Domestic violence is more than a husband hitting his wife or a wife battering her husband. It can turn quite deadly as it did when a wife ran over her husband for looking at another woman, or a man fatally shot his young daughter before killing himself.
In Louisiana, a couple argued after church services ended because the wife caught her husband looking at another woman during services. According to witnesses, the argument continued as the couple attempted to get into their car.
The 22-year-old wife tried two times unsuccessfully to run her 24-year-old husband down with the car, and succeeded on the third try. She was booked on an attempted murder charge and her husband was treated at a hospital and released.
In Florida, a grand jury refused to indict a 47-year old wife who killed her 50-year old husband after witnesses told of years of vicious physical abuse. A psychologist testified the mother of three met the test of a battered spouse after she fired two shots into her husband in January of 2000.
Tales of abuse included testimony from the victim’s daughter regarding the beating her father gave her on her 18th birthday to let her know that even though she was now an adult, he was still the boss.
In Florida, a man fatally shot his 11-year-old daughter and then killed himself when a SWAT team stormed his home after his estranged wife called 911 from a neighbor’s house. The 30-year-old man, who was facing domestic violence charges, and his 27-year-old wife, were separated and divorcing. A restraining order had previously been issued against the husband due to battery; he had not yet gone to trial.
A few domestic violence cases make the news. But there are tens of thousands of husbands and wives who are being abused who suffer that abuse alone, living in fear every day of their life.
Domestic violence doesn’t just happen within the lower class or a certain ethnic group or to “bad” people. Domestic abuse and violence happens everywhere. You may be the victim of an abusive spouse, or you may be the abuser.
There is no one answer as to why a relationship that should be loving is abusive instead. There is no one answer as to why a person remains in an abusive relationship.
Abuse takes many forms, and it has many faces. Gender does not determine who will be the abuser and who will be the abused. Women are just as capable of causing abuse as are men.
Why would someone stay in an abusive and violent relationship? Fear? A feeling of unworthiness? Believing the abuse is deserved? Hoping the abuser will change? Believing this is the way love is?
Domestic violence is never appropriate or deserved, under any circumstances!