Lee’s Story
Chapter Six – Angels in uniform

This is a true story written by a survivor of domestic violence.
Names have been changed to protect the identities of those involved.
Copyright - Lee & Wonderful Women 2009

I was sickly thin when I was told I was pregnant again. I am 5ft 8” tall, and I weighed 43kg’s.  My doctor’s biggest worry was getting me to put on enough weight in order to prevent another miscarriage. I’d suffered a miscarriage two years earlier, so had to be careful.

Throughout this pregnancy I continued to suffer at the hands of Mike. In fact his treatment of me was worse than ever, and I often wondered where the situation with him would lead.

Mike had by this time also acquired a taste for gambling. So at least three times a week after work he’d take the hour long drive to the Carousel Casino. When it got to 8pm in the evening and Mike wasn’t home, I knew he was probably at the casino, drinking and gambling. I also knew that he would stumble in anytime between 11pm and 2am when it was not uncommon for him to wake me up, screaming at me because his food had dried out, or for some other ‘reason’.

Through all of this, Mike’s family were simply not there for me at all – in fact, they didn’t believe me when I’d tell them what was going on. Boy would they get a reality check years later!

I gave birth to a healthy baby boy on the 3rd of January, 1995. Poor little Reese reminded me of ET – he was so yellow. Of course Mike and his father were thrilled that I had produced a son. I was just relieved that my baby had been born healthy, after all the stress I’d been through. And I was especially pleased that this time around I was able to breast feed.  

A few days later, I returned home from the hospital. Within 48 hours Mike had moved out of our bedroom, preferring rather to sleep in the spare room. He couldn’t handle all the noises that go with having a newborn, especially the sound of Reese at the breast.

The situation in our home by now was far, far worse than when Penny was born. Mike was getting drunk pretty much on a daily basis. So the rages erupting in our home were also happening daily which was very disturbing for not only the new baby, but Penny too.

If there wasn’t a meal prepared on time we’d all suffer the consequences. If there were dirty dishes in the sink, it would set Mike off. The more he raged the more little Reese wanted to be on the breast. It was the only way I could keep him quiet and calm. And I needed to because if Reese cried it infuriated Mike. I couldn’t get the baby into a routine at all, and found myself depending on my eight year old daughter more and more for help. She soon became Reese’s second mom.

Four weeks after Reese was born I begged Mike to go for counselling with me. What a disaster that turned out to be.

Referred to a junior counsellor at Eskom, I poured my heart out to her in front of Mike. This did nothing constructive and only succeeded in aggravating the situation at home.

Knowing that appealing for outside help was simply not an option and that I was not in a position to provide for my children on my own I began to sink into a terrible depression. I no longer wanted to leave the house. Almost at rock bottom, my days were a constant battle of trying to keep it together for my children.

I knew I had to find a way to crawl out of the barrel of misery I was in. But being so broken I had no idea how to go about this.

One night Mike pulled me up the passage by my hair and dragged me into the bathroom. He then bashed my head against the bath I don’t know how many times; maybe twenty. As usual, he was careful not to injure my face. Somehow I managed to free myself and run out of the front door. Mike caught me on the grass. When the neighbours screamed over the fence for him to stop attacking me, Mike threatened them.

As I was screaming for help, Mike’s solution was to sit on top of me forcing one finger down my throat and blocking my nose with the others. I couldn’t breathe. The children were hysterical.

There was another visit from the welfare lady a couple of days later. Knowing there was nothing she could do to really help me; I never said a word about what was going on.

But I began praying. . .  While I was watching TV or washing dishes – I would pray silently. I would ask that I get a phone call telling me Mike was in hospital after a drunken car crash. I would ask God to send a Chaplain to the house to inform me that Mike was dead. I did this, and may God forgive me.

And then an amazing process began. A process that I would only come to understand years later which turned me from victim, to survivor, and then to survivor-healer.

It started in mid 1996, after I found a job as a music teacher in a pre-school. It was ideal as I could take Reece with me. At the end of that year I had saved enough to purchase my own keyboard. In January of ’97, with keyboard and
2-year old bundled into the car, I began doing free demonstrations to other
pre-schools in the area, and within a week I had secured 12 schools to teach at.

Wonderful Women is drawing up a list of helpful resources for victims of domestic violence and other types of abuse.

If you are based in Dubai or Gauteng in S.A. and provide a service that you believe should be on the list, or know of someone who does, please e-mail sue@wwnetw.com.

There is already some information that can help abused women on the Wonderful Women website – www.wonderfulwomennetwork.com.

Human Relations Institute (Dubai) (971-4) 365-8498 & 365-8578
www.hridubai.com is linked to The Foundation for International Human Relations, Washington, DC and offers a wide range of Psychology related services. With multilingual and multicultural professionals on board they combine both Clinical and *Forensic Psychology to effectively assess, treat, and consult on cases where domestic violence is involved. (*Forensic psychologists translate psychological information into a legal framework, usually for the purpose of testifying in court.)

The Restorative Justice Centre
(Pretoria, South Africa)
Tel: 27 (0) 12 3232926.   Contact Suzanne Robinson-Davis suzanne@rjc.co.za, www.rjc.co.za deals with domestic violence situations. They sent us the case study:

Although people think that domestic violence always involves women being abused by their partners, there are cases where the male is the one on the receiving end.

The Restorative Justice Centre (RJC) recently dealt with a matter in which a husband opened a case of assault against his wife after she had thrown cutlery at him which left him with a scar on the chest after a heated argument.

During a conversation between the social worker and the wife, she asserted that she acted in self defense as he had been abusing her for the past 8 years in their 20 years of marriage.

The couple willingly participated in a Victim Offender Conference which was facilitated by a social worker from RJC.

Both parties had the opportunity to express themselves and lay out any hidden feelings and aggravations that they had.
 
During the session, it soon became apparent that the wife was abusing alcohol. This was one of the factors that contributed to the couple’s conflict.

The RJC social worker assisted the couple in finding common ground and agreeing on certain ground rules.

The wife acknowledged the strain that her alcohol abuse put on her family and was willing to go for rehabilitation. She also agreed to seek new ways to deal with stress.

Even though there is still a long road that this couple has to walk together, with RJC’s continued intervention, the journey will no longer be one devoid of hope. 

Johanna Richmond in Dubai,      
Tel: 050 345 8076,
E-mail: johannarichmond@hotmail.com       is a psychologist, counsellor and cognitive behaviour therapist who can help women to become more assertive and develop boundaries. Licensed with Dubai Dept. of Health

Mike did not seem to have a problem with this – he couldn’t really as I was working with children between the ages of 3 and 6. It was absolutely wonderful to earn my own money, empowering. I began feeling a sense of worth. I had a purpose in life, and the sun slowly began to shine in my world again.
 
It was February 1998. Twelve years since Mike and I were married. Penny was 11 and Reece 3. My business was going well and I had managed to maintain the number of schools I was teaching at. Although the abuse was still happening on practically a daily basis, I was able to manage it better due to my healing self esteem and developing financial empowerment.

We’d had a spate of house break-ins in our neighbourhood, and a concerned neighbour told me of a forthcoming community policing meeting taking place at our local police station. When another neighbour, Mary, showed an interest in going to this meeting I mentioned it to Mike. He immediately rejected the idea, despite my reasoning that it would be in our best interests to do something as homeowners in the area. After he refused to go to the meeting I decided to take a stand. So together with Mary and Gloria, I went.

It was the best thing I had done in a long time! I arrived at the meeting looking quite snazzy in my size 8 black pants and red and white striped T-shirt. In attendance were about fifteen men – a combination of policemen and a few high-ranking officers from the South African National Defence Force. And then there were us three girls. We were initially quite intimidated in this testosterone charged room, but once given the opportunity to give our input, I found myself standing up and, with fist bashing down on the conference table, demanding to know what the police were doing about the crime in our area. I then spoke for about 20 minutes telling the forum what was happening and how we felt ‘under siege’ by the criminals. Yes – pathetic little me, shooting my mouth off at the powers that be. And they all listened, hanging onto every word I said.

I must’ve done something right. At the end of the meeting the girls and I had half of the men present standing around us trying their best to get us to commit to ‘getting involved’, and of course, exchanging telephone numbers.  And these were all men in uniform. To a vulnerable battered woman it was like being surrounded by angels from heaven!

That night we drove home like excited schoolgirls. Of course we were going to get involved. But as we got closer to home I wondered how on earth I was going to explain this to him.

Funny enough, I wasn’t too concerned. That night something had changed in me. I knew before I walked in our front door that I was going to become an active participant in the fight against crime for our suburb, despite knowing full well that Mike would object bitterly.

I reasoned in my mind that what I wanted to do was for the good of ‘us’. Though I had invited him to be a part of it, he had declined. So I wasn’t scared to stand by my decision. Even though I knew I was setting myself up for punishment frankly I didn’t give a rat’s ass!

I had, after all, made friends with the police and army officers that night. And because I had some of their numbers on my phone, I felt a sense of security that I had not felt before. With my new contacts, Mike was out of his league.

Of course I played the meeting down. I couldn’t exactly tell Mike that I had taken a stance that left a room full of beef and brawn in awe of my sudden outburst of confidence. But he would soon come to realise that I was taking back control of my life, and there was very little he could do about it.

And little did I know just how much of an impact I’d had in that meeting that night, and how, as a result, my life as I had known it for the past fifteen years was about to do an about turn.

To be continued.

“If just one woman, trapped in an abusive relationship is able to find the emotional tools to leave and better her life through reading my story, then writing it will have been worth it.” – Lee