SPRKS IN CSF: Domestic violence

SPRKS IN CSF: Domestic violence: As I read the NY Times piece on domestic violence' a snap shot of domestic violence spread' my first urge is to go on an  educationa...

Domestic violence

As I read the NY Times piece on domestic violence' a snap shot of domestic violence spread' my first urge is to go on an educational route, next I think as a clinician would  and want to write part clinical...

Here I digress and want to follow my mind  and go to where it wants to go, any way that was the reason that I started the blog so long ago, to put it all on paper , to regain letters and words as I tried to re-group my mind , gather the piece-meal bits of my brain into some kind of a cohesive functional whole. I know I will never feel brilliant again, I will always seek out places to withdraw  to, to hide in, to be invisible, especially when  I am told how great somethings that I did is...

I will always remain wary, the invisible scars never fade .

I do not allow to be gaslighted, nor give up 'me' for some altered reality any more. I too remember calling the Domestic violence helpline , with the thought of seeking support, had called a few times from work and hung up after dialing the number, just  as the shame rose in waves... I had a facade of respectability and intactness to keep and to preserve these I allowed myself  to be  slowly decimated.

I felt  that with reasonable make up application and rational sounding explanations it could be contained , until it was no longer contained and it spilled out more and more towards the children .

As always no victim in similar situation is ready until they are ready  and that is the reality .

Looking back I can see clearly , and I can project to a variety of out come possibilities  'if  I had stayed' none of them  have me in  a living mode...

The lack of support one feels is  at times real, at times it is a distortion of our perception.

When there is a gun near the bed , it is an implied threat and there is no point trying to repeat to yourself that 'you are over reacting ' to this and 'it is all in your head'. The financial control  is no fiction, nor is marital rape , even when you try to rationalize it all with some religious piece or cultural  practice rationale . Looking back, I realized that the subtle  signs were there from those early days of marriage (thank fully those were days  before any cell phones and air tags) of quizzing about  your work interactions , of  telling you the color of a dress that  you loved is 'not good ' finding that dress you bought being have so many small cuts  as you go to wear it, were all early warning signs . After all you loved that dress because it was your favorite color... they  all pointed to the tsunami that was coming to swallow you as life  moved ahead...

Now I know suffering domestic violence to stay married is not a measure of success, nor a virtue. I may have thought of these , but with time you were denied any thoughts... You moved , a shell , an automaton, dull and controlled , alone as your universe shrank further and further . You feared the closing of the blinds  and curtains until one day you accidentally found out that an open window or door , or a neighbor  ringing your door bell  acts as a deterrent and so you learn to create some relief  on occasion from the constant threat...

Just like some elected  officials views when it comes to abortion, I was told at one point that I have to  go for a late abortion, even when I and my doctor knew it is dangerous, because  the father felt he has a right to a son next... Chance confluence of events helped and hence I am here to tell the story, along with the blessing of a great daughter. I feared  and worried for the  intergenerational transmission of abuse ,may be the post divorce stable environment I could manage  helped to keep those genes from switching on... I hope so.

The threats that he will call CPS on me , the stalking , the threat to call my work and make me  return to him, the threat to make me  and the children live in the streets  none of it ever  came to be , but it made me figure out how to live with canned black beans , eggs and some leafy greens/ frozen vegetables to provide nutrition for the children. It was not long ago that I mentally prepared to live in a shelter , wearing a hoodie and dark glasses (yes, my plan so others won't recognize me  at my job)thankfully never came to being . At times I think back , ever so briefly and feel I am just viewing it from the outside . I try not to dwell on what was taken from me... time, emptied out bank accounts, hid away assets  , career etc , as they are irrelevant at this time as I am still alive and here for my children. After all those are just things , I am here now and that is what I have to focus on... the here , the now...

I try to move away from the past as I know it is not healthy for me to go to the past as it is bound to trigger some thing and  re-start my nightmares  all over again . I do not need that  for me in my  todays.

I can also very clearly sense the victim of domestic violence when I come across one now . I understand the defensive stands  and the shame they  feel as they try to hide  behind their facades. It is a helpful tool for me .

by Pc-3 (06/23/2024)

SPRKS IN CSF: GHOSTS

SPRKS IN CSF: GHOSTS:  The evening's slanted rays weaved their humid haze into tendrils . In those  ghostly wisps were memories that never got made... Those s...

GHOSTS

 The evening's slanted rays weaved their humid haze into tendrils . In those  ghostly wisps were memories that never got made...

Those stray shell casings that had dented time in a corridor , they had robbed the memories along with the lives that never even had a chance  for a grasp at life, nor for the memories to ever  form.

The pain that jostles  one awake in the ungodly hours of the night, just pulsates with the perpetuity of loss.

In the golden godly hours Robes deemed Bump stocks legal; in the corridors of virtue ,the shell casings stayed empty for they were emptied on life...lost lives... Still the Robes glistened in the gaslight, as they always did , may be more glowing with all that halo of power. There is consistency  in that glow of power.

Yet the memories could never form, they never stood a chance , never could they form from an erased life... 'Tragedy' the word lost its meaning when life itself became a caricature, of all the forms in us , of us , of humans , of the whole that could not even be .

However the  Robes , they changed forms, shapes, styles ,hue  and the gaslight added an edge of omniscience to those  robes.

Here in wandered the little ghosts, on the wispy rays of  the sun that sneaked in through a window , through some slanted shutters that failed to close out the light fully...The came in there and sat in the pews where sounds of a negation echoed , negation of their lost lives, negation of their 'being', as were their rights to being were dissected ,rarified and rendered into words. They do wander , wondering if any one will  remember or  ever take note , like so many ghosts who wander the land  on a ray of hope  in the mist, will you even know they exist?

The shell casings spew out more ghosts as bump stocks connect to its destiny, a destiny of destruction...

As shell casings rain on decimating even a small hope for life, all to evanescence into ghosts, ghost we are to be...

short story by Pc-3 ( 06/16/2024)