To friends of abuse victims

Here’s the part about being in an abusive relationship that most of you do not know: we typically know were getting abused & that he’s a piece of shit. But there’s always an underlying Power structure—(either he controls all the finances, or our religion forbids divorce, or we have no one to run to for refuge, or we have kids that we can’t just force to eat crackers and live in cars until we’re stable). We’re human, so when the abuse first starts, we vent. We never anticipated how angry it would make you. We never realized that you might cut us off because it burdens you to hear about our relationship problems. So we start lying to you, not to ourselves. We start telling you that everything has fixed itself and that he’s better; that we’re not getting abused. You’re maybe all the love we have in this harsh reality & we need you. But your idealistic suggestions that we just “go” are fairy tales. So stop lecturing us and just love us through our hard times.