My friend is going back to her abusive X.
Slowly but surely.
This is extremely difficult to witness.
They separated and were firm enough on this decision to sell their family home. She bought her own place, and he bought his. They worked out child custody arrangements. She started counseling. He started counseling. Their kids started counseling.
At some point she came to the conclusion that he would never change, and she told him she wanted a divorce. He retaliated by telling her that, no, he wanted a divorce. He wanted a divorce first, and he was also going to take her kids from her. He hired a lawyer. He had a family inheritance to pay for it. She did not.
Within a month or two of his recent threats, they started to hang out again. They went paddling together and she felt like they talked like old times, and that she could see the person she first fell in love with. On that trip he revealed that he was dating other women. She kept it together and didn’t react, while he described in detail his adventures with them.
Later she told me that God had told her that she was not meant to ask for a divorce. That if her husband wanted one that was fine, but she was instructed to not divorce him. She felt at peace with this knowing. Not long after her revelation, he invited her out on his boat. The first thing I thought was I hope he doesn’t kill her.
She told him she didn’t want to go out on his boat if it was a friend date. If she went on the boat she wanted something more. Later, when I asked her how the trip went, she told me they connected and it was incredible. Again, he was his old self that she loved so much.
She began talking about giving up her career that she had spent years and years educating herself on. That she would move back to his family homestead that she’d refused to live on for their whole marriage. She thought she would now be happy being a house wife. That it would give her more time to be with her kids. It was what he’d always wanted from her.
It is said that it takes a woman up to seven times to leave her abusive partner.
It doesn’t matter if you’re rich or poor, educated or not, none of this matters with matters of the heart. There is a cord there. First, the cord of love between two people that grows and strengthens as the years pass by. Then the cord to your children. Then the cord to your relatives. Then the cord to your community.
It is a difficult act to cut these cords.
I love you.
-In Sisterhood
