DNP / RN DARE TO RISE UP

Reclaiming Your Power in the Aftermath of Domestic Violence
1. Auflage 2020
ISBN: 978-1-77277-395-8
Verlag: 10-10-10 Publishing
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: PC/MAC/eReader/Tablet/DL/kein Kopierschutz

E-Book, Englisch, 268 Seiten

Violence is a complex phenomenon. When power is leveraged over the mind, body, and spirit, where in the galaxy can the survivor of domestic violence escape? Domestic violence mutates and traverses every major component of humanity. This book provides an in-depth discussion of culturally specific issues and systems of oppression impacting the diverse spectrum of domestic violence survivors. Healing from domestic violence requires that we question, interrogate, understand, accept, and then love the parts of ourselves that society and our abuser diminish. All efforts to end violence against women ultimately have to return to this question: How do we change societal values so that women's rights to live free of insults, invasion, disempowerment, and intimidation are respected? Domestic violence is not uniquely intersectional. In fact, most things are related in some capacity to ours and other social identities. We can and should apply intersectionality to everything we do. More than a theory, intersectionality offers a way of living with, thinking about, and contributing to the world around us. As members of a global community, it's essential to understand each other's nuances and instrumentalize those nuances in global problems. The goal of this book was to express some of the differences in our experiences of violence. Topics like Islamophobia, Antisemitism, disability rights, Christian cults, abuse in domestic violence shelters, modern slavery, and welfare politics are also relevant to our discussions. While it's not possible to get to everything in a book of this size, I hope you are engaged and ready to take on those topics individually. If this book is your introduction to domestic violence, I hope you will continue to 'do the work' as they say, and think about what wasn't covered here, or what you'd like to learn more about. And furthermore, as we hope this book respects, domestic violence is not solely an issue of heteropatriarchy or male supremacy...

Autoren/Hrsg.

DNP,

RN,

Leseproben

PROLOGUE “There is one universal truth, applicable to all countries, cultures, and communities: violence against women is never acceptable, never excusable, never tolerable.” – Ban Ki-moon (2008) On October 05, 2019 @ 2:34 a.m., the trajectory of my life changed forever…. Domestic violence is complicated, and I hope understanding the nuances of this endemic problem might provide space for these stories to be held. One story in particular got me thinking, not because of the blatant harm of the woman’s abuser, but because of the subtlety of abuse. She’s agreed to let me tell her story here… I was almost 17 when I had my first kiss. A month later, I was asked by my friend to explore each other’s bodies in a department store dressing room. He told me I joked about walking around naked too much, and if I meant it, I should just show him my body. The encounter left him with blue balls, and he could not resolve the issue himself. He told me he could no longer look at me as a friend because of the pain his erection caused. I was concerned, and felt his pain was my fault. He said we could not be friends unless we had sex to resolve the pain. He told me to look at it as an opportunity to explore each other’s bodies once more, and take the pressure off of sex with future partners. I said no many times before I said yes. I tried to negotiate with him, but he insisted that he could not resolve his blue balls unless I was naked. I said yes after much pleading and coercing, and almost didn’t go through with it. He said we could not be friends unless we had sex, so I gave in. He was one of my best friends at the time, and I could not imagine my senior year without him. I told myself I felt selfish for not giving in to what he wanted. He told me I was the most selfless person he knew, and because I liked that idea about myself, I wanted to make sure I didn’t do anything to change his mind. We got together like this for the next few nights. He asked me if I enjoyed it, and I did not want to say no, so I told him I was too overwhelmed. But he kept pushing and pushing, and told me to tell him I wanted to. Unaware of what was happening, I eventually grew feelings for him. We dated in secret, away from our parents, off and on for almost a year. It was a very tumultuous relationship. His best friend sometimes texted me when we were in the middle of a fight, to get me to see his side. His friend was complicit in what happened to me, and told me he didn’t think my boyfriend was a good person but that I should still be with him. Because we had to hide our relationship from our parents, and my mother worked at our school, we met at night in our homes. He would usually sneak over on weeknights, and I would sneak over on weekends. I was very tired the next day and had a hard time participating in class. When he came over, I would often fall asleep, and he would wake me up to make out and do other things. He got upset and left if I did not stay awake while he was there, and would be passive- aggressive at school the next day. Nights he did not sneak over were because we got in an argument (which was often), I had a test the next day (less often), or I lied and said my mother was sleeping in the next room. He called that a “night off.” We mostly did oral sex because penetration was too painful. I later learned that the trauma of my relationship with him caused vaginismus and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). I tried to fix this but could not figure it out. He told me that my body was abnormal and that I should go to the doctor because something didn’t feel right. I went, and nothing was wrong. Sometimes he would get caught for sneaking out, and his parents would take his phone away. During those times, he would text me through his friend. He said he had an app that let him access his friend’s phone number and send messages. I don’t know how often he did that, or if I always knew who I was talking to. As for my own friends, I did not have many by the end of the relationship. My best friends had all left except him, because they thought he was toxic for me and I couldn’t see it. Watching me with him was too painful for them. When I did spend time with other people, he wanted to know where I went and what I did. He got mad at me for spending my lunches with friends instead of him, and he told me I didn’t dedicate enough to our relationship. When I was with my friends, I was only thinking about him. He texted me constantly and I felt pressured to respond. He was always on my mind, which is where he wanted to be. I felt like I didn’t have a moment alone because, even when I wasn’t with him, I felt like I had to include him in what I was doing by texting or calling him. It was exhausting. Before he moved and went to college, I helped plan a goodbye party for him. We got into an argument before and after the party because I had scheduled a concert with my friend, months in advance (before I knew he was leaving), and was excited to see my favorite band. He wanted to get drunk together that night, and he told me I was not putting enough effort into the relationship, which was a common complaint of his. I ended up skipping the concert, in tears, because I did not want him to get mad at me. After much coercion, we got drunk together—or I got drunk, and he slipped his vodka into the sink when I was not looking. I believe he was intentionally sober when we had sex that night, but he wanted me to be drunk. When we went off to college, we were still together. We were going to break up when we left for school, but he wanted to stay together for the comfort and normalcy of being in a relationship. I told myself it was a courtesy to stay together because of all I had put him through. I suggested an open relationship, and he agreed. But when I talked to other guys, he felt like I was cheating on him, and that hurt me a lot. We broke up and got back together many times, until October when I broke up for good. Shortly before our final breakup, he told me he wanted to have sex together over facetime. The first time was consensual, but the next two times were not. I told him I did not feel comfortable doing it, and I remember he said he was sorry, but he would just keep asking. He wanted me to videotape it so I wouldn’t have to do it again, or so he said. The second time, the videotape supposedly got deleted. I was crying so much the third time, but I couldn’t figure out why. I didn’t realize what was happening was wrong. He apologized, and that made me feel a bit better in the moment, so we continued. When we broke up, the sexual abuse stopped, but he continued to verbally assault me and manipulate me. I planned a trip that following summer, and he made me feel selfish for not getting a layover in his city so we could see each other. Again, I felt selfish and unworthy of him. I then realized how horrible he made me feel, and I terminated all contact. I have not spoken to him since. It was not until months after the initial assault that I realized what happened. Years later, I am still learning about the full extent of the relationship and finding terms to identify specific abuses by. Memories will come back to me that I forgot, and I realize the full extent to which I have suffered once more. When I read about the effects of intimate partner violence, I realize my mental health symptoms, sleep problems, eating problems, and anxiety are all related to him. I think about him many times a week. My post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) did not go away for three years after the first assault. Reclaiming my body in a sexual sense is something I struggle with, but I feel much more confident and in control. Emotionally, I also struggle. I have accepted what happened to me, but it took a long time, and I fear I still have a long way to go. For a while, being a survivor was part of my identity. I know now that I am so much more, and that being a survivor only increases my self-love and personal strength. Many survivors feel that their partners, family members, or friends never did anything that bad, hurt them that much, or made them feel that insignificant to qualify as DV. But society does not tell us that DV can be subtle. When you live in a culture that promotes violence, as U.S. culture does, the normalcy of abuse seems insignificant. When you are told that your feelings don’t matter, you’re lying, or you’re crazy, the care you deserve seems too distant, and not in the cards for you. But that isn’t true. You deserve to be loved without abuse. You deserve unconditional support and compassion. Domestic violence is not an individual problem; it is not unrelated to the ways in which we see ourselves, our culture, and our society. Domestic violence impacts everyone. It is my hope that in writing this book, readers in abusive relationships will be able to come to the same conclusions I did, and that readers who may engage or have engaged in abusive behaviors can recognize the full extent of their harm. If there is anything I have learned, it’s that abuse happens to everyone. Domestic violence does not exist in a vacuum; it is not limited to women or children or a few bad apples. Violence is systemic. It impacts survivors and non-survivors alike. Reading this book will equip you with a more completive,...