Have you ever felt the flesh of your partner’s fist hitting your face? How about the warm trickle of blood down your body after they cut you? I have, and so has Christy Mack.
I promised myself that I would never show the darker part of myself, my nightmares, in this blog if I started writing for it and yet here I am. I’m angry and there’s no other way to put it. In the last week I have seen so many people posting on twitter and Facebook how Christy Mack ‘deserved’ what her ex boyfriend did to her; because she’s a porn star. I was afraid to tell anyone when my ex was beating me, when she threw me to the ground or blackened my eyes, because of the way people act towards domestic abuse victims. Clearly I was right, I mean I work in an adult sexual health store so I must have deserved the things that were done to me because of the job I have? What bull. I didn’t deserve what was done to me any more than Miss Mack did.
People say it’s easy to walk away from an abusive relationship that you don’t have to stay. People also say that it’s easy to call the police and they will take care of it for you. People who say these things have never had their face smashed into a counter top causing their lip to split and scar for life. These people have never sat on the floor covered in blood from a beating so severe they thought they would die. I have. I’ve watched my life flash before my eyes because my ex told me she was going to beat me to death if I ever left. I have been a victim of domestic violence, I have been beaten, called names, abused and afraid for my life. I spent over 2 years being abused, afraid to run, afraid to hide and afraid that I deserved it. I am a survivor, and I am proud that I am still here, that I can live past the nightmares. I am also proud that there are people out there like Miss Mack who aren’t afraid to stand up, who fight back against the people who oppress them, I don’t judge her, I admire her. I never called the police, I never showed the world my scar or bruises; I hid in fear. I admire Miss Mack for standing up, for taking a risk and fighting back. She is an inspiration to me, someone who was pushed down, oppressed yet still stood up and moved forward. You can’t understand what she has gone through unless you’ve been where she has, where I have been, battered, begging for life and gasping for air.
Do you judge me? Do you think I am less of a person because my ex took a broken beer bottle and used it to cut my chest? Do you think less of me because I have lain on the floor being kicked in the stomach? Do you think less of me because my ex put me through the wall and had to plaster over the damage? Do you think less of me for hiding my bruises with makeup and saying I fell down the stairs or walked into a pole? Or is it you think less of me because you believe you would never allow this to happen to you?
Abuse doesn’t start right away, it grows, it starts with an order to do something, it starts with being called a derogatory name, with a push, with a squeezed wrist. You don’t meet a person and say hmmmm I’m going to date this person regardless of them beating me, you don’t allow them to abuse you, you are forced. Abusers are smart, they draw you in with their charisma, their love for life, they hook you with kindness and slowly introduce their dark side, so you wake up one day realizing, my god I’m being abused. Therapists call it the honeymoon faze, they draw you in with romance and promises, than abuse you, and bring you back in with more promises of change. It’s like Rihanna said “On the first page of our story, the future seemed so bright, then this thing turn out so evil I don’t know why I’m still surprised.”
Somehow it becomes easy to blame yourself, like if you hadn’t of burnt their supper, or didn’t show up from work 20 minutes late, than none of this would have happened. Like ‘War Machine’ said if she hadn’t of had a man in her apartment they would be engaged and none of this would have happened right? It took 3 years in abuse counseling for me to realize that I was not the problem; nothing I could have done could have prevented it. I feel for Miss Mack because I know how hard the road to recovery is, and I don’t mean physically, the mental abuse is much harder to repair.
As a woman who has been abused, who has picked herself up from a bloody mess on the floor I am asking you, from the bottom of my heart, stop judging. Stop posting these horrible comments about Miss Mack, stand up and support her, don’t allow her abuse to become a joke, let it become a story of survival, of a woman who wasn’t afraid to back down, to fight back.
Think about the women you know who hide it. The woman walking down the street at night with sunglasses on. These women are daughters, sisters, mothers and friends. Stand up against domestic violence because when you judge these women, you become the abuser.
Asia
PillowTalk 