Ciest la vie. French for "such is life." A term used by optimists to describe less than pleasantries we all must attend to during our short stay on Earth. Recently, my sister posted a blog titled "domestic violence" and I thought, here goes...ciest la vie.
I am the daughter of a batterer. My father was a typical, cookie cutter perpetrater who used threats of and actual violence to control my mother for years. He drank too much, the scape goat that disguised the true problem; his sexist, machoistic personality and his CHOICE to use his strength to hurt people he deemed lesser, people he supposedly loved.
He never hit me. I thought he loved me. I blamed my mother for his behavior, the same way he did. She was too slow, too stupid, too much of a bitch for him to leave her alone. Couldn't she be more like me...Daddys Little Princess...because then he would snuggle her up on the couch and fall asleep with his beer breath in her face. That's what he always did with me :)
Today, I include myself on the list of his victims. He may only have screamed at/ cussed over/slapped/punched/dragged by the hair the women he was married to, but he hurt me as well. My entire family was affected by his choices. We were all completely torn apart. I'm not sure what kind of person I could have grown into if he had chosen better, but his choice to devalue woman, children, and family and his choice to use violence as communication taught me a few lessons I wish I'd never learned. Without those lessons, perhaps I'd be stonger, more confident, and capable of making choices for my own life based on the things I value instead of the values he chose.
Domestic violence, in my life, has always been the rain cloud I can't quite outrun. My first "boyfriend" if you will chose to throw a frying pan through a window before choking me over the stove while the burner was still on. All in front of a friend who, thankfully, refused to look past it. She helped me out of that one. My next "sweetheart" was a guy who raped me in a tent at my cousins wake after I had successfully drunk enough liquor to feel nothing and passed out. The alcohol and the numbness were my choice, but the "sex", which I asked him to discontinue multiple times before he came inside me without a condom, was all his. Third times a charm, right? My night in shining armor carried me away from all my own troubles, and deep into his. I was so indebted to him for being such a pleasant (to look at) distraction that I felt called to return the favor. Indebted certitude can only go so far...or can it?
The last time David hit me was January 8th, 2011. Spilled juice and a mischivous four year old led to a slap across the face, blood oozing, and a knife to the throat with the threat that, "if you ever try to call the police again I will fucking gut you!" A real hero. Just like Dad.
Today, I watched a DVD called "Amy's Story" told by the detective on the case of a woman who was killed by her husband after surviving years in a violent relationship. Watching her story of events unfold from bad to worse was heart breaking, but also eye opening. I don't want to be the next woman to leave her kids and parents in the car while she runs into her own house to pack only to get shot and killed for having the courage to leave.
So no more. Forget ciest la vie. I'd like to keep the scraps of optimism I cling to and build more, but I refuse to accept domestic violence as a less than pleasant necessity. That's no longer a truth I'm willing to believe. My CHOICE is to move on from all that bullshit and leave it in my past...I'm ready to get on to my future.
