Psychological Abuse Is A Plush Leather Recliner.
You eventually find the cold comfort.
“What’s stopping you now?”, I ask her stoically.
“I don’t know!”, She evades her gaze, while talking to me. There’s no one in the room. Except both of us. I am trying to keep my tone whisper-like, so that her husband doesn’t eavesdrop. He is sleeping in an adjacent room. And she doesn’t wants her husband to overhear.
“Tell me! What’s stopping you now?”, I try to color my voice with concern, may be she may open up.
“I don’t know”, I can feel her sore voice filled with irritation, “I DON’T KNOW”.
I gulp down a lungful of air. But my heart goes out for my closest friend. We’ve been best of friends since my heart grasped the meaning of friendship. A rebellious girl, she got into an early marriage and ended up being abused for being what she was.
Strong headed as she was, her first reaction to the abuse from her husband was to rebel. In return she got thrashed mentally and physically. But the most was emotionally.
South Asian communities are close knit patriarchy, where a woman is cornered, tongue-whipped and flogged on walking out of a marriage, even today. Especially if she comes from pseudo-literate families.
Also due to lack of an infrastructure that supports a single woman in professional and personal grounds, it deters many woman like her to walk past the marriage.
After almost two decades into a psychological abusive relationship she finds herself glued. Even now when her grown up kids stand by her side, she finds it illogical to move out. Initially when everything was against her she fought back like an injured cat. Now she’s made peace. Or at least she feels so.
And the reason for staying into it is always “I don’t know why I still want to be him”.
Many time she finds herself damp and adulterated with reasons like, “ Now at this age? I will have to answer the society! I am tired. I am done. I don’t want to bashed and roasted by the society for separating at this age”
Or she even manipulates herself by saying, “He’s getting better. He use to beat me, now he’s stopped doing that. He is burdened with his business you know. On who else will he empty his frustrations if not me?”
****
Yes! He thrashed her but only when instigated, otherwise he is a very loving family man.
Yes! He hammers his ideas into her head for every decision she makes, because he thinks she has brains in her ankles.
No wait, it’s him who concludes every decision for her. Not because he wants to take the lead, but because she has lost all the capabilities on decision making. Even if that decision is as trivial as selecting a restaurant for dinner.
And most importantly, he’s always a call away when she’s sick. He nurses her like a baby.
“Aren’t these changes enough to keep the relationship going” She tells herself without conviction.
I know wading through midlife her luxuries weigh more than abuses in the silent corner and bustling streets both. But he never fails to beg an apology after dehumanizing her.
Even his apology directly depends on the degree of abuse. If she is tongue lashed with some poisonous humiliation the apology comes with a kiss on a forehead and a crushing hug. She says that pat on her head is as soothing as general anesthesia that restricts her to feel the pain of the a cuss words and demeaning, well-aimed slaps.
Initially when she wanted to break free from the marriage she struggled alone. With the medicine bills, and home, and school fees. It’s with the most of the women here. Finding a job with your given educational background, raising the kids while managing home and job is a herculean task.
However silly it might sound, here there is no system for baby-sitting. Not structure where a single mother can get a job conducive to her time-availability. The relatives and neighbors and extended family have all the rights reserved to instruct the single woman to be in her best virtues.
Unlike western culture, south Asian communities have erected a strict patriarchy prevails in all walks of life. Either parental home or marital home, if you miss the two, you are estranged and stray.
Now my friend tells me she doesn’t want to raise her daughter in such name- calling environment. Because they say a daughter raised by a single mother is of easy virtues and indecent. She was worried what if her daughter will slut shamed for coming from a single mother.
But now her kids are grown up and push her to move, yet she finds it hard.
May be because now that plush leather seat of her marriage allows her to take abuse in doses like bitter pills. Which in return gives her a house, financial support and a label of ‘dignified high society wife’. However the most she gets is a foggy vision and perpetual dissatisfaction of living someone else’s life.
