The latest installment in my story for the No Longer Quivering blog has been posted.

When The Levee Breaks covers my late pregnancy, homeless and sleeping in a friend's cement-floored, unheated laundry room. I have added some detail into the story so even if you read an earlier version you will find some new material.

-Trigger warning-



Patric Stewart: The Legacy of Domestic Violence

Thank you, Mr. Stewart, for telling so vividly the child's view of domestic violence. That couldn't have been an easy thing for you to do.

My latest guest blog entry, entitled What It's Like To Sing The Blues, has been posted on No Longer Quivering.

This project of memoir writing is a curious one because I am forced to remember how I thought and felt about people and events at the time. I've already had one present-day disagreement with someone who was unhappy about what I wrote about her. I know her in the present in a very different way than I knew her in the past. But I am writing about my past understanding and she couldn't see how I would write something critical of her behavior then if I don't have any grievance toward her now.

Those of you who have followed my guest blog posts at No Longer Quivering have read about my anger towards my mother, for example, although we mended our relationship later on. But there was a time in my life when I felt I truly hated her! Since those early years I've done a lot of work on compassion and forgiveness and can place her in perspective.

Likewise I've had a lot of years to think about my relationship with Mahasraya* and put it in some perspective. I myself was young and my own knowledge about how to have a relationship was limited and flawed based on the dysfunctions present in my own family. I played a role in accepting abuse by remaining in the relationship. Now I understand the many forces that keep women such as myself mired in abusive relationships--I've written about it myself. Yet that doesn't mean I don't bear some responsibility for enabling him to continue the abusive cycle without being held accountable by my leaving. I finally did, of course, and perhaps that prevented abuse to others in the future--I have no way of knowing that. Don't get me wrong--Mahasraya is the only one responsible for his behavior. I'm just saying that I am also responsible for my own.

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*also known as Michael John Cody, formerly from Chicago, IL, son of Patricia and John Cody, grandson of Emma Muhne, to separate him from the many other Michael Codys out there.

ETA: From the Ramayana by Tulsidas — “There is no other dharma better than acting for the welfare of others. There is no worst sin than giving suffering to other.”

I'm a former abuser... and Should you dump a former abuser? are two related articles, the first sparking the second. The Salon letters are, as always, quite interesting.

Natalie Portman, recently on Top Chef in a vegan challenge, opts to be one of those strident, obnoxious vegans that give the rest of us veggie-eating folks a bad reputation.

If you've watched the Dollhouse on TV, you might be interested in this thoughtful article about the real life dollhouse: Hollywood.

Finally, a government report underestimates the number of people with disabilities who have been raped.

I wrote this a few years after I left my ex husband.


I Have Won

Crashing against the wall
World spinning crazily
Your voice from a distance
Screaming in fury
Self righteous condemnation

Again the blows come
They seem to explode inside my head
I don't see your fist
in its journey towards my body.

In defeat I huddle
Arms over my head, shielding in vain
Knees drawn up to chest
I believe this is the end.

Finally you finish
Your anger and frustration relieved.
Surprised to be alive
I remain where I am, in shock.

Slowly reason returns.
I try to pull myself together
Clutching the shreds of sanity--
Determined to survive.

In bitterness I hear the pleas
To forgive you one more time.
Ignore the empty promises
"It'll never happen again."

I know better than that
I've heard it all before.
I've also heard the denial
In between the beatings.

I want you to understand:
Violence has no excuse.
There is no rationale.
No end justifies that means.

You're wrong about me.
I can make it without you.
Someone else could love me,
And I can love myself.

Now I'm on my own.
Life is peaceful and serene.
No fear intrudes on my home,
Or in the lives of my children.
I have won, after all.

I am passing on this clipping from Dear Abby:


Dear Abby: In 1996, in memory of a 19-year old woman who was murdered by her boyfriend, you printed an item requested by her family.

It changed my life. On March 29 of the year, my dad said, "I have something for you," and handed me your column.

It contained a list of 15 warning signs of a batterer. It was my wake-up call. At first I thought, "How can this help me?" Well, it did.

No. 1 took me back to the beginning of my relationship with my fiance'. By the time I reached No. 15, I had reviewed the past seven years of my life.

Few realize how important a role verbal abuse and criticism play in an abuser's efforts to gain control and keep you from leaving. The verbal abuse was harder for me deal with than being kicked in the back when I'd walk away from one of his outbursts.

After reading that column, I finally understood there was nothing I could change about myself that would make him love me. Thank you, Abby.
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I think insurance company exec jokes will soon replace lawyer jokes in popularity. Apparently, in some states it's OK to deny coverage to a woman who is beaten by her husband (or a man beaten by his wife) because domestic violence is seen as a "pre-existing condition." I'd like to say April Fools or something but you can't make this shit up!

I wonder how long it is considered a "pre-existing condition." If you divorce the guy but he comes and beats you up again, will they pay for your hospital care then? What about the PTSD you suffer even after you leave? Can you get therapy? What kind of inhuman people want to prevent a battered woman from getting medical care, anyway? The federal government can't do a worse job of administering health care than the states and insurance companies are already doing!

For those of you who are following the link from No Longer Quivering and are curious about other biographical entries, here they are. I'm not putting all my memoir writing online for obvious reasons. These are all rough drafts anyway and may bear little resemblance to the final product. :)

Pre-Hare Krishna involvement:

Scents From My Childhood
F. Komatar

(I have more of the above offline.)

Guest blog posts for No Longer Quivering:

Patriarchy Across cultures

My first marriage to Mahasraya (so far, still have more to write):

Meeting

Falling In Love

I've connected the above posts with the ones below via the Patriarchy series at NLQ.

Pregnant In a Laundry Room

Childbirth Led To More Violence

Should I Stay or Should I Go?

I Can't Live Without You!

Separation

The Odyssey Part 1

The Odyssey Part 2

Adventures In Cultivation:Odyssey Part 2 interlude

Odyssey Part 3

Two Days In The Life, Odyssey Part 3 interlude

After The Odyssey

Friends Locked: From the Other Woman (letter)

Mother of Mercy (stand alone piece)

These next two were some of the earliest writings I did regarding my abusive marriage and I reprinted them in my online magazine, Uppity Women. I just want to add that Maxine, mentioned in the second piece, passed away in 2001 and she is sorely missed.

Why Don't You Just Leave That Jerk? (essay published in 1994 La Gazette in Santa Cruz)

So You Left The Jerk. Now What? (follow up essay also published 1994)

Other biographical entries (just to help me keep track):

Joy In Unlikely Places: My son's head injury

Spanish Guy (Just before I got together with Mahasraya)

Comfort From Above (also connected to son's head injury)

I'm Alive (2001 heart surgery from paper diary)

Trials of the Heart (Salon piece)

Almost: Meeting Dave (my current husband)

Appointment With Death

Letter From A Christian

Bonnie and Virginia (my mom and her sister)

Here's my post about something my Grandma said on my answering machine after my mom and aunt passed away, with a link to the voice recording of that message: Terilyn, you only have one to hate now--me. Your Aunt Virginia was buried yesterday-beautiful...funeral. Your mother was buried Thurs...Wednesday. And Grandpa goes in for "prostrate" cancer next week so you probably won't have him anymore so I'll be the only one for you to hate.

I was crying last night, believe it or not, from a show. I've been watching Grey's Anatomy since first season and identifying so much with Meredith Gray's childhood. Last night she kind of got hammered because first her dad tried to apologize and make amends as part of his new found sobriety (he dived into the bottle after his wife died), then she encountered a little girl who shot her dad because he was abusing her and her mom--so Meredith stood up for her to her mom. Then she got into it with the chief of surgery because she did so and he later apologized to her for not intervening when she was a child. He'd had an affair with her mother and when he broke it off, her mother couldn't deal with it. She threw herself into her work as a surgeon and neglected her husband and child. Meredith's dad left and she was alone with a neglectful and emotionally abusive mom who later tried to kill herself in front of Meredith. The chief had tried to tell himself all these years that it wasn't his fault or responsibility. But he had to face the fact that he saw the neglect and did or said nothing.

So he delivered a long and heartfelt apology and I just burst into tears. Suddenly I was that little girl who no one intervened for. I was the battered wife who no one called the police for.

All my life I have been driven to intervene for women and children. I don't want to leave anyone feeling like no one ever cared about their suffering like that. I testified against my own half brother for his abuse and neglect of his kids.

If more people stood up for kids, maybe we wouldn't have so many violent criminals, drug addicts and other emotionally damaged people.

I've been up all night reading in fascination about the lives of two women, Vyckie and Laura, who spent years in the "Quiverfull" movement and finally broke free. They started a blog entitled "No Longer Quivering" There is also a Salon article about Vyckie.

I am amazed at the parallels (which I've noticed before) between life as a fundamentalist Christian woman (of the most extreme variety) and life as a Hare Krishna woman. Patriarchy looks the same no matter what the cultural trappings one wraps around it.

Warning: could be triggering for survivors


ETA: The video was taken down. I don't have time to search elsewhere for a copy. Let's just say it was well done and had a surprise twist and I hope we'll be seeing it on TV soon.

Great New Zealand ad against domestic violence:



And change is possible:



Another story of change:

Abuse victims report long-term poor health and depression. Researchers are puzzled by this, according to the article. I'm not surprised at all. Long after bruises fade one is still affected by the verbal abuse that was heard so many times it has become part of one's self image. It takes a lot of conscious effort to try to counteract that.

Also they should look at the sports study of concussions and brain injury.

I am reading some of the coverage of Chris Brown's abuse of Rihanna and everyone piling on her for reconciling. No one gets why it's so difficult for her to just walk away. That's because no one but her is in a relationship with him and in love with him. Without that emotion, it's so easy to see that she should leave him.

I'd like for her critics to imagine that suddenly the person they love hits them several times during a heated argument. I'd like for them to imagine the shock that this person they love is behaving this way. Those who say there should be a zero tolerance policy should imagine this. Imagine walking away from the person you love, the person who previously gave no obvious hint they'd ever do this. Imagine that person crying as they express remorse and promising to change. This person you love, this person you've shared so much with, this lover who is crying over having hurt you so badly. That angry person who hit you seems like an aberration. Surely this lover you've trusted with your heart and soul, who has been kind to you when you were sick, who has supported you in so many ways, this kind person is the real person, and will overcome the anger. Your love softens you and you agree to give them another chance. Everyone deserves a second chance, right? It's only fair.

Love doesn't stop on a dime. It takes a lot of beatings to kill it completely.

According to an article in CNN, Research shows that athlete's brains have damage from concussions.

This easily applies to anyone who has repeated blows to the head. Most battered women, if not all, are being struck in the head or having their head smashed into walls or floors. Even if you don't end up in the hospital with a serious concussion, you may have a mild concussion. This research shows that even those milder concussions are doing damage. The damage doesn't show up in MRIs or CT scans, but in this study they examined brain tissue of deceased athletes and saw extensive damage. Some of the symptoms of that damage were sleep disorders, depression, headaches, and memory problems. They call the disorder chronic traumatic encephalopathy.

So far six out of six brains of former NFL players show the disorder. The youngest case was an 18 year old who already had the beginnings of brain damage. Think about it, our high school kids who play vigorous sports who get their heads knocked around may be getting brain damage. Researchers were shocked to find damage deep inside, not just on the surface.

This was particularly chilling for me to read because I have the surface evidence of damage--leading me to believe I may very well have some additional damage that wasn't seen on the MRI.

I've written to the Sports Legacy Institute and suggested they expand their research to include people who've survived repeated domestic assault. All one has to do is donate their brain to the project. I plan to donate my organs and be cremated anyway, so I'd be happy to sign up. At least my family can get some answers.
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Nearly One in Five Young Women Have Experienced Forced Intercourse.

Support the Know More Initiative. Unless, of course, you are a social conservative.

Lesbian rights pioneer Del Martin, wife of Phyllis Lyon, died yesterday at the age of 87, just two months after the legal marriage she fought for.

Excerpt:

Ms. Martin and Lyon were plaintiffs in the lawsuit that got the state ban on same-sex marriage lifted. They were married at 5:07 p.m, just minutes after the ruling took effect.

Four years ago, when San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom allowed marriage licenses to be issued to gay and lesbian couples in San Francisco in defiance of state law, Ms. Martin and Lyon were the first of about 4,000 same-sex couples to wed and made news internationally. Those marriages were later nullified by the state's high court but paved the way for the successful legal challenge.

"We would never have marriage equality in California if it weren't for Del and Phyllis," said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the San Francisco Democrat. "They fought and triumphed in many battles, beginning when they first bought a home together in San Francisco in 1955."

Pelosi called the death of Ms. Martin "a great loss for me personally and for our entire community."

Newsom, who said Ms. Martin "laid the groundwork for all those who want a life of dignity," ordered the flags at City Hall and the rainbow gay-pride flag at Market and Castro streets to be flown at half-staff until sunset today.

Ms. Martin's activist reach extended into the feminist movement when she became the first open lesbian to serve on the board of directors of the National Organization for Women, and she helped spearhead a successful campaign to get the American Psychiatric Association to remove homosexuality from its roster of mental illnesses.

In 1995, Sen. Dianne Feinstein named her as a delegate to the White House Conference on Aging, where she and Lyon, a delegate appointed by Pelosi, focused attention on the needs of aging gays and lesbians.

Feinstein said Wednesday, "Del and Phyllis were a loving couple, cherished by an entire community. They inspired so many, young and old."
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This story broke last night in local news when Hans Reiser, staring a sentence of 25-to-life in the face, agreed to take authorities to the site where he'd buried his wife Nina in order to set the stage for a late, post conviction plea bargain to second degree murder (15-life). His defense team had maintained that Nina might be in Europe. The burial site turned out to be less than a mile from his mother's house in steep terrain and likely would not have been found without his help. The murder is thought to have taken place after she came to drop off the kids for a visit and while the kids were in the basement. The area where the body had been buried was searched previously with cadaver dogs but the actual site was difficult to access.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/CRIME/07/08/missing.mother.ap/index.html

Now, if they can just find the body of Drew Peterson's wife Stacey.

http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/story?id=3810718

http://cbs2chicago.com/local/stacy.peterson.laci.2.564862.html

These women are dead but clearly misogyny is alive and well.

Violence Against Women is a Men's Issue--Jackson Katz

I don't normally repost entire articles; I'll come back and reduce this to an excerpt in a day or two. I just thought this one was really important and wanted to make it easy to read right away. (I know when I'm busy I don't utilize links to other sites, then I forget to come back when I have time.)

Here it is:

Jackson Katz, an internationally recognized educator on gender violence prevention among men and boys, argues society must first transform how it thinks about violence against women if it wants to prevent these acts from reoccurring. "As a culture, Americans first must take the step in acknowledging that violence against women is not a women's issue, but a men's issue," Katz said.

"This is the foundation strategy for engaging young men and boys in gender violence prevention," Katz told an audience of school counselors, social workers, teachers, University of Iowa psychology students, social workers, and community members at a forum in Iowa in April. "The first problem I have with labeling gender issues as women's issues is that it gives men an excuse to not pay attention. This is also the problem with calling them gender issues, because the majority of the people in the status quo see gender issues as women's issues."
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Katz points out a pattern that has evolved regarding how the media uses passive voice and sentences when reporting gender violence. Using a board in the front of the room, Katz helped make his point by providing the audience with a concrete exercise to illustrate the power of passive voice (see below).

John beat Mary. (active)

Mary was beaten by John. (passive)

Mary was beaten. (passive)

Mary was battered. (passive)

Mary is a battered woman. (active)

"John has left the conversation long ago, while Mary evolves into the active victim," Katz said. "This evolution of victim-blaming is very pervasive in our society, because this is how our whole power structure is set up. We start asking why Mary put herself into a position to be beaten by John."

"If we really want to work on prevention, we need to start asking questions about John, not Mary," Katz said. "We won't get anything done until we start treating these issues as men's issues and shift the paradigm at the cultural level."

I've been reading about the FLDS (fundy mormon sect) in two books, Under The Banner Of Heaven by Jon Krakauer and Escape, by Carolyn Jessop.

It is pretty clear that while it was always a very strict environment where women's lives were very controlled, once Warren Jeffs gained power (as his father became ill and then died) it took a turn into full blown dysfunctional cult-hood. It makes it a lot clearer to me where the line is drawn between an alternative religious movement with some restrictive rules and literalist scriptural interpretation and an oppressive and dangerous cult. Carolyn Jessop writes from her view on the inside for many years, bearing and raising her 8 children before she engineered her escape. Krakauer writes from outside but using many interviews with those who were on the inside and those who were very close to the group or whose paths crossed some of the people he portrayed.

( Read more... )Given the rise in numbers of both branches of Mormonism, I recommend reading both of these books for a full picture of what may be in store as they gain power.