My First Speech On Domestic Violence

by ComputerBob

October 7, 2005

Below is a transcript of my very first speech on the topic of domestic violence. I was honored to present it to an audience of several hundred people at a local domestic violence center's annual fundraising luncheon on October 7, 2005.

I grew up in a 4-bedroom brick house, in an upper-middle-class Chicago suburb. My father worked for IBM, and both of my parents were leaders in their church.

All through school, I was a straight-"A" student and a "teacher's pet." In the fifth grade, I was reading at a high school level. In church, I was an altar boy. I never smoked or used any drugs or alcohol. In fact, I never got in any trouble at all.

How many people here would have recognized that I was an abused child?

And, if you had, what would you have done about it?

When my father swore at my mother and threatened her, my brothers and sister always looked down at their mashed potatoes. I always looked him right in the eyes, as if to say, "I see what you're doing, and I'm not going to forget it."

Over the years, I got a lot of beatings for "looking at him the wrong way." And those beatings went on and on, because I refused to give him the satisfaction of seeing me cry. Ironically, whenever he beat my sister, he always yelled at her to stop crying.

For my mother, the cycle of abuse was a textbook case: A time of walking on eggshells, followed by an explosive incident, followed by a "honeymoon" phase of promises and going out for dinner, then back to walking on eggshells.

As a child, I didn't get any "honeymoon" phase. For me, it was walking on eggshells, followed by an explosive incident, followed by walking on eggshells again.

When my father dropped out of college, he said that it was my brother's and my fault - we were babies, and our crying had kept him from being able to study. When he cheated on my mother, he said it was her fault for being a bad wife. And when he abused her, he said it was because she had "opened her big mouth" and had "pushed his buttons."

When I was 6 or 7, I saw my father beat my mother so badly that she ended up in the hospital. If you had asked me what had happened to her, I would have told you the same thing that she told everyone - that she had fallen down the stairs.

The emotional scars of abuse never go away. My older brother deals with his by not remembering anything about his childhood¹. My sister dealt with hers by attempting suicide as a teenager, and, since then, by suffering from every allergy and sensitivity known to modern medicine. My younger brother dealt with his by abusing alcohol and drugs for years, and then by stepping in front of a freight train. I deal with mine by writing and talking about what I've been through and what I've learned. I also try to remember that, with apologies to Friedrich Nietzsche, "That which doesn't kill me, makes me..." bitter and resentful... unless I constantly and consciously take control of my emotions.

In July, 2004, just two months after their 50th anniversary, my parents came to Florida to visit my wife and me for a week. On the third day of their visit, my father became physically and verbally abusive to my mother and demanded that she go home with him. For the first time in 50 years, she refused, telling him, "I'm not going to let you bully me any more."

So, after threatening my mother and me for nearly an hour, he abandoned her here, and drove all the way back to Chicago without stopping, averaging 74 miles per hour the entire 18 hours.

A few days later, he began calling her. His calls typically alternated between telling her to "get your ass home;" sarcastically asking her if she was enjoying having sex with me; threatening to kill himself like my younger brother had done; and telling her that he loved her very, very much.

Last October, my wife and I helped my mother get a "no contact" injunction against my father. He has violated that injunction several times, but because his violations are misdemeanors and he lives out of state, there isn't much that anyone can do to hold him accountable for them.

My mother lived with my wife and me for nearly a year, until a few months ago, when we found her a nice condo to rent nearby. Several months ago, she filed for divorce from my father. She is doing pretty well on her own, but those of us who love her are often frustrated by the way that 50 years of abuse have left her interpersonally obtuse and functionally handicapped.

It's a good thing that the wonderful people at xxxxxxxxxx understand and care about people like us. They've been patient, sympathetic, knowledgeable, helpful, and loving to my mother and me for more than a year. I suspect that, like many families who have survived abuse, we may need their help for many more years.

Please do whatever you can do to support them.

UPDATE: Three years later, I was deeply honored to give another speech at that same annual fundraising luncheon.

¹ In 1995, in a conversation with my older brother and his wife in their kitchen, I told him that I saw him treating his children the same way that our father had treated us. His response was, "I don't remember much about my childhood. I figure it's in the past and it doesn't affect me any more." I told him that his childhood does affect him and will continue to affect him until he deals with it.