Her head was pounding from the sudden blow. Blood was running
down the side her face as she began to remember. He had tormented
her, degraded her feelings, and took away her financial stability.
She felt forever trapped as she was the only one to witness such
vile acts. “There is no one here to see this. There is no one here
to save me from what happens inside these walls” she whispered,
voice cracking.
Victims like this must go through the injustice of not being
able to feel safe in their own home or even their own skin. Whether
it be inflicting harm for the victim through physical abuse, toying
with their emotions through emotional abuse, or financially
controlling them through financial abuse, abusers find ways for
many women to suffer from domestic abuse in their daily lives.
Physical abuse is one of the many aspects of domestic abuse.
This type of abuse is most known as it can be seen with one’s own
eyes. However, physical abuse doesn’t always have to happen on the
victim. In many cases, physical abuse can happen somewhere near the
victim. It shows that “When a partner is violent near or around
you, doing things like punching a hole in the wall, the message is
‘Next time this could be your head'” (Carlson 146).
Numerous amounts of people will brush off the incident and
believe that it will not mean anything in the future but this sort
of act can escalate quickly and leave the victim in shambles. If
this message is given, the abuser is releasing their anger on an
object physically and it will not be long before the abuser directs
their anger on their victim – the one who caused their distress.
Once they direct their anger on the victim, it can lead to extreme
violence that the victim is not capable of keeping under control.
Sam is a victim who had been physically abused herself. She speaks
out about one of the stories of her journey with physical abuse:
I was at home and I cooked his dinner…he came home when the
food was on the table. He was like ‘Oh, it’s too cold,’ so I put it
in the microwave and warmed it up. I gave it to him and he said it
was too hot…and you start to get this worried feeling like ‘It’s
going to happen. He’s going to hurt me.’ He threw the plate and
smashed it against my head and he started beating me up and kicking
me on the floor and punching. (Sam?)
This is an example of severe physical abuse. Here, the abuser
takes a typical, simple misunderstanding and exaggerates it until
it reaches its full capacity. In most cases, those who are in
healthy relationships would be able to work this out without it
becoming physical. The victim shows that she has the constant worry
of not wanting to go against the abuser’s needs. Thus, they are
always tip toeing around the abuser and the second they do
something even the slightest bit wrong, it becomes another heated
fight. This instance is just one glimpse of what a day in the life
of a physically abused partner must go through.
There are always other cases. Some outcomes of physical abuse
could even be fatal. This is one of the more extreme cases of
physical abuse. It should be known that “One woman is fatally shot
by a spouse, ex-spouse, or dating partner every 14 hours”
(“NCADV”). Many do not understand the significance of homicide in
physical abuse and do not link this importance to the fact that it
still happens. This statistic shows that those who are in domestic
abuse relationships are at a very high risk of being killed by
their significant other.
