Circle, Circle, Circle

“Should I get a divorce?” I asked the therapist. We’d been talking for nearly an hour and I was still torn. No one in my family had ever split up, no one in my family knew my marriage was falling apart.

It was also true no one in my family knew about Daniel’s drinking, the never-ending fights, the violence. Not even my best friends knew what was going on.

Now I was sitting in a therapist’s office, discussing the unbelievable.

“Let me draw you a picture,” she said. Taking a black felt pen, she drew a circle. Inside, she drew a tiny bottle. “That’s alcohol, your husband’s one true love.”

Then she drew a large circle around the smaller one. “That’s your husband, revolving around his one true love. Whether he’s drinking or not, he’s always
thinking about his alcohol, there’s little room for anything else.”

She looked at me. I stared at the picture, then into her brown eyes.
“What about me?” I asked.

Now she drew a third circle, neatly trapping the first two circles inside.

“This is you, revolving around your husband, revolving around the alcohol. This is you, revolving around the love you want to have, but can’t, because he is not free to love you.

“No matter how long you stay, how hard you try, how much you love him, your husband will always revolve around the alcohol. Even if he stops drinking, he’ll always think about that last time, the next time, the ‘if only’ time.”

“What should I do?” I asked in a whispery voice. Close to tears I asked, louder: “Just tell me what to do.”

Dr. Angela sat back in her chair. “Have you ever heard of an intervention?”

I shook my head.

She explained: Family, friends, boss, co-worker, me, others —anyone, everyone— corralling Daniel into a corner, telling him he needs help, he needs to quit drinking, he needs to be better to himself, better to me. And at the end of it all, a treatment program, maybe in-house, if he can’t stop on his own.

“What the f*** are you talking about!” I bellowed. “You’re telling me, after everything I have been through and – I told you, I told you what he’s like, what he has done, can’t you see what he will DO to me once he gets back, oh my god are you crazy? An intervention! Oh my God, no!” I smacked the table, crumpled that piece of paper. Now I was standing, leaning over her.

“You think I should ride in on some white horse and rescue him? WHO THE F*** is going to rescue me? Where is MY white horse? Where is MY white knight? How come I always have to be there for him, to do for him, goddamitt, WHO is going to DO FOR ME?”

Dr. Angela draped her warm hands over my balled fists. She gave them a squeeze and looked directly into my eyes.

“I guess you’re getting a divorce.”

I left my ex December 1993. Those words, that moment, still electrify me to this day. She led me straight to the painful—and critical—conclusion abused women hate to face: We are the agents of our rescue.

by Susan Rich, (c)2014 All Rights Reserved

Epiphany

I was folding his socks in the basement.

The washer gurgled, the dryer hummed. The noise was a rumbling freight train, a caboose trembling on the tracks.

I had a stack of his clean socks and was mechanically matching and rolling one into the other. He hated that. Said I should line them up neatly, one atop the other, toes touching, leg bands even, and fold it in thirds, leg band to middle, toe to middle. Just like his mom did. He liked how his mom did things.

I’m the one doing the job, my mind ground out in reply to his endless criticisms. I didn’t speak the words. He wasn’t listening and I’d already learned not to talk when he drank.

He was sitting on the couch, holding a can of beer. There was a pile of empties stacked neatly in the corner. The sour stink of Old Milwaukee’s Best fouled the sweet scent of clean sheets.

I was folding, rolling his socks.

The washer gurgled, the dryer hummed.

We’d moved into the house not three months before. I was already tired of the large rooms, manicured yard, the never-ending housework. I was tired of him, tired of myself, and I knew it.

Trapped, I’d trapped myself.

The pile of socks grew. White round balls. He frowned at them.
I wish you wouldn’t do them that way.

I threw a sock ball at him.
Here. You can do it yourself.

He shook his head. Frowned. Swapped an empty can of beer for a full one; the pop-top cracked and hissed. He sipped.
You don’t have it so bad. Lots of girls would be happy to have a husband like me. No one will ever treat you the way I do.
He sat, threw the sock ball back at me. Do it right, he said.

I was folding his socks in the basement. I stopped. My breath stopped.

The washer gurgled; the dryer hummed.

I looked down at my hands, hands holding a white tube sock.
I put the sock down.
I looked at him and spoke to the inside of my head, to my invisible ears and shaking heart.

I can treat myself better. I can treat myself better.
I can treat myself better than you treat me and I can treat myself better than anyone I will ever meet.
I can treat myself better and I deserve to be treated better and I will learn how to treat myself better.
I want to be treated better.
If I live alone I will be treated better.
If I never have another love I will be treated better.
I can be treated better.
I want to be treated better.
I deserve it.

The washer drained; the dryer clicked off. The room grew quiet.

I finished folding his socks.

by Susan Rich, (c)2014 All Rights Reserved