In 1985, if I had followed through with my own plan to drive my car over a hillside, or connect a hose from the tailpipe to the driver’s window, I could have been in jail, too—had I survived either plan.
Fortunately, I never followed through with what would have been the easy way out, from rearing three children ages four and younger, while seven-months-pregnant with my fourth child. I wasn’t a single parent, but I felt like one at the time. I know and understand the stress and frustration that comes from single-handedly trying to care for the needs of toddlers who can’t do everything for themselves. I know what it feels like to be criticized for what you are doing, even as your inner voice criticizes you more than anyone else could.
I’m not sure if that’s what sent Duley over the edge when she killed her two sons, but I have to admit I feel her pain. Not having taken that final step, though, I must also admit I don’t know how she feels now. I can imagine but, and I thank God for this every single day of my life, I never had to feel the pain or regret that comes from a single desperate action.
There are plenty of women, other mothers who have also walked in Duley’s shoes, who have, though. They sit in prison cells around the country, trying to mend their hearts and their minds, after taking their children’s lives. Abigail Arnold, who counsels these women from Coffee Creek Correctional Center in Oregon, told me their grief is overwhelming, and their guilt cannot be measured.
Arnold was kind enough to endorse my upcoming memoir, Sister of Silence, back in 2008 when she learned its topic matter relates to the women she helps. This is part of what she said: “Sister of Silence shows every woman who reads it that she is not alone, that all over the country she has sisters in her pain and fear and shame. For professionals, it offers precious insight into an achingly common theme in their clients’ lives. I look forward to using Daleen’ story as an inspiration to my clients, to show that they matter and that what they’ve survived isn’t their fault. With her gritty honesty and compelling style, Daleen has given my women a way to say, “If she made it, I can, too.”
I’d like to think that whatever happens to Duley, she might end up reading my memoir one day. Maybe it will help her see, like Abigail said, that she isn’t alone.
NOTE: Sister of Silence is coming soon to a bookstore near you. Prepublication orders are being taken now. If you are interested in buying a copy, please complete the information to the right of this article.
]]>That will be my next post: Why is it necessary to have five to seven previews (and now, a few commercials) which take up from 15-25 minutes and waste my time? Am I the only person who doesn’t mind showing up “late” these days, knowing that by the time I park the car, buy a ticket, get some popcorn and a soda, and feel my way to a seat in the darkened theatre, the main feature still will not have begun playing?
My digression is leftover from the commercial that played today, a commercial that helped combine not a few years of annoyance and downright frustration together, so that I finally have to speak up and say something. And this is it:
Does anyone even have body odor anymore? How would we know if they did? Is there a single cook left in a kitchen anywhere in this country who doesn’t mind the smell of garlic? Or how about the fragrance of wet dog, old tennis shoes and musty books? My personal favorite scent is coffee a la fried bacon and eggs, but who knows what that smells like these days.
And do you know why? It’s because someone—no, everyone—has one of those irritating deodorizers plugged into the outlet in their kitchen, and their bathroom, and their living room. Along with every other room in the house.
In the Febreze commercial that played today, some really neat things were taking place in the background, which the characters in the foreground were oblivious to. That’s because their attention was caught and held by what is apparently the newest plug-in deodorizer on the market: it captivated them in such a way that the audience was led to believe the characters were experiencing some kind of out-of-body (or a really good drug) experience. Not that they were simply so overwhelmed by a plug-in deodorizer that they couldn’t control themselves.
If I had been in the room where the plug-in thingy was, I wouldn’t be able to control myself, either. That’s because I’m a member of the population that has allergies to such chemicals. I’ve had them since 1988, and just when I think there couldn’t possibly be another product on the market to make my suffering any worse, along comes those stupid plug-ins, designed to hide, mask and cover up every natural odor known to man.
Personally, I’ll take the smell of sweat, rotten broccoli or even dirty diapers any day—because these things are not chemicals that cause illness, and those odors don’t excite my olfactory senses, making my nose run, causing me to cough, or develop phlegm that lasts for hours, if not days. And then, if I don’t take enough medicine (Mind you, that’s at least three: an antihistamine, a decongestant and a nasal spray.), I can end up with a sinus infection that has knocked me on my derriere and, in the past, made me a captive to corporate sick days.
As someone with allergies, I don’t go near the chemical aisle in the supermarket, but if I must, I hold my breath and make a mad dash for whatever item I need, and then just as quickly run out again. By the time I take my next breath, I feel like I might just pass out—which is why I save the chemical aisle for another family member. (Or skip it completely and use vinegar for my household cleaning.)
As someone with allergies, I have had to force myself to ask friends and family not to wear cologne, aftershave, perfume or scented hair products. And at my last job, a fellow coworker stripped her personal hygiene cabinet of everything she thought could be the culprit, but I still continued to sneeze around her. Finally, while sitting in a staff meeting one day, I realized what it was: her clothing! She was using a detergent known for its strong-arm scent. (Truth be told, I actually miss wearing perfume, and I’ve had to use fragrance-free everything for the last two decades.)
Once in a blue moon, I have found a scented product I can use. This has happened maybe 10 times, tops. But when it happens, it’s usually because the product is natural—not man-made. Even then, I’m very cautious, because for some reason, the natural floral fragrances can cause an allergic reaction, too.
But I cannot imagine that any company in the near future is going to create a deodorizer thingy that is unscented, or which doesn’t send me into a coughing attack. So until they do, I can only appeal to everyone who uses the things: When was the last time you actually got a whiff of your beloved’s underarm and was it really that bad? Or was the fragrance wafting from the electric candle so powerful, you wouldn’t know?
Tell me, is it too much to ask to be able to smell burnt cookies and Fido’s wet fur, instead?
I say this because during the last few years, the world of publishing has been turned upside down, as e-books, the Kindle and now the iPad have come onto the scene, competing for a major share of the book market. Today that’s happening more and more, making it easier for writers everywhere (like me!) to self-publish their wares. The time for mass-producing your own book and then selling it online has never been better, thanks to sites like Amazon.com.
Sister of Silence has undergone changes, too. Along the way, a New York City literary agent I met while attending a writer’s conference suggested I collaborate with a well-respected editor. That led to an almost totally different book, one that told not just my personal story, but also looked at society in general. Now, two years later, I have stripped the narrative nonfiction sections from Sister of Silence so it’s more in keeping with what a memoir should be.
Most recently, I hired an artist to design the book’s cover. That’s a huge step, and one I’ve been considering for quite awhile. Of course, I once imagined someone from Random House, Scribner or the like would offer me the services of one of their in-house artists, and then we would squabble over whether it was the perfect cover for my book.
With Megan, that wasn’t necessary, and made things much easier. Right now, we’re ironing out the fine details. She’s really gifted and knew what to draw immediately, once I told her the idea I’ve had in my mind’s eye. I’m so excited about this incredible artwork, I can’t wait to post it here for my waiting readers!
Tentatively, I want to complete the final manuscript revisions so it’s ready to ship to a printer by mid-June. In the meantime, we’ll publish the first few pages soon, so please check back often. Sister of Silence will be here before you know it!
As one newspaper after another makes its final print run, and reporters walk away wondering what to do next, a sad fact escapes the masses: If investigative journalism, that traditional method of gathering hard news, weighing what’s real with what isn’t and then turning what’s left into a story that readers can actually understand, goes the way of the dinosaur, we will take a giant step backward.
Especially is this true when it comes to crimes against women. Instead of it being a sometimes thing, victims of rape and domestic violence will then regularly get the cold shoulder when it comes to the time law enforcement will invest to
investigate these crimes, and the energy prosecutors will use to take such cases to trial.
In 1998 I wrote a two-part series for The Dominion Post about news tools available to police officers, including $2,000 camcorders they carry around with them to make their jobs easier—and make prosecution of such crimes more successful. (That article is no longer available online, but a similar one written at the same time, can be read here.)
Eleven years later, I have learned that these expensive tools aren’t, in many cases, even being used. A recent case I know about shows the damage that comes from what can only amount to laziness: a woman was assaulted to the point of needing surgery, she called 911, the police showed up—but the officer didn’t investigate.
Didn’t use his camera. Didn’t take notes. Didn’t ask if she was injured or arrest her batterer.
Maybe that’s because, as a recent West Virginia prosecutor told me, police officers’ attitudes basically haven’t changed. While acknowledging that most cops do a good job, he said they still don’t like investigating domestic violence cases. In fact, he added, if not for the law requiring them to do so, they would do what they used to, before such laws were enacted—many officers would just ignore them completely.
I’m not sure what happens when it’s a matter of rape, since that’s a crime that can be even trickier. But I do know this: some prosecutors won’t even take a rape case if the woman has been drinking. Here at West Virginia University, where more than 700 campus rapes occur a year, if any of those cases involve a female student who imbibed alcohol, she may as well not even report the rape.
Knowing how hard it is for a woman to report rape and domestic violence, I can’t help but wonder where we will be, down the road, when newspapers are gone and no one’s left to dig around to find stories like these.
Sadly, there are already too many of them, even with real journalists still at the helm of many daily newspapers. But that’s changing. What then?
When investigative reporters clean out their desks and don’t receive a paycheck for digging up the dirt on police and prosecutors, it’s a safe assumption that these crimes against women will be assigned even less importance than they are now.
And today, in 2009, that’s far too little, as it is.
]]>
That’s a question I’ve wondered about more times than I count: Rihanna has apparently done it (in the past) with Chris Brown, just as Whitney Houston did with ex-husband Bobby—that other infamous Brown. Ditto for Tina Turner, whose escape took 16 years, two more than Houston's own.
I’ve learned the answer to that question, having returned to the scene myself, many times. But it has nothing to do with wanting to be slapped, punched or shoved around. Nor is it because women like me are gluttons for punishment—though God knows we’ve all experienced doubt and self-blame, questioning whether such gluttony might not be at the root of our need to return.
I don't know a single woman who likes being battered, including myself. But having been a police reporter, I do know it’s not just criminals who return to the scene of a crime: so do victims, showing a strong emotional bond that onlookers can't see and don't understand.
The psychology of returning to a crime scene is different in these cases. For women who have been abused, the desire to regain the upper hand, to walk away with a different ending—on our own terms—is quite strong.
So what’s wrong with that? Well nothing really, except … it rarely happens. Because the truth is, you go back, you get sucked into your bad boy’s cycle, and before you know it, you’re more than bruised and cut. Instead, you’re laying on a cold metal slab that’s moving you into a long cylindrical container used for diagnostic purposes—because, while X-rays can show broken bones, they can’t show serious and sometimes permanent muscle damage. But MRIs and CAT scans can and do.
The cycle of abuse involves the honeymoon phase, which might include flowers, candy or a romantic card over a candlelit meal and promises that it won’t happen again. Worse, it includes all that EXCEPT the promise: Bad-boy-turned-good denies the violence happened at all, or implies, insinuates or outright accuses it of being YOUR fault.
Rihanna is fortunate: she’s still alive. Many, many women, are not. Hopefully she’s learned the lesson other women before her have, and hopefully, it won’t take her several years, like it has so many of her sisters.
So Rihanna, please, please, PLEASE, trust your own reality and listen to your father. Then take a line from one of your hit songs, “Take a Bow,” and don’t forget this is the reality for most batterers: “Don’t tell me you’re sorry ‘cause you’re not … you’re only sorry you got caught.”
I know this because I turned twenty-one in August 1984, and gave birth to my fourth child eight months later. But shortly before that fourth and final birth, I nearly went crazy from the intense pressure I felt—and the enormous responsibility I knew was mine, to provide for every need of my four children. Having been depressed for years, I nearly took our lives: my three daughters, my own, and my unborn son.
I wasn’t a single mother in the normal sense of the word—but from early 1980, when I conceived my first child, until April 1985, when I gave birth to my last—I certainly felt like one. If my coal miner husband wasn’t working or searching for work, he was volunteering at our local fire department. A self-described “workaholic,” he was always busy doing something that took him away from home.
So the full-time job of rearing our four children fell to me. When my son Zach was born, his sisters were ages four, almost three, and 21-months old. I was still breastfeeding my youngest daughter. I turned twenty-two a few months later, but not before I was sterilized. Just as the decision to have four children in rapid-fire succession had not been mine, neither was giving up my procreative powers. It was one of the most difficult and emotionally devastating things I have ever done—but today I am convinced it was the only thing that saved my life.
More important, it saved the lives of my children.
My memoir, Sister Of Silence, tells about what life was like for me then, as well as why single parenting is so dangerous. I’m hoping to soon be able to provide a copy for the many interested readers who have requested one. Until then, let me say that all the hue and cry over Nadya Suleman’s decision to give birth to 14 children in less than 10 years is missing the mark. Just because Suleman’s mental thought processes may be in question, does not mean her children should suffer.
I feel sorry for Nadya, and she has my sympathy. (Just as I do her mother, Angela Suleman, who is bearing much of the burden of rearing these children.) Even more, both women have my empathy. I know how daunting—deadly even—it can be to try to bathe, feed, clothe, teach and train only four children under the age of five, so my heart goes out to the Suleman family. But this is not about the mother—this is about the babies who had no choice in the matter, who were born, are alive, and must grow to adulthood under less than favorable circumstances.
I used to pray for my children to become happy, healthy adults who also were productive members of society. But because I was so outnumbered, I feared I had too little love to give them, to guarantee that would happen. As it turns out, my four have surpassed my wildest dreams, in the wonderful adults they have become. They are caring and compassionate and a credit to their community. But it was “touch and go” for many years, and the results of being reared by a mother who wasn’t diagnosed with major depression until 1991 made all our lives, at times, a living hell.
That’s my biggest fear for the Suleman brood. They cannot escape who their mother is or the decisions she made that brought them into the world, just as they can’t escape the genetics that determined their sex, their eye color and their bone structure. What they can escape is what my children didn’t: living with a mother who was frazzled beyond belief because she had an inadequate support system, yet who tried her hardest to keep up the pretense that life was good, that she could handle anything—and her children were doing just fine.
How can the Suleman children escape what mine didn’t? Quite easily, you see. Instead of casting blame or calling names, do what’s right by the children. Help them in whatever way they need it: financially, emotionally, psychologically and socially. The first step in doing this is to have her fertility doctor shell out a huge amount of cash for the eight new lives he’s helped bring into this world—and the six other mouths waiting at home, who now have less financially and every other which way, as a result. Then the rest of us can get in line behind him.
But most important is this final piece of advice: Do not leave the children alone with their mother and grandmother. Regardless of the circumstances, but because of the children who had no say in the matter, these two women need a small army and round-the-clock support. They will for several years, until the entire family has gotten beyond the danger zone that comes from the deadly mix that has created the Suleman 14.
]]>One of my favorite family photos shows my father standing in an open doorway with about four feet of snow piled up behind him. He’s wearing a $50 insulated, fur-trimmed parka that he paid for with his own money while working on the Defense Early Warning system in Tanana, Alaska, during the late 1950s and early 1960s.
Dad worked as an electronics engineer for the military on its DEW line, the enormous radar network that ran along the 69th parallel between Alaska and Greenland. During the Cold War, the DEW line was supposed to give early warning in the event the Soviet Union tried to bomb the United States. Dad loved Alaska, and regaled me throughout my childhood both with stories of his adventures up north and slides showing his life there.
Back then $50 was quite a price tag. But Dad was working outside in the Alaskan wilderness, and he had to have something that would keep him warm. But getting back to the other jacket: who pays $2,500 for the one Governor Sarah Palin wore while being introduced to the American public? Evidently we, the taxpayers, do. The single comment that jumped out at me about ShoppingGate , among many others, in yesterday’s The Washingon Post, was that of Gretta Monahan. She said:
“Everything is relative … Sarah Palin's goal is to be the vice president of the United States and that's a pretty damned big job. The better your image is, the better people will receive you.”
Yes, Greta, everything is relative. So the $150,000 shopping spree Governor Palin and Company went on (hubby Todd also benefited, as did other Palin family members) is relative to the American people’s current plight: they are broke, unemployed and homeless.
Not the homelessness of yesterday that forced one to live in a car or under a bridge; this is the new homelessness, brought on by greed like that from executives of American International Group, Inc. According to Bloomberg, they spent “$440,000 last month at the St. Regis resort in Monarch Beach .” Apparently, they did that about the same time they asked the federal government for a $85 billion bailout … from their greed-induced financial collapse.
What, if anything, can be learned from this? Only that since September 19 some greed remains undiminished. That’s when Wall Street came tumbling down faster than Humpty Dumpty, only to be followed by Wall Streets in foreign countries around the world. What on earth is a woman who calls herself a hockey mom just like any other doing with such exorbitant tastes, when so many citizens aren’t able to make their house payment—let alone go shopping at Neiman Marcus?
And no, I’m not a supporter of Senator Barack Obama. As far as I’m concerned, if he can afford to pay $1,500 for a two-piece suit that’s fine. It’s his money, to use as he sees fit. But paying that price out of your own pocket is far different from what Governor Palin has done, by having the Republican National Convention pick up her shopping tab.
As with many professional journalists, I don’t vote. I remain neutral with regard to politics and politicians because I can do my job better that way. I happen to believe that objectivity is still a cornerstone of journalism, so what better way to remain objective than to not take sides?
But I am an American citizen who lives in a house the bank foreclosed on about two months ago. It was only due to the kindness of a family friend that we are still living there, and the reason why the public auction slated for August 28 was cancelled at the last minute.
I have never been a spendthrift or a clothes horse, so I can honestly say my spending didn’t lead us into this position. Rather, my husband’s first wife died after fighting a 10-year battle with breast cancer, leaving him a mountain of unpaid medical bills. When we married, he continued to run the small business that had been in his family since the 1940s. He gave to the handful of employees who needed his help. If they had an emergency, he gave them an advance on their paycheck; if they needed to borrow his heavy equipment, he loaned it without charging them a penny, and if they did a great day’s work, he bought beer and pizza for them at the end of a long hard week. And we helped our respective six children financially, when they were in a pinch.
In the meantime, his son, a boilermaker, was tragically killed when he fell from a power plant. That was a year ago. Since then, my husband has had to have a quadruple bypass and I needed back surgery so I could continue to work, earning less than $27,000 a year. Together, our medical bills are out of sight.
So Gretta, who works as a fashion advisor to Rachel Ray, will just have to forgive me when I say I have no sympathy for people who equate price tags with character.
]]>But I would direct those words to another Joe: Governor Joe Manchin, who is demanding a Hollywood apology for discrediting the state and its residents by inserting a racially-charged scene between WVU fans and the Syracuse team in the movie, “The Express.” In particular, a hateful audience portrayed as WVU fans in the movie called the black Orangemen “coons” and that other word, the “N” word, which I personally find outrageous and offensive.
Governor Manchin told Universal Studios it was “an unfair portrayal of West Virginians.” I like the governor but with all due respect, I think he’s wrong. That’s because I’ve done some informal polling since I learned about Manchin’s protests. Plus, I’ve seen racism here firsthand.
]]> The Dominion Post story quoting Manchin appeared in the Saturday, Oct. 11, 2008 issue. That night, I attended a live music show in Kingwood, W.Va., where I met another white woman who takes exception to the Governor’s claims. Basically, this woman said it doesn’t help our state to ignore the racism that’s part of our history—and which still exists. In essence, she said Governor Manchin would be doing everyone a favor if he would admit there’s a problem and then take steps to fight it.Because I’ve seen and heard racism throughout my life, I’d have to agree. My father was prejudiced, but my mother wasn’t. He was born and bred in Jackson County, W.Va., while she was a California girl. Maybe that’s the difference; maybe not. And even with all his prejudicial flaws, Dad did like and respect some blacks, including the family friends of my mother’s, who visited us in the late 1970s. They stayed with us for a weekend when they were considering moving here.
However, after touring our small town, they decided our part of the Mountain State wasn’t right for them. (They lived in Berkeley County, which, being next door to Washington, D.C., had a large black population.) Maybe that’s because they sensed the racism all around us—Preston County had very few blacks, and most of them then lived in one small neighborhood, on the other side of the tracks. (I kid you not.)
This was the same family who opened up their home to me when my parents moved to Amman, Jordan, so I could finish summer school. Their two sons were close to my own age, and treated me with nothing less than dignity and respect, as if I was a sister to them. I can’t imagine them treating me like the white “family” treated Megan Williams, a young black woman who in 2007 had the misfortune of moving into that family’s West Virginia home.
Williams, for anyone living under a rock, is the young black woman who was kidnapped, raped, tortured and otherwise assaulted by six West Virginians. Police discovered her at a Logan County mobile home Sept. 8, 2007. In addition to being confined under a sink during part of her ordeal, Williams “was sodomized with a stick and a noose was tied around her neck for lengthy periods.”
My black friends later came to visit my children and me sometime during 1994. The younger son married a white girl, and I’ve never forgotten what happened while we were standing in line at a local grocery store. A white man and his wife were watching us when he directed some blatant and rude racial comment at my friends. I wanted to smack him, but doing so would have only brought me down to his level. My friends, by comparison, weren’t righteously indignant; they took it in stride and refused to allow his ignorance to spoil what was an otherwise beautiful day.
I’m not sure if that was before or after the cross burning that took place in Newburg, a mile from where I grew up. It was set aflame on the front lawn of a local couple. I grew up with the girl; her "crime" was in marrying a black man. Until that moment, I largely believed such things were the stuff of Hollywood movies. Later, I heard about other crosses being burned in our rural county. And recently, someone told me the Ku Klux Klan still holds meetings up in the neighboring mountains not far from here.
Even more alarming, several months ago a high-powered executive told me she was supporting Senator Hillary Clinton for president, because there was no way West Virginia men would elect a black man. She said this after hearing a group of men talking about their decision to support Clinton. More recently, one of my daughters heard people in our region say Senator Barak Obama will be assassinated if he becomes president.
As disturbing as that is, it’s even more so when I realize the people my daughter speaks of aren’t alone: Other people have said the same thing. If that’s not racism, I don’t know what is.
More recently, while acting in the capacity of a paid journalist, a man said the “N” word, speaking derogatorily of blacks in general. I was offended not only that such attitudes still exist, but also because people still voice them. Which goes to show these racial attitudes are strongly entrenched.
So my apologies to Governor Manchin and Dick Easterly, the Syracuse quarterback who played with Heisman winner Ernie Davis. In an interview with West Virginia Public Radio, Easterly said, “there’s no question in the 50s and 60s throughout the country there was racial tension … all over.”
Racism is not a thing of the past; it’s still alive and well, as the above experiences reveal. That being said, it might be good to remember that no Hollywood movie is based totally in fact. Sometimes scenes are fabricated to show the flavor of a person, a locale, or an idea. I’d have to say that the fictional scene depicting West Virginia as a racist state may have come from what happened to Megan Williams.
The violence she experienced has been called “one of the worst hate crimes in United States history.” In comparison, the fictional WVU fans make our state look far better than what Megan endured. (Her experience led not just to a march in Charleston-the state Human Rights Commission also traveled to Logan County to hear other residents complain about what they believe to be prejudicial treatment in that area of the state.)
Now back to my informal poll: I went to see “The Express,” and questioned a few blacks along the way. I asked a group of college guys I passed if they had experienced racism in West Virginia. “No, not like that (as portrayed in the movie),” they said. Then they said, “It’s a lot worse in Virginia, or the Carolinas.”
I guess I should be happy that the Mountain State is somewhat better than our sister state, but I’m not. And just what does “not like that” mean? I think a black woman working for a security firm got it right. “It’s not obvious, it’s more subtle. But it’s here. You can see it by the way people act when you pass by them,” she said.
Apparently, the farther south you go, the worse it gets, and the more blatant it becomes. But here in West Virginia, it’s a little different. Here, racism isn’t usually about cross burnings or raping black women. Instead it’s subtle. The truth is that few people here will come right out and call a black person the “N” word to their face, but they sure will talk about it with their white friends and family.
I love West Virginia; it's a beautiful state with a rich history and strong, tenacious people who can be as tender as they are tough. Yet denying that racism happens here does nothing. Not for our state, or for anybody who has been its victim. And it's about as effective as saying sexual abuse and domestic violence (two other components in Megan's experience ) don't happen here in Almost Heaven.
Sadly, the state is steeped in denial. It's one of the things we do best.
While it was undeniably tragic to learn about the California family who died last weekend, as a result of job loss and related economic problems, it wasn’t unexpected. What troubles me even more, though, is the knowledge that with more than 150,000 jobs lost in September alone, more murder-suicides will follow.
Ever since September 19, I’ve been watching the world scene wondering when such reports would begin flowing in: mothers killing children, fathers killing families, or people killing themselves. I can’t speak for anyone else, but I know I can’t be the only person in America who’s noticed a subtle shift in society’s stress level.
I think it began several years ago—or maybe I just started looking for it then—when customers began buying their fast food on credit. Places like McDonald’s or Wendy’s didn’t always take credit cards; that’s a fairly recent change in this country. And I’ve worried that paying later for food you eat now was the tipping point for the credit crisis we now find ourselves in. After all, credit cards have typically been used for people’s wants, not their needs.
So when the credit trend added food, a basic necessity and most definitely not a want, to its list of “must haves,” I became concerned. (Yes, the argument could be made that people who buy their meals, and those of their families, in the drive-through lane, are paying for a “want,” instead of a “need.” And I’d be the first to agree. But at the same time, how many people find themselves at the mercy of a schedule that leaves them little time to sleep, much less eat—or cook—a family meal? I’ve never paid for fast food with a credit card, but I have faced days where the amount of money in my purse is larger than the amount of time left in my day.)
Maybe that’s why I began watching people I passed in the supermarket aisle, at the cash register, or while pumping their fuel. That’s when I noticed something different: They weren’t talking, they weren’t smiling, and they seemed distracted. In fact, where I once found myself talking to other shoppers, more and more as of late, I’ve found myself wondering why everyone was so stressed and introspective.
This failure to connect with other people isn’t a new trend that began with the recent financial meltdown; I’ve been seeing it for the last few years, if not longer. And it’s not just the absence of friendly, even curious, interchange that bothers me; it is knowing that introspection leads to isolation, which leads to … suicide, filicide and stories like the one coming out of Los Angeles.
Psychologists are speaking out now, telling us to help keep each other safe, by being involved with each other; by reaching out to help family and friends in crisis; by intervening when necessary. I feel this is so important that I address it on two levels in my book, Sister Of Silence. First, from the personal perspective, and second, from the “here’s what we can do to help” perspective. So I add my voice to those mental health experts, and implore anyone—neighbor, teacher, coworker, family member or friend—who can help, to do so. And do so now! Don’t think about it, don’t second-guess yourself, and don’t wonder if you’ll look stupid, or risk losing a good relationship. Because all of those things might happen. But they might not, too. And I can promise you that even if they do, at some point, somewhere down the road, the person or people you helped will thank you. If you don’t help them first, though, they may never get that chance.
If you want to learn why men who lose their jobs are more likely to turn to violence, see my article about unemployment and domestic violence. With no sign of improvement in sight, the current economic climate makes it imperative we all keep our eyes open, alert to the chance to help someone else—before it’s too late for another family.
]]>I say this because of the recent study I wrote about in July. Commissioned by Liz Claiborne, Inc., it found that pre-teens ("tweens") as young as 11-years-old are dating AND becoming victims of violence in the process.
Such violence can and does lead to pregnancy, as a 1995 Alan Guttmacher Institute study found. It revealed men age 20 or older fathered 66-percent of the babies born to teen mothers. Which makes it, by definition, child abuse. This problem hasn’t gone away; it’s just been swept under the rug until just such a time as this: The daughter of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin is about to become an unwed mother (until she marries her teenage boyfriend, Levi Johnston).
Because a national audience is focused on a young woman who, by all rights, should be given the dignity of bearing her child in private, and also because the national teen pregnancy rate spiked in 2006 for the first time in 14 years, there is no better time to talk about the repercussions of teen dating and pregnancy than now.
The other consequence from teen dating can be seen by what happened to Sami Hightshoe and Lindsay Burke: Sami was repeatedly sexually abused in the woods behind her school and in her own home by her boyfriend, from the age of 14 until she finally found a way to end the relationship—with a restraining order against the guy. To protect Sami, her family had to spend $6,000 in legal fees.
]]> I met Sami in Washington, DC, at the National Press Club earlier this summer, where she grew so choked up talking about her experience, she could barely tell the media what happened. (As a mom and a fellow sister of silence/rape victim, I wanted to do nothing more than hand her a tissue, and tell her it gets easier, each time you talk about it.) Through her tears, this teen of 16 told the audience that she just wants to help other teens in similar situations to get out—before it’s too late.“There is hope out there. They’re not alone,” Sami said. In fact, Sami found that hope herself, within just such a group of fellow survivors: Stand Up, Speak Out (SUSO), which helps other teens get out of abusive relationships.
Sami’s relationship with her boyfriend, who was two years older, started out—as many do—just fine. But then, “he started following me everywhere. He told me what to wear … he checked my phone calls to see who I was talking to … he would push me up against the wall if I tried to walk away,” Sami said. His emotional manipulation was equally harmful and did exactly what he intended: It kept Sami silent. He said if her parents found out about the (forced) sex, “they wouldn’t love me anymore and I wouldn’t have any more friends.”
Sami finally confided in her mother and got out alive: Lindsay Ann Burke, 23, wasn’t as fortunate. In just a few days, family and friends of the former school teacher will face the anniversary of her death: Lindsay was murdered three years ago this month, on September 14, 2005, after her ex-boyfriend, Geraldo E. Martinez, slashed her throat in his Rhode Island home.
Lindsay, described by those who knew her as "the girl next door," and Martinez met at a friend’s wedding two years earlier. It led to their “tumultuous relationship,” her parents, Ann and Chris Burke, said.
A memorial site for Lindsay says: "She was mesmerized by him, and when the controlling behaviors started, she, like all victims, didn’t recognize them. They were insidious, occurring slowly, and when she did question them, she believed his excuses and apologies. She felt sorry for him, as he told her about his difficult childhood and she believed him."
Ann told me she believes men like Martinez prey on the best among us: People who are “honest, trusting, compassionate, traits in victims which we find most admirable … the abuser plays on that.”
Society assumes women are battered because they were battered during childhood (often true, but not always) but the Burke family was the exception. Both educators, Chris (Lindsay's father) said there was “none at all” in their family of four. (Lindsay has an older brother, Chris.) He and Ann believe this is equally harmful for unsuspecting young women: They have nothing by which to gauge the abuse.
The Burkes said parents must become educated about the warning signs in an abusive relationship, many of which are subtle. And they need to talk to their "children about what a healthy relationship should contain, which is respect, number one,” Chris said. He doesn’t think most parents are doing this, because they assume their children know what is healthy and what isn’t. “You can’t assume anything today,” he added.
Ann actually teaches health education in the schools, and she says parents need to begin talking about relationships by the time their children enter elementary school; incorporate how to get along with other people, and then broach the topic of showing respect. Gradually build on that and by eighth grade, children will know “the warning signs,” she said. This will help them so by the time they reach high school, they’ll know what to look for in a healthy relationship, she added.
“Education is the key to addressing this major health problem and … we believe teen dating violence education must be mandatory,” Ann said. “Teens have a right to know this information and parents have a right to know as well, so they can discuss this with their children and reinforce what they are learning in school.”
“It’s too late to help Lindsay, but I believe Lindsay would want us to help others,” she added.
At least something good came from Lindsay’s death: Her parents and Rhode Island Attorney General Patrick Lynch helped pass the “Lindsay Ann Burke Law.” It requires grades 7-12 throughout the state to teach about teen dating violence in their health curriculum.
Not only do teachers and students learn about dating violence: It makes annual awareness training for parents mandatory. Ann says the dating violence training is no different from other mandatory training for students, such as HIV, drug and sex education. She wants to see it become a national program so it ensures teens will know not only the warning signs, but also “how to help themselves and others, and where to get help.”
Then, “episodes of teen dating violence at school will no longer be ignored,” Ann added.
The findings of the recent teen/tween dating violence survey should help with that goal. And Dr. Elizabeth Miller, a leading expert on adolescent health and trauma, said it’s greatly needed. As a researcher and a doctor, she gleaned three important points:
She’s seen it firsthand in her clinic, so some of the findings didn’t come as a surprise. What did surprise Miller is that its extent and severity “is staggering and … really critical for us to pay attention to.”
Tweens and teens need to understand what a healthy relationship looks like, “but our media images of unhealthy relationships” are so insidious, and so many (youth) assume emotional control and jealousy are part and parcel of all relationships, Miller said.
“We have to stop minimizing. We have to stop sticking our heads in the sand. We need to recognize that … abuse is occurring in adolescence, it’s occurring with younger adolescents, and it’s not okay,” she added.
The study produced some crucial information about today’s youth, when it comes to dating and violence. But it didn’t address that other problem that occurs: teen pregnancy. Miller told me about a study she took part in during 2007, which shocked researchers. Those findings show that not only do teens become pregnant while dating, but all too often their male partners take steps to ensure this happens.
Abusers sabotage their partner’s birth control efforts, including forcing the partner to have sex without a condom or other contraceptive use. Early sex and violence for those teens, age 14-20, produce what Miller called “a lifetime history of pregnancy.”
This is a piece of the puzzle that is little known, but which happens more often than people think. (I explore how this happened to me in my memoir, Sister of Silence, which I hope will be a good tool for parents, and provide a warning for society in general.) Perhaps now that teen pregnancy has become a hot topic, parents will realize how much guidance their children need when it comes to dating, violence and respect.
]]>And if parents don’t stop with the “not my kid” mentality, what should come as a strong warning will end up paving the way to what some experts are calling “a new wave of disturbing abuse” in the future.
The alarming results of a new survey show that not only are tweens (age 11-14) and teens (age 15-19) pairing off into couples, they are having sex (including oral sex) and getting beaten and battered in the process. And if that isn’t bad enough, their parents are clueless about what’s really going on.
Consider these actual findings—and these are not opinions; the survey asked about tweens and teens' own or their friends’ dating practices, as well as the parents' beliefs about what’s going on:
When it comes to tweens:
When it comes to teens:
When it comes to parents:
That’s what I took away from a press conference held July 8 at the
National Press Club in Washington, DC. While I didn’t find the result surprising, having experienced many of the same things discussed therein myself, it is nonetheless sad and scary that 32 years later, parents are still not doing their jobs.
In my next post, you’ll meet Sami, a teen whose ex-boyfriend sexually abused her in the woods behind her school and in her own home. You’ll also meet the Burkes, whose daughter Lindsay was viciously killed when she tried to end an abusive relationship.
Their stories will inspire you to do what you can to help yourself and others—especially your own children.
The national survey was commissioned by Liz Claiborne Inc. and LoveisRespect.org. More than 2,000 online interviews were conducted, and demographic quotas were used to achieve a gender, age and ethnic mix that would align with U.S. Census data.
Yes, Americans do have sexual hang-ups, and no, they don’t do a very good job at teaching their children about sex and sexuality. But both topics are a necessity if we want to help teens reach their emotional, psychological and financial potential. Because a teen mother burdened with the chore of caring for a baby over an 18-year (usually more like 20 years, plus) period, definitely misses out on her potential. In most cases.
In some cases, though, what happens can be far worse than that. I spoke about one of these scenarios in my Aug. 3, 2007, column at the Cumberland Times-News last year: it discusses mothers who kill their children. Evidently, I wasn’t the only person who thought it was an important issue—the column took second place in the critical thinking category in the 2007 Maryland-Delaware-DC Press Association contest. (See: Many factors involved when mothers kill.)
Reading about experiences like mine, a teen mother of four children who nearly took that route myself, is one way to become educated about the real dangers facing our young people. Another is to look on the Web, where any number of great sites are available to help parents figure out how what the problems are, and then how to help their children.
For instance, Liz Claiborne, Inc., has been working to prevent domestic violence (a very large problem for our families) since 1991. Check out their site at Love is not Abuse. The other site it operates, the National Teen Dating Abuse Helpline (Love is Respect), offers teens great advice about how to remain healthy during dating relationships. The company has even come up with a curriculum for use in schools, to help teens stay free of such violence.
Sites like these are good because teen sex isn’t the only thing too many parents fail to talk to their children about—so is teen violence. In fact, it’s something that few parents are even aware exists. But it does and guess what? If you take a teen, add some dating violence that includes sex, you have sexual abuse. And sexual abuse can and does result in teen pregnancy.
Just ask Joe Klein, the Time reporter who in 1996 wrote a “Public Lives” column, “The Predator Problem,” for Newsweek.
]]> Referencing a 1995 Alan Guttmacher Institute study, Klein correctly informed us that the majority of teen mothers become pregnant by adult men. His column also pointed to a 1990 California survey, which reported that those teen girls were 10 years younger than the men who fathered their babies.If you’re still not convinced, that survey was looking at girls who were only 11 or 12. And this was 18 years ago, when we weren’t ready to accept that children that young were willingly having sex. As it turns out, most of them weren’t. A 1992 Washington state study Klein also highlighted found that 62-percent of 535 teen moms were victims of rape or molestation. The men guilty of these crimes were, on average, age 27.
I wonder how many of those very young teen moms ended up like me? I referenced my August 2007 column for a reason—because it’s timely. Teen dating, teen pregnancy, sexual abuse and filicide-suicide are sadly, all too often interwoven themes we refuse to see. But the pattern’s there. We just have to look for it.
And it’s time parents and society understands this. If the Gloucester 17 doesn’t serve as a wake-up call for parents to stop being afraid of talking to their children about sex, if Klein’s article doesn’t help society see fingers are being pointed in the wrong direction and if my experience, as one such pregnant teen, once upon a time, doesn’t do the trick, then it’s quite possible nothing will.
If so, then we may just go the way of Rome.
]]>But it's not just a problem in this small Western Maryland town where I work: it's a national problem. And that's why people need to know how to change their behavior, saving themselves and loved ones in the process. So the time for Sister Of Silence has arrived. While I continue working in the newsroom, covering these serious problems, I can only hope it helps others as much as the processes and knowledge it contains helped me.
During the past eighteen months, this site was down, and for that I apologize. Sometimes the daily business of making a living just gets in the way. But now it's back up and ready to go. Read, enjoy and learn - how living life differently is its own reward!
]]>One of the most difficult topics to talk about when it comes to domestic violence is the idea that rape can and does occur within marriage, and other intimate relationships where love should be the basis for sex. Perhaps even more challenging to talk about, though, is the fact that pregnancy does occur through these acts of rape. This is really a much bigger problem than you might expect, and one that is supported by several major studies, as reported at the Centers for Disease Control website.
According to the CDC, 10% of American women were raped (or experienced an attempted rape) by a husband or significant other. And the evidence reports that this rape doesn’t just occur once—it occurs repeatedly.
Approximately 4.7% adult women become pregnant through rape. This led that agency to take U.S. Census figures, and arrive at the conclusion that an estimated 32,000 such pregnancies occur annually in women who are 18 or older.
Where pregnancy occurred:
Because of the numerous associated problems (such as depression, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, and attempted suicide), this is what the CDC’s study found:
“Rape-related pregnancy occurs with significant frequency. It is a cause of many unwanted pregnancies and is closely linked with family and domestic violence. As we address the epidemic of unintended pregnancies in the United States, greater attention and effort should be aimed at preventing and identifying unwanted pregnancies that result from sexual victimization.”
Please see the CDC’s website for more details about this serious problem.
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