Many believe that it is easy for the victim to leave their partner and the abusive situation ~ they are wrong! It is by far one of the hardest decisions one can make. Leaving is often harder than staying. When you are in an abusive situation, to stay you have the security you have always known, even if it isn't always safe....to leave would be to enter the unknown, to become more afraid of if/when your abuser may find you - and ultimately, the consequences of leaving. And often, the victim will return to the abuser and the situation. Unless, one is ever in the situation, one can never really understand....
Here I have listed some reasons why the victim stays, or returns to the abuser, which are in most cases, the partner. Below those are also my own reasons why I stayed with my spouse.
1. Loneliness
2.. Doesn't want to leave children
3. No place to go.
4. Lacks funding resources and employment skills
5. Hopes spouse will change.
6. Doesn't know where, or how, to seek help
7. Fears reprimands from spouse - afraid of what abuser will do to her/him, and the children if she/he tries to leave.
8. Afraid to live without partner
9. Believe children need both parents
10. Considers divorce a stigma, and believes family must stay together at all costs, despite the pain and the danger.
11. Loves Spouse
12. Believes it's shameful to admit they don't have a good marriage
13. Considers spouse a victim and wants to help - they believe they can help their partner
14. Believes they are at fault and have no worth as a person.
You may find these reasons are not enough to make you stay if it were you, but believe me - they would! You see, in many of these cases, the victim genuinely loves their partner (regardless of the abuse), and often believes that there is a problem that they can help fix....or mainly they have come to believe that they are the problem and no one else but their partner (abuser) wants them. But that is what their partner has instilled in them, because that way they can be assured that the victim won't leave them - why would they, if they believed that no one else loved them? It is truly a lonely and destructive experience to endure.... I know, because I lived through it, and I felt all these reasons of why I had to stay with him.
My Reasons for staying -
One of my reasons was that marriage is for life, and I took him for better or for worse - and many people to whom I sought help from told me just that....and therefore I felt I had to stay - so I did. Oh, I genuinely loved him too, and thought that if he really loved me he would change....but I was kidding myself. A lifetime of habit and experience taught him otherwise.... After a while I didn't know how to ask for help or where I could go - so many believed marriage was for keeps and I had to stick it out. I was often told that "the first year of marriage is the hardest", but was emotional (and eventually physical) abuse what they meant? I don't think so. And like many victims, I was partly afraid to leave and felt I couldn't live without him.... I left once, but was lonely without him, and also pressured by "friends" to "stick it out". Some in the church said that I didn't take my marriage vows seriously when I left - that added to the shame that I already felt....I couldn't make him happy and I couldn't make my marriage work. I failed.
No one but a victim can understand the enormity of confusion, hurt, shame, loneliness and faliure.... And I can only help open the eyes of those who don't know what it is like. So if you do know of someone in an abusive situation, don't pressure them into leaving - they will only go back....but rather, be there for them and let them know that you are there. Tell them that they don't deserve to be abused, that you are afraid for their safety (and children), and that you are there to help them whenever they need and decide that they are ready to leave. That is all you can do. The rest is up to the victim. They need to know that they have someone who DOES care enough to help them, without pushing them.
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