestic violence. Here’s an example from the comments section on James Altucher’s blog:
“[Penelope Trunk is] out of her mind to think that her children are not being abused. She, in fact, is as guilty of that abuse as the farmer that beats her.”
The high-and-mightiness that emanates from the public discussion of domestic violence is breathtaking. Everyone is an expert. Everyone knows what’s right.
Here’s an example from the comments section on Jezebel, a supposedly feminist community that is full of anger towards women who live in violent households.
“No one gets another chance to hit me. I don’t care that I have the training to fight back.
“One incident, and YOU LEAVE. Violent people don’t get better without a lot of work, and it’s not *your* problem. Once someone raises a hand to you, you owe that person *nothing.* It’s likely that the violent behavior will escalate. Sometimes it is deliberate. Either way, YOU LEAVE.”
This person sees everything very clearly. If there’s abuse, you leave. Even if it’s small. Because all small abuse gets huge.
I don’t think anyone is suggesting that if the guy hits you twice, the kids are better off living in a single-parent home and hearing their dad called an abuser. What people do say is that the odds are it won’t stop. The odds are it will get worse. The odds are, the kids will be worse off, in the end, having lived with the dad.
But the truth is that we do not believe that men who leave two, visible marks on their wife should lose their kids.
You know how I know we don’t believe this? Because if Child Protective Services sees two bruises on a kid at two different times, the kid is not removed from the home. Think about it: Is that kid better off with parents who might be able to stop, or in the Foster Care System for the rest of their life?
So we are making bets, right? Is it better to leave, because it is likely to get worse? Or is it better to stay because the benefits from things improving, although unlikely, are huge?
I’m in the startup community. It’s the world of high risk. You bet big on yourself, you kill your family’s credit, you put your house on the line, and maybe, just maybe, your company will make it.
So why wouldn’t I bet big on myself now? I am not the whole problem in my family, but I am half. And over the last year I have described multiple situations where I was half the problem.
I can improve my own half and see what happens. Have you been to couple’s therapy? There’s a saying that a marriage is a gear system. If one gear changes, all the gears change.
Blog commenters will argue against this idea by telling me not to change because It’s not my fault.
But really, how do they know? We know that I grew up in a home where there was lots of violence. So it’s likely that I will be in that kind of house when I’m an adult. And surely it’s possible that I am contributing to the mix since I am statistically likely to create a violent household. Here’s another thing: You don’t know what I did leading up to the bruise in the photo.
I’ll tell you what my mom used to do leading up to my dad hitting her:
One night they were wallpapering. They had been wallpapering the living room after work for a week. My mom got mad at my dad and threw red paint all over the wallpaper. Ruined all their work. He didn’t respond. He was stunned. Then she knocked over the table with the wallpaper and the glue. It ruined the newly varnished floors. He held her arms so she couldn’t do anything else. He held tighter and tighter. She kicked him to get loose. She left no mark. He hit her in the face.
If she blogged about it, and showed the hand print on her face, she might get 500 commenters telling her it’s not her fault.
Should she leave with me and my brother because our dad is violent and we should not live with him? Or should she work on her own behavior to see if she can single-handedly stop the violence?
I think the most grown-up, good parenting thing for her to do would be to understand her own behavior and stop it so that me and my brother could grow up in a home with both our parents. She didn’t do that, of course. She had little insight into her own behavior and she and my dad ended up taking most of their anger out on me.
My mom had good choices she could have made because, in fact, part of the domestic violence was her fault.
“It’s not your fault” completely limits a woman’s choices, because you are saying that she is powerless to control the situation. And if you tell every woman “it’s not your fault” then they can’t improve. How do women get better at not creating a violent household? Probably by changing their behavior. This doesn’t mean “always tiptoe around your spouse and become a mouse”. But it can mean a wide range of positive changes.
We are all growing personally. It’s not your fault is almost always a path to no growth. It’s what Oprah founded her show on, right? Personal responsibility. Why don’t we go there, first, before we go to “it’s not your fault”. The truth is that if we take responsibility for the problems in our lives, we can solve the problem. If we blame other people, we are always running. People who blame other people can’t get along with siblings, can’t get along at work, lose friends quickly. People who facilitate that behavior say, “It’s not your fault.”
Most of the success of my blog comes from my reliance on the idea of personal responsibility. There are no bad bosses–it’s only you. If you can’t get a job it’s not because of the job market, it’s because you are unemployable. And you can fix that. Your heavy workload is not because someone gave it to you — you gave it to yourself. People like what I say because I show them how they can fix anything when they take responsibility for fixing it. That’s what I truly believe.
And that’s why I’m staying with the Farmer.
curiousfarmer.com/
curiousfarmer.com/
fraud?
curiousfarmer.com/
wow wow wow
Thank you for being so honest with yourself and with us, Penelope. There are some people out there that CAN indeed provoke and provoke and badger and badger and nag and nag and go absolutely batshit crazy on someone to the point where the other person snaps and gets violent. It happens all the time. Your honesty has caused me to look back on some of my own past and realize various situations where I was just as responsible for bad behavior in a mate that amounted to verbal or physical abuse. Bravo. You are so brave. I truly hope you get the help that you both deserve and need.
Giving the message it’s okay for anyone who has been physically battered by another person to blame themselves for their abuse and injuries is beyond awful.
This is what people who hit and hurt their loves ones do–they say the victim made them do it.
“You made me put my hands on you. You made me push you, throw that thing at you, punch you, cut you, shoot you. It is your fault. If it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t have done it.”
If I lose control and push, slap, punch, kick, cut, shoot somebody–it’s all that person’s fault he/she got hurt!
Boy, is that liberating.
Can I kick my cat and punch my dog too? After, all if they weren’t in my way aggravating me, they wouldn’t have gotten kicked or punched. How about my kids? They are as annoying as hell.
Wow. I never saw it that way before.
Thank you, Penelope.
you write a lot of crap but you have surpassed yourself today. Congrats.
Penelope, I actually came to your blog last week for the first time after I read about your situation at babble.com. I was glad to find your blog, even though the details of your childhood made me sick, because I was able to see how smart you are. I am just dissapointed that you chose to only address the comments where people did not make you responsible for your situation and ignore the ones where other people (like me) made you responsible. Not only you are responsible for staying but you are also putting your kids throught that. It is not fair and it sticks with them. I know, not because I grew up in a violent home but because when one of my aunts got married (and I was very young) I remember that her husband came to my parent’s house looking to bring her back because, according to him, she was crazy and out of control. Later, we found out that he has tried to beat her up after an argument over dinner, and even when she was way smaller than him, she pushed him against the refrigerator and he almost got knocked out. At that moment, I understood the power I had to protect myself from violence and that is what makes me intolerant to violence not only because of the consecuences to the main victim but most of all to the consecuences that kids have to suffer. They are the victims with no choice but to stay.
I hope that your family can heal from this. Therapy (Anger Management/Marriage counseling/ Family Counseling) is a must. Otherwise, staying will only perpetuate the violent behavior. And this is not okay. I believe that you love the farmer. But separating, even for a short while, would be the best thing. Children need to be in a peaceful, loving household even if it means there is only one parent in it. Where is your ex-husband in all of this as I know you have shared custody? Take good care.
This post makes a lot of sense for your situation, Penelope -I’m happy to see that you can see how you contribute to his shoving (i won’t say beating, cause it wasn’t) you.
With that said- you still need to fix yourself, and you can. Don’t feel compelled to stay with him while you do it though. The ‘healed’ you may choose a completely different person than the Farmer. And that’s okay.
i’ve commented a few times here…yes, women with financial means and good jobs are victims of domestic violence. we often have a lot farther to go in terms of peeling off the layers of denial. DV is not something that happens in “families like ours.” Just denial. Because it often turns out that families like ours are chockful of violence of all kinds. It happens to people in all classes, of all financial means. You are lucky; you can leave without wondering how you will pay rent, etc. Doesn’t mean it is easy.
Yes, you can change yourself and that doesn’t not always mean the other person will change for the better. When I stopped accepting the abuse my ex dished out he got even more violent. If one person could fix a marriage comprised of 2 people, I would have done it — as I’m sure others who read your blog would have done. It can’t happen. Sorry you have trouble seeing that.
I am sad at the violence that your kids see day after day. And because of the homeschooling, they never get a break from the stress in your household.
Luck is a terrible thing to depend on in your situation.
I was just introduced to your blog by my cousin, it happens that I came out of an abusive relationship with children and I left. My girls see their father regularly, I wanted them to be able to develop a relationship with him that I hope and pray doesn’t become abusive. But I had to give them the chance to do that, they deserve to have a father in their lives, and it’s not their fault that he and I could not make it work. That being said, I just wanted to say that this happens to be the first of your posts that I’ve read, and I like your style and support what you have said. I think everyone’s situation is different and it takes a strong person to be able to see that and take inventory of themselves. I wish you the best and truly hope it does work out for you.
To stay or not to stay. This is a personal decision for all people in this situation – both the pitcher and the catcher. I’ll tell you why I left, and why I think about going back all the time.
My (ex)boyfriend is hot and passionate and stirs positive feelings in me that I haven’t felt in a very long time. When it is good, it is fantastic. But he is an alcoholic with what I suspect is an undiagnosed borderline personality disorder. His drunken, rage-filled tantrums had been increasing over several months to the point that my sarcastic joke about *whatever* would set him off on a “serious discussion” path that I could never win.
My first serious sign that I could get hurt was when he got mad at me for not cuddling with him in bed after an argument, and he punched a spinning ceiling fan, the broken blade sailing through the air like a sword. I ran from his apartment, knowing that he needed to get help or I would be next.
I saw him twice in the following 2 weeks. Both times I pleaded with him to get help, go to counseling, something. He refused. Didn’t see what the big deal was. Swore to me the he would never lay a hand on me and he knew it. I wasn’t so sure, but I don’t have a crystal ball, either. I know that he meant it, but I wasn’t so sure he could keep his temper in check.
The third time I saw him, we spent a GREAT day together. He had a cocktail with dinner, and another and another, until he went from saying all these wonderful things about me being the only one for him and our future together, to him throwing a remote control at me, grabbing me by the hair, bending me backwards to yell in my face, then throwing me down on the ground so hard and with such force that I sustained a broken wrist out of it.
Why I left is obvious. But here’s why I stayed after the build-up to the broken fan incident and after:
1. I fell in love not only with him, but his words to me. Having someone say that he loves you and wants to build a family with you when you are 39, divorced, childless, and have your own abandonment issues is intoxicating. Remember, when it’s good, it’s very good.
2. He is a man who is sick and needs help. Everyone in his life has left him at some point or another, and with good reason. But there is something about that Florence Nightingale effect that some of us women have. We think we are the ones that can fix him, save him. My therapist tells me no, but I’ve watched enough Hollywood endings to hold out the option that it is still possible.
3. He is my drug. And the dopamine that rises in me every time I think of him is tough to battle. I miss him like crazy. I dream good dreams about him every night. I do not hate him. And then I look at the cast on my arm and remember what he is capable of. Right now, the cast is the only real thing stopping me from calling him, and even that has less and less of an effect as the days and weeks go on.
And lest you call me a Stupid Girl, well maybe I am. But I’m also a girl who has a masters degree, a very good job, I once had a 15 year marriage that was stable (if boring), and this is the first man who has ever laid a hand on me. My brain knows that I cannot go back. That we do not have a real shot at a happy, safe future together. But try telling that to my heart that cries for his recovery every day, and for me to be standing by his side when he does.
Personal responsibility is huge, I agree. But it has to be on both sides. If he (the Farmer or my boyfriend) does not OWN what he has done. regret it, and get help to change it, then our personal responsibility is to either protect ourselves and our children (born, not-yet-born, even pets), or to know that the possibility is high that it will happen again and to accept all of the consequences that come from that decision to stay. All of them.
First, I really like your blog.
Second, Anne is very correct about the difference between Domestic Violence and Relationships with Violence.
I’ve been where the Farmer is, I believe. Done some of the things he’s done, for what sound like very familiar reasons.
Married for 7 years now, the simple fact is that we stay together if we are committed to learning as adults what we never learned as children. That is, how should we handle anger, frustration, and emotional pain. A functional relationship only occurs between two people who have learned these skills. Until that point, we can separate, we can leave each other and start it all over again with someone new, all b/c we haven’t learned what we need to know.
Or we can stay, forgive, and help each other learn. It takes children 9-10 years to learn how to handle these painful emotions; it honestly takes just as long for those of us who have to learn as adults.
And for reference, I did not grow up in a violent household. I grew up with split-custody, over-worked parents, both of whom have had 4 marriages. I had no real friends until my senior year in college and never learned how to deal with an emotionally stressful situation.
I’m not autistic or anything like that; I was just never taught what I needed to know.
I’ve always loved your honesty and have learned a lot from you. But this post did push it over the line for me. Not that I don’t think that you have valid points, and have a lot to figure out. It’s that this last series of posts is probably generating a ton of money for you and it involves children and domestic violence.
I’ve thought about it for days. It makes me a little sick, honestly, that you’d use this situation to drive controversy and readership. I hope you find a way to handle this that keeps you and your family safe. I won’t read anymore…not that it matters to you, people unsubscribe every day. But I wanted to tell you why.
I want to echo those who suggested DBT skills training. I grew up with a borderline mother, and indeed this led to the sorts of violent situations that Penelope describes here so well. My mother was far less kind and thoughtful than Penelope, and their lives have devolved into something very dysfunctional and beyond help. But if you’re willing to change, Penelope, I really think DBT is the way to go. You have to realize that your emotional needs are disordered, and in fact it is not your husband’s responsibility to address your emotional needs whenever they arise. Your insistence on having your emotional needs met is its own form of violence. You talk about taking responsibility for your role: that means believing that your emotional needs are disordered, and learning to manage them the same way you would manage diabetes or any other sort of chronic ailment. I wish my mother had had the perspective or willingness to admit this and to change.
I think what’s needed here is a simple review of one of your own blogs’ subheds:
“There are no bad bosses” (or bad husbands, maybe, by extension?
“Overcome incompetent skills by leveraging others” If you aren’t good at shutting up so he can sleep, maybe you can talk in a different room.
“Overcome moral incompetence by knowing your boundaries” Or establishing new ones.
“Always weigh your benefits” and put the downsides on the other side of the scale.
It really works. Not just when you wrote it, but now, too.
Penelope:
Look at it this way. If you work in an office and you act/perform poorly, there are certain appropriate and inappropriate responses your employer might have.
You could meet in your manager's office for a meeting where you discuss your performance in a calm manner which is a good way to handle things (it's textbook, at least). Your manager could stand outside your cube and loudly proclaim your faults for everyone to hear. This borders on verbal abuse and intimidation but falls within the subjective grey area of rightness versus wrongness. Your manager could also meet you in the parking lot, break your windows and beat you with a tire iron which is bad because 1) its obviously abusive, 2) it really hurts and 3) windshields are expensive.
Your work performance might have been the catalyst for your manager's response, but your manager is responsible for that response. You are not responsible for your manager's response. No matter how badly you act at work – even if you go so far as to threaten people's lives – beating people with a tire iron is always wrong unless it was done in self-defense. And even then – people don't normally have ready access to tire irons at work unless we're talking about mechanics, in which case all previous assumptions are out the window.
Bring this situation back home and we still have two people interacting, each person responding in ways that are either appropriate or inappropriate. Maybe you acted inappropriately (which is what you intimate from this post). That does not give The Farmer the right to respond with violence unless he was protecting himself (ie you come at him with a tire iron), protecting you (you try to hit yourself with a tire iron) or the kids (you come at the kids with a tire iron). Even if his actions were justified in this context, the justification stops once the threat of violence on your part (if it existed) has ended.
The question, then, is how bad were your actions? Did they constitute a real, physical threat to him, to you, to the kids? If so, okay. The next question we need to ask is did his response end the moment the threat ended, or did it continue? If it continued, it was wrong. His response is his responsibility, no matter what you do to provoke him.
Another thing you need to consider is perception. Research shows that people in stressful situations (like job loss, a marriage ending, physical or verbal abuse) are not capable of accurately assessing the specifics of their situation. They see things as either much worse or much better than they actually are. This is a common cognitive bias.
You thought it was okay to go back to your parents when you were a kid, even as your parents abused you, mistreated you and warped your sense of self worth. Unless you consider yourself fully healed from that experience, you are not qualified to objectively assess the situation to determine how dangerous it actually is. We're all like this in some respect, though, so don't think you're a freak or anything. It's just a common human trait.
One of my friends was abused when he was a kid. Looking back, it was obvious but I had no idea what was going on. I was a kid. The idea that parents treated their kids that way was completely foreign to me. One day, my friend stopped coming to school. His dad beat him so bad he was in the hospital for three months. He almost died. Still, his mom went back. It was only after the dad came after one of the girls that she finally left him.
My friend moved away after high school and never looked back. Good for him. His mom moved next door to me when I was just out of college. She came over to borrow some rice once and apologized for everything. I told her it wasn't her fault. She said she knew, but she still wishes she'd left sooner. That's another common thing. Once they get out and stay out, most abuse survivors wish they'd gotten out sooner.
Her daughter, by the way, is married to an abusive man. She thinks its her fault no matter what people tell her. She things she can change him even though none of his previous wives have been able to.
That's the thing about kids who survive abuse. Research shows that they tend to grow up to relive abuse in their adult lives either as victims or perpetrators. If this cycle continues in your home, it will continue not just with you, but with your kids as well. You know this. You've seen it in your life and the lives of others as well. If The Farmer's actions were inappropriate (regardless of your actions), and if they remain inappropriate, you are not only reliving your past abuse, but you are dooming your children to the same fate.
I don't know what you're going through. I've never lived through it. I only remember stopping over to my friends house one day after school to see how he was doing; seeing him lying on a bed, writing in pain and listening to his mom say that he just had the flu and that he'd be back in school soon. I should have known then. She should have known, too, by her own admission.
You said you're used to taking risks. What kind of a risk are you taking now? You have all the power here. If your husband (who has not seemed to progress in intimacy to something closer like "My Farmer" on your blog despite the progression in real life) was inappropriate and continues being inappropriate, its time to go. No manner of improvement on your part will change him. Life doesn’t work that way. If you are the violent one and he is protecting you, then its time to change.
Either way, your response is your responsibility. I hope you make the best choices for you and your kids.
A few people brought this up last time but it wasn’t the majority, but I thought this reading your post: it is possible to push someone past their limit. I didn’t automatically think terrible things about the farmer, or about you, just that the two of you had a tangle of very intense emotions. Our brains are not well-equipped to deal with such intensity without resorting to fight or flight. Usually when someone is approaching this stage, if you can recognize the escalation, it’s good to back off. It’s not always possible though without training and practice though. The signs of escalation are there though, if we can learn to recognize them (they vary for each person).
It reminds me of the time I pet a strange dog. At first the dog wagged his tail and acted friendly, and then suddenly I noticed his head was down, he was standing very still and a low rumbling came from his throat. I stopped petting him. If he wanted, he could have shredded my hand in an instant but instead he gave me signals to back off before he became too overwhelmed.
When my husband and I fought, we both pushed just the right buttons to send us both into the zone of crazy. It takes an almost military regimen of repetition & training to change a behavior (why do you think basic training takes 80 days of nearly round-the-clock immersion? It’s so responses become second nature — but that takes a lot of work).
A million things can happen in an argument to escalate it — if both parties know they have the capability to do this “dance” together, it is possible to take steps to change the pattern.
One of my girlfriends has been reading “The Five Love Languages” with her husband and she says it saved their marriage. It goes on the basis that everyone has a particular way they feel loved, and it’s important to understand this so you can each do things for eachother that make the other feel loved. For example, her hubby felt loved when she was physically affectionate. She felt loved when he spent quality time with her. He didn’t understand why she was so disappointed once when he came home with flowers and cancelled their date night — he thought the flowers would be enough for her because they would have been enough for him. This book helped each of them understand how to offer the other more of what they needed.
Another good resource to study is a concept called “Nonviolent Communication”:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nonviolent_Communication
“NVC is based on the idea that all human beings have the capacity for compassion and only resort to violence or behavior that harms others when they don’t recognize more effective strategies for meeting needs.”
I wish the best of luck to you & the farmer, sending lots of love to both of you. I really value all that you share here, thank you for bringing to light a very difficult and yet very important subject.
Listen to me, when I say that the only person that you will ever have control over is yourself. You cannot change him, will not change him. He will change when he wants to change, and not before, and there is nothing that you can do to force him to do so. This is not denying you your agency, it is being truthful. The only question is if you are going to stick around and wait for it to happen, while exposing your children to this poison. He may never change, no matter what you do, if he feels like he’s getting what he needs out of the situation.
You have control over what you do, and how you feel about things, that is it. The problem is exactly what you laid out before. You are also getting something that you think you need out of this situation. You are trying to get an abusive person to miss you when you’re gone, because your parents didn’t. *That* is why you stay. It is pathological.
I too don’t agree with people bashing the abused and claiming that it is all their fault. It isn’t. I don’t hate women that are like you, I love them. I love you enough to tell you the truth, and urge you to do what is best for you, because whether you believe it or not, you do deserve it.
Working on yourself, improving your life and your mental state are good things. Leaving a toxic relationship and doing those same things is immeasurably better. Why? Because he *will try to keep you from getting there*. It’s in his best interests to do so.
My mother went through this too, after dealing with decades of psychological abuse from her father. She had to leave her relationship, had to spend a good 8 years in therapy before even touching another man, because abusive people were the only ones that really gave her a thrill. Getting through it is hard, but it is worth it, when you get to the point where you honestly believe yourself to be worthy, and actually find that person who will miss you.
Ask the kids what they want and then do it.
Penelope, I agree with you about the flaws in the common response to domestic violence. While there are no doubt aspects to the Battered Wife Syndrome that require a “victim” to receive unconditional support, picking one spouse to blame in a bad relationship is simplistic. But by showing yourself to be someone who will accept some form of abuse you invite a lot of the online attacks you’ve received.
I wish that the Zero DV Tolerance folks were all anti-war and anti-police violence. It seems to me that one of the foundations of our culture is that might makes right. Criminalizing domestic violence seeks to lend the power of the state to assist the weaker party in a sad personal situations. But in doing so, one party has to be seen a weak. Cooperation rather than victory is a better goal.
The holidays are stressful and it is fun to get away to a hotel. Since you decided to got back to the Farmer, I hope you were able to have some peaceful family times together.
To clarify, what I think has been wrong in some of the responses to your original post is that people assumed that you were a battered woman, but my reading of your situation is that it is more nuanced. Women who are being held in a relationship by terror do need to be supported and protected.
She went to the hotel to get away from someone who just threw her into a bedpost. She thought she was dying. She thought she needed to stay away for at least a month. She took her kids with her. You think she was really just looking for a fun get-a-way from the holiday stress?
This blog is getting just rediculous. I believe you will do anything for attention, publicity and then the ability to write on and on, “your” toughts… Grow up, get help, and someone take those kids away from her!
The point I want to make is that leaving doesn’t necessarily end the violence. A woman is more likely to be killed in the first six months after she leaves then any other time.
This is all attention-whoring at it’s finest, which is what I’ve come to expect from Penelope over the years…but there are innocent children involved here, and I hope to God someone called CPS/Social Services to get them over to that house.
Penelope has never and will never understand that things are not all about her. I agree with someone on one of the previous threads who said that the real reluctance to leave is probably not nearly as cerebral as Penelope proclaims, but comes down to simple economics. Never mind that there are women’s shelters that could take in Penelope and her children; that would be both an admission of failure and probably less posh accommodations than Ms. Trunk would prefer.
This whole thing is just sad, sad, sad. Ridiculously sad. It would be one thing if I was hearing these words from an inexperienced 16-year-old. But this is a grown woman defending her indefensible decision to stay with an abuser.
News flash – the abuse won’t stop. It will get worse. Someone may end up dead. Hopefully it won’t be the kids. All the bullshit justification in the world won’t matter if that happens, which I pray to God it won’t.
This blog is nothing more, and nothing less, than the sad testimony of an irretrievably broken narcissist dragging her children and everyone else around her down into dysfunction and codependency. If we continue reading it, all we’re doing is feeding the downward spiral. I won’t do that. I can’t. I’m out.
There are two things to balance here: your well-being, and the well-being of your children. As their mother, you have chosen to add their well-being to your list of considerations — in fact, it’s pretty high up there. That’s an incredibly big burden and a very tough responsibility to live up to. I don’t doubt that it’s incredibly hard to uproot or give up on something, especially if you have a strong sense of determination, or you’re just plain stubborn.
If your kids are…
*watching violence happen, however it begins
*fearful of conflict between you and stressed as a result,
*around a situation where you don’t feel you can say no, or defend yourself because of your personal valuation, thus preparing you for further abuse
*going to be put in a situation where they feel like they need to defend you
*having inappropriate conflict resolution modeled consistently
… the choice to remove yourself or not — permanently — goes from being a discussion about your history and your desire to fix things, or an examination of any inappropriate violence or aggression you have exhibited in the farmer’s direction, or how your Asperger’s fits into the whole mix to a much bigger question about what parents need to do for their kids. You left and took them to a hotel when you were hurt — your instincts were solid.
Don’t choose a desire to “fix” over your responsibility not to break your kids. Please.
I rarely comment on things, but I had to comment here.
You have to leave. I know you don’t see it, but you have to trust everyone who says you need to leave.
You grew up with abuse, so it’s your normal. But it isn’t normal. Mature adults with healthy reactions don’t hit each other.
My husband and I have been together for more than ten years. Do you know how often he’s hit me? Never. Do you know how often I’ve hit him? Never as well. We’ve gotten mad, we’ve screamed at each other, we’ve stormed out of the house, we’ve yelled and said things we regretted later. But neither of us has broken anything more expensive than a pencil, or hit anyone or anything.
Here’s a mental test you can do: what would you think if you saw two strangers behaving this way out in public? Or, would this reaction seem normal if it were an interaction with anyone else?
For example, I couldn’t imagine it being acceptable for a restaurant patron to shove a waitress into a table for getting an order wrong. Can you?
You also have to ask yourself: would you want your children being treated the way you are? For any reason whatsoever? Do you want to continue this cycle for another generation, or do you want to show them a healthy reaction to being shoved into a post so hard you think you’re going to die? (Which, in my opinion, should include leaving him, getting to a safe place, and pressing charges. He shouldn’t be able to abuse anyone else, either, and you have the power to try to keep that from happening. I’m not living your life, so I can’t tell you what to do, but this is advice I’m giving, so I feel OK making suggestions.)
Sure, you have done things. Everyone does things that make the people they love angry. My husband left the house with a sink full of dirty dishes even though he knows I can’t stand to scrub pots, and set the clean laundry on the bed instead of putting it away. He sets the toilet paper rolls on top of the dispenser instead of replacing them, and he keeps stacking things on top of my jewelry box so I can’t open it.
I forget to take my shoes off when I come inside. I leave dirty laundry on the floor. I put plates in the dishwasher without scrubbing them first. I let the kids run around and yell while he’s trying to get work done.
People don’t have to behave perfectly to not get hit.
You deserve better. You deserve someone who wants to have you around. You deserve someone who you can argue with without having to wonder if his next response will be a punch to the face.
You deserve time to yourself until you’ve gotten enough perspective to believe me.
Penelope,
I couldn’t agree with you more on this post. I use to be one of those voices that said, get out if there’s abuse. Little did I know how difficult that can be until this past year. I started dating a man that turned out to have a drug problem and PTSD from Iraq. The combination caused some violent outbursts that got worse. Pretty soon I was shoving him back. Scary, I missed sleep and work. It was difficult to walk away for some of the same reason’s you mention. I did. He’s cleaned up and has been sober for 4 mouths and wants a second chance. I’m unable to do so but am working on forgiving him. We still talk and it’s gotten easier. Bottom line, this isn’t a black and white situation, for anyone. I admire you for the having the guts to disclose it and to push back for those that haven’t been there. They really don’t know.
Best of luck. It will work out.
Lisa – you don’t know who ‘hasn’t been there before’.
PT blogger feels free to graphically document several of her episodes, without fear of any repercusion at home.
Now, when you survive broken bones; broken noses; and living in fear/walking on eggshells because you don’t know what would trigger an attack, you will understand what some people mean by zero-tolerance.
I have been critical of some of your writing before, particularly in relations with men. I am sure you are correct that your behavior helps to escalate situations to an emotionally hot level.
Nevertheless, that does not mean you deserve to be harmed, or that you have culpability for you being harmed.
I can’t tell you what the right thing to do is, because, in spite of the confessional nature of this blog, I am not privy to any of the details, or more importantly, what your fundamental values are.
But I will say it troubles me to see you claiming culpability for the violence.
For the state of your marriage relationship? Sure, you definitely play a role in how that is going, and it is commendable that you want to improve your part in that.
But for the violence? No. That was his action, and he is solely accountable for it.
I think it’s in its way similar to affairs. Might one partner behave in a way that make an affair more tempting for the other partner? Definitely. Does that mean that it’s that partner’s fault if the other goes and has the affair? No.
Visited the farmers blog just now. He talks about reviewing a pair of insulated bibs that a company had sent to him. Below is the last paragraph of that blog:
“I'm going to wait and wear them for a winter season before I give my final review. I'll try and be unbiased and give an accurate review, but anyone with common sense knows a blog may not accurately describe reality”.
He bold typed the last 7 words….interesting.
That would be because abusers often make excuses for their actions and do not honestly believe that they are doing anything wrong. It’s a common tactic to downplay the situation and claim that nothing is wrong, or alternatively blame the victim.
It doesn’t matter what she did, as long as that was not threatening his physical safety or the safety of others. She posted a pic of a horrific bruise. Is he trying to claim that there is more to it than her side of the story? Well, duh. He’s still responsible for what *he* did.
See, you don’t know if that bruised body is hers.
You don’t know if that farmer’s guy hit her. She said he did, but how do you know what really happened?
Where somebody else read the previous comments as showing concern for victims of domestic violence, she interpreted that as hatred. It’s an interesting perception of reality.
Well. Your last post seems like a set-up. You only gave readers one side of the story so naturally people reacted in a one-sided manner. And now it feels like you’ve reprimanded readers for their one-sided reactions but you still have not provided the full story. What IS the full story?
And also based on the more accurate definition of “Domestic Violence” provided by one of the commenters, (I think most of the comments on the last post where probably addressing DV and not “violence in a fucked up relationship”) now would you agree that zero tolerance for domestic violence is wrong?
You’ve probably heard this comment a million times, but I don’t know – maybe a million and one will be help.
You don’t make the Farmer be violent. The Farmer is violent because he lacks coping strategies to handle conflict in a more productive way.
Saying you ‘aren’t to blame’ doesn’t limit your agency, because no matter what you do the Farmer makes his own choices in how to respond to it. You could be a raving termagant to live with, but that doesn’t mean the only possible response is physical violence.
I don’t know if the best plan is to stay or leave. But I do think the one on whom the onus of learning new behaviour is on, is the one who is violent. Because I don’t think anyone can live with someone and never get on their nerves. There just has to be a contract that you’ll try not to, and if you do it won’t get violent.
Penny,
After 10 years, I can’t read anymore. Life isn’t all roses and lollipops, but it isn’t this.
Goodbye,
Dale
Everyone has an opinion and so you do. Do what you think is best for you and your family. You and the Farmer are going to work this out one way or the other. Peace to you Penelope.
Actually, in the situation you described with your parents, your father still shouldn’t have hit your mother. He could have walked away at that particular moment, get psychiatric help for her, divorce her…. Violence is really never the answer.
I think you grew up making internally making excuses for your parents’ behavior, though you thought you recognized how their abuse damaged you. For example, I can talk about how my father’s alcoholism damaged parts of my childhood, but if an outsider tried to say something negative about him to me, my first reaction would be to defend him.
Because you’re used to the making-excuses cycle, you will continue doing that in your relationships as an adult.
Good luck. The mentality behind your post is completely wrong, but I’m sure it’s hard to try to change the way you view the world as an adult.
I respect your right to stay in your marriage and work on this situation if that is what you want. However, I can’t imagine that reporting the very personal details of your relationship on a blog will repair your marriage. That’s what personal diaries are for.
If you are 50% of the problem, as you’ve stated, then I encourage you to seek intense psychiatric help and soon. You can not change the Farmer but you can make changes in yourself. Recovery from childhood and now adult abuse will take time.
I pray you will have the solace that you seek in 2012.
As insightful as you are on so many issues, I’m a little disappointed you didn’t conclude your post by specifically noting that the only person you can change is yourself. You skirt around the issue and even make some oblique references to this, but why not come right out and say it!
I think the thing that is most disturbing about an incident like your most recent one is that the real question is not hypothesizing about whether or not staying is the better option. I think the real question is really a two-parter. First, can you change your behavior to make it less objectionable/offensive to your spouse. Secondly, if you can in fact make the commitment to change, and do in fact change, what impact will it have on your husband? Will your efforts to “meet half way” actually affect his behavior in a positive fashion or will there just be other things you do that he finds objectionable and use them as an excuse for more unacceptable behavior.
If you can in fact be objective, and I assume you can since your relationship with the farmer has lasted several years now, you should be able to predict his behaviors and responses to a variety of stimuli. If you realistically accept the fact that he will only find other behaviors on your part as new excuses to respond in an unacceptable manner, that you are only fooling yourself if you decide to stay together in spite of this.
Having been married more than 40 years, I fully realize that I sometimes exhibit behaviors that aren’t well received by my significant other, but I know if I eliminate the behavior, the relationship will stabilize again. By the same token, I often overlook things that in the past I might not have been able to slough off, but am not afraid to address things I find particularly objectionable also. The give and take works. The all give, no take approach doesn’t.
As a final note, I have learned to limit my emotional approach to situations and try to limit my “battles” to not only the ones I think I can “win”, but also the ones that are actually important
I’ve read your blog(s) for eight years now and have found many of your observations/insights useful, especially in the context of my two daughters and their work experiences. I hope you can find an answer to this dilemma. Ultimately, you are the only one who can actually answer the relevant questions as to how to proceed.
Thanks again and good luck!
“‘It’s not your fault’ completely limits a woman’s choices, because you are saying that she is powerless to control the situation. And if you tell every woman “it’s not your fault” then they can’t improve. How do women get better at not creating a violent household? Probably by changing their behavior.”
Personal responsibility does not extend to someone else’s violent behavior. It takes just one partner to create a violent household, and it doesn’t matter whether the non-violent partner “improves.” Whatever that means.
You have chosen to stay with the Farmer, so you must live with the consequences. I just hope this does not end in disaster for you and your sons.
On an entirely different note… why did you stop your MAILBAG section? I kinda like it.
Don’t these posts bother your ex? And what kind of situation your kids are in?
I won’t offer any advice. I wish you all the best in coping with a difficult situation.
Some of you people make me sick, you think its ok to beat someone because they nag you? That is just GROSS!! If this woman has problems it most likely stems from the abuse. I don’t care how much someone nags, the best thing to do is leave. Thank god I found a good man that I don’t hav to nag, he does things without my asking. As for the woman who writes this blog she needs help and her kids need to be taken to safety. So you mom threw paint on the wall and ruined the floor, you dad was in the wrong for putting his hands on her. Penelope, you don’t deserve to be hit just because you talk to much. I really hope you get help one day soon! Nobody has a right to put their hands on anyone else be man or woman. It seems to me you write this blog for two reasons to help yourself make excuses for the farmer and to get attention, well you do really well at both.As for the person who said they feel sorry for the farmer I bet you an abuser youself aren’t you? I will never read this blog again as it makes me sick. Most of the people who read this see to get off on hearing about this woman’s pain. Yeah I bet the majority of you who read this are or have abused someone. Good luck to all of you sickos.
Seriously? You publish a photo of an injury, projecting the thought of a vulnerable person (yes, this is what the photo of naked person implies – someone without protection for those who can get over the sex aspect), you write “I think I’m dying. ” and expect people to NOT tell you to get out?
totally agree
Yep. I guess her relationships with the Farmer, her ex, her in-laws and her parents weren’t providing enough of an audience so she’s unleashing the crazy on her readers.
My phone auto corrected the your and turned it to you for some reason. Oh well you know what I meant.
I’m surprised no one has posted this gem from the inimitable The Last Psychiatrist:
“Penelope Trunk has a history of sexual abuse by her father. She has a pattern of intense, unstable relationships; a history of self-cutting, bulimia; is emotionally labile and reactive; and her primary defense mechanism is pretty obviously splitting, i.e. things are all good or they are all bad.
Trunk says she has Asperger’s, and maybe she does, but what I’ve described is “borderline personality disorder.” BPD is not a description of behavior exactly, it is a description of an adaptive coping strategy. In other words, people persist with BPD because it works.
“Works” has a limited definition for borderline: prevention of abandonment.”
He/she also agrees that no one can tell you when to leave your spouse, but I still think you should.
Hi, Penelope, I had to write a response to this post because while I feel strongly that while you are completely right that this is your life and your choice to make, I want to point out that:
1.) Zero tolerance for domestic violence is important because violence that is tolerated by the abuser implies implicit permission that it is OK. By staying, you don’t penalize the abuser for his transgression. If the consequence for abuse is not immediate, swift and irrevocable, then it’s as though you are implicitly saying violence is OK. You choose to stay because you love this person enough to risk the return of violence, when actually, you are making a choice between leaving and getting hit.
2.) I can say this, as someone who grew up in a non-violent household, beating someone for talking too much is not a normal, healthy response.
3.) Because you grew up in a violent household, I think it far more likely that you were socialized to pick violent men to fall in love with than you somehow possess the knack of turning perfectly normal fellows into abusers.
4.) Please get out for your children. You’re staying with this man means your children are growing up in a violent household, continuing a cycle of violence into the future.
I admire your risk taking and your notion of responsibility. If I understand it you are engaged in a high risk play in which the possible outcomes are success: everyone – Penelope, Farmer, two kids – lives happily ever after; and failure: another fucked up marriage lurches towards disaster, two kids who, if they aren’t dead, will be leading screwed up lives and lining the pockets of therapists for ever (and maybe even blogging about it) and a Farmer who, if he hasn’t taken his shotgun to himself may well have taken it to you and the kids. You go girl; roll those dice.
Maybe your responsibility extends to both outcomes. And everything you have told us leads to conclusion that success is less likely than failure; and what you have been successful in so far – startups – has little in common with what you have been spectacularly unsuccessful at – human relationships.
It would be interesting to know what the people who are most likely to be affected by your “responsible” choice to stay with it but on your terms – the Farmer, the kids – think about it and whether or not they buy into it. The way I see it, making decisions that can seriously influence people’s lives without consulting them is the opposite of responsible. Tell us what responsibility is, Penelope.
Zero tolerance for domestic violence is as wrong as zero tolerance to drinking alcohol is for recovering alcoholics.
You are the Charlie Sheen of the online self-help world.
Penelope,
I am a domestic violence therapist and I have been in abusive relationships before. Your post above is chock full of indications of battered woman syndrome, a sad and hasty backtrack on the post where you posted the injury from the Farmer. I am also baffled as to what reactions you expected – you should know well enough that not everyone is going to coddle you or give you the exact response you were hoping for, whatever that was!
"You, maybe, are unable to fall in love with a guy who is violent. Good for you. But do you have to hate women who aren't like you?" People who are not in violent relationships do not hate you Penelope, they are baffled and angry that you continue to make excuses for the Farmer, and also angry that you continue to expose your children to violent and criminal behavior.
"The high-and-mightiness that emanates from the public discussion of domestic violence is breathtaking. Everyone is an expert. Everyone knows what's right." I'm sorry you feel that way but the reality is that most people have the common sense to realize that when someone is living with someone who chooses to be violent, that person being victimized NEEDS to get out. It's not EASY to leave and the help of a therapist as well as a proper support network is needed, but it's the RIGHT and SAFE thing to do.
"Or is it better to stay because the benefits from things improving, although unlikely, are huge?" You answered the question yourself when you said "unlikely" – and it is a serious indication that you need professional help when your thinking is so distorted that you think continued exposure to violence (for both yourself and your children) is in any way justifiable by POTENTIAL/ NOT-REAL-YET BENEFIT!
"I can improve my own half and see what happens. Have you been to couple's therapy? There's a saying that a marriage is a gear system. If one gear changes, all the gears change" This works for normal relationships as any therapist worth her salt will reliably inform you that couple's therapy is NOT done when one partner is violent. This is because:
1. The violent partner will continue to blame his behavior thereby re-victimizing the victim over and over again.
2. It presents a safety risk to both the therapist and the victim.
3. Violent/abusive partners need to commit to changing their behavior ON THEIR OWN and BY TAKING RESPONSIBILITY FOR THEIR ACTIONS, something that they are designed NOT to do.
"I am statistically likely to create a violent household. Here’s another thing: You don’t know what I did leading up to the bruise in the photo." Oh yes, do tell, since you are obviously partly to blame for another person's violent outburst, because you know – violent and criminal behavior is justifiable.
"If we blame other people, we are always running" Actually Penelope, you are deluding yourself with another lie you designed to justify staying in the relationship. Calling someone "responsible" for his actions and refusing to be blamed yourself for it is NOT blaming, it's being wise enough to make a decision to save your life.
"People like what I say because I show them how they can fix anything when they take responsibility for fixing it. That’s what I truly believe – And that’s why I’m staying with the Farmer" How are you going to fix someone and something that is based on psychotic, neurotic, controlling and abusive behavior Penelope? The reason you're staying with the farmer is because you have deep seated issues that distort your views of safety, love and your self-worth. And THAT's why you're staying with the Farmer.
The violence will continue while you continue to exhaust yourself concocting these stories and justifications, I hope and pray for your sake and the sake of your children that it does not take a death to help you to see clearly.
Love is not supposed to hurt. Period.
Good post. Hopefully Penelope will read this. The only way this post is not spot on is if the alleged abuse by the farmer is made up. In that case Penelope needs counseling of a different sort.
I’m considering that possibility as well.
I don’t usually read this blog, I came here following a link from Slate’s XX Factor. Posts about non-career issues will obviously draw a wider audience and links than regular career advice.
The first post featured a dramatic (and, yes, titillating in its way) photo of the abuse. Then this post, that attempts to pull the rug out from under the assumptions the first post seemed designed to induce.
And then we’ll have “started a conversation” about domestic violence, and maybe some readers who came over for the domestic violence discussion will stick around for the career advice.
I’m not saying this is what’s going on; I’m acknowledging the possibility. Obviously, publicly and falsely accusing someone of domestic violence in order to draw traffic to one’s website is a terrible thing to do. And so is pushing your wife to cause a bruise.
The truth may be somewhere in the middle. But there’s a chance we’re all being suckered.
The Farmer and you seem to agree exactly on the appropriate reaction to a lot of stress and upset.
You hurt yourself (lamp over head).
He hurts you.
Everyone agrees hurting you is okay. It’s not. IMO that he wasn’t horrified and upset when you hurt yourself was a red flag all on it’s own.
Women get better at not creating a violent household by not tolerating it. Research says that while men claim to have so much difficulty reading a woman’s non explicit “no” on a date – men are just as good as women in reading a bosses non explicit “no” in a social situation. Violent men don’t hit their co workers. If all men who resort to physical action were unable to find a romantic partner that tolerated it the vast majority of them would change.
A small number of people do get off on drama and bruises, but the smart ones take care of their and their partners’ safety. If you’re one of them, you need to keep your submission safe, sane, and consensual – and never submit to someone who *doesn’t* respect that when he wants your submission.
There are some very good guidelines on keeping the drama safe, sane, and consensual at http://www.rcdc.org/articles/tamar-ssc.html
Maybe it’s time to switch to a career in photography.