A Story of Strength

Megan Stone facilitated an honest discussion about verbal abuse at the Women’s Center Brown Bag Lunch, “Verbal Abuse: So, I haven’t been hit?” on April 18^th.

Stone told graduate students about her relationship with a man during college that began pleasantly, but eventually turned verbally abusive. Susanne B. Dietzel, the Women’s Center Director spoke occasionally, providing encouragement for Stone as well as information on why abuse occurs.

“I was a softball player and he was a baseball player . . . it was perfect he swept me off my feet,” Stone described the beginning of the relationship. But after the honeymoon period, little by little her boyfriend began to plant negative seeds in her head that controlled her actions.

Skirt = Slut???

He would repeatedly call her an alcoholic and a slut. “He kept calling me that because I liked to go out with my friends . . . I knew I wasn’t but after him saying it over and over again, sometimes you look in the mirror and you’re like am I,” Stone said. He trained her to think that only sluts wore skirts and went to the bar.

Shortly after she ended the relationship she did go to the bar in a skirt with her friends. But because of the power he had over her, she became uncomfortably conscious of where she was and what she was wearing. “I was completely shaking in fear . . . it was trained in my mind,” she said.

Why did she stay? She stayed because she wanted to help him. She felt it was her duty to help him find the right path. Also she felt that deep down he was a good person and so was she. It was not until she picked up a pamphlet that discussed the signs of an unhealthy relationship, that she realized she was being verbally abused. At that point she knew she had to get out of the relationship.

Susanne Dietzel explained that women are socialized to stay in a relationship and to help men with their problems, sometimes neglecting themselves. So a woman needs to “deprogram [herself] and actually say I need to take care of myself, it is not my job to take care of him,” Dietzel said.

Stone outlined signs of abuse, relating the events in her relationship as examples.

Looking back, she sees how he slowly isolated her from her family and friends. He made her feel that her family was the enemy and he was the only one who truly understood her. She began to make him the priority of her life.

He would also display his temper to intimidate her. One time they got in a fight and he punched the wall so hard that it left a mark. The message sent was clear to her —“you’re next.” Later in the relationship he would swing at her.

She confessed that she eventually became jealous. “I became this person I did not even know who I was anymore,” she said.

He became so good at lying that she did not know who or what to believe. He had a wonderful way of knowing what to say to persuade her.

Anytime they had a fight, he would always try to keep her in the relationship. “It was all about sucking me back in,” she said. Sometimes he would come crying back to her, begging her to stay with him. He even went so far as to give her a promise ring to make her stay.

Love is blind. She did not realize that in the relationship she had lost herself to him. Once the reality of the relations became clear to her, she feared leaving the relationship. She had lost her friends, and her emotions were in the palm of his hand.

“There is a sadness and depression factor. You really don’t have your emotions. He had everything,” she described how she contemplated what would happen to her once she left the relationship.

In order to get out of the relationship you really have to cut off all ties. Because her Ex kept trying to come back into her life she had to take steps to ensure he could not contact her, such as changing phone numbers.

People who attended asked Megan if she thought he would have changed. No, she said he would not have changed.

It was brave of her to discuss her relationship and to realize that her life is better without the relationship. “If I would have stayed with him, he would have ruined my life,” she said.

For more information on the Women’s Center at Ohio University visit their Web site:
http://www.ohio.edu/womenscenter/