Overview

People tend to blame the victim for not leaving an abusive relationship, but they don’t often take into account all the reasons why a person may not be able to leave. Thandie offers some insight as to why she couldn’t leave her relationship. Her story does not feature consistent physical abuse. People can be emotionally and financially abused as well. Thandie telling her story can encourage others who may be going through even more horrific things to work up the courage to leave, and seek freedom from abuse.

Transcription

It’s harder to leave an abusive relationship than most people think.

Often, when one encounters a person in an abusive relationship, one thinks, “Why doesn’t she just leave?”

The answer to that is a lot more nuanced than most people realize. Not everyone is capable of leaving, even if they want to.

Thandie is one of those women. She married the love of her life, and recalls him being a sweet and caring man during their courtship. He was always willing to help her and those around her. He was a great son. Out of all his siblings, he was the most reliable caretaker of his mother. Thandie admired that characteristic, and she believes that is what made her fall in love with him.

She says she knew she might have made a mistake right after they were married, but she wasn’t set on this at the time. He stopped talking as much and was very insistent about her contributing to the bills. Thandie did not mind contributing. She was in nursing school and enjoyed her work at the time. Eventually, this did get a little more difficult for her. Her husband made significantly more money than her, and while she struggled to come up with the funds needed to support their lifestyle, he never did. She attempted to talk to him about maybe taking on some of the bills, and he did sometimes, but never continued. He’d complain and she would take them back over. They had a child, and she ended up being a handful. Childcare was expensive, and so Thandie eventually left the workforce to care for their child and manage the home more efficiently. This was the ultimate mistake.

Thandie could not leave the child with her father for a long time. He became irate and at one point, said he wanted to throw the child out of the window—because she wouldn’t stop crying—so he could get some sleep. This is what prompted Thandie to leave, and what put her in the situation she is in today.

Thandie put her child first, as most mothers tend to do, but it cost her. The ultimate financial control that she gave to her husband put her at a severe disadvantage. I think it’s pertinent to say that Thandie was rarely physically abused. She only recalls a couple of fights that left her with bruises. The abuse was more emotional and financial. It’s something many people don’t think about.

Being financially dependent on a person committed to making your life a living hell is hard. Thandie even found it difficult to go back to work. At one point and time, she’d gotten in a car accident that left her car totaled. Her husband agreed to supplement the money she’d received from the car initially to get her a new car. They searched and agreed. The day they were going to sign for the car, he asked her to send the money so he could buy the car. He never bought the car. He pocketed the money and left her with nothing. This made it difficult to find work in the future. The place where she lived didn’t run on any bus line, she didn’t always have access to money for an Uber or Lyft, and the work she was trained in rarely had work-from-home positions. Not to mention the fact that she had been out of the workforce for a long time, raising her child, which would cause gaps in her resume.

Her husband would often sneer at her and tell her that she was worthless and should get a job, but whenever she posed solutions to do just that, he would thwart her attempts. He didn’t actually want her to get a job. He knew she would leave if she was ever independent again.

Regardless, Thandie is slowly making changes in her life to get herself out of this situation. While it’s a slow process, she is looking forward to freedom. This is just one account of a women stuck in a terrible marriage, and it’s tame. Things could be much worse. We encourage people to have empathy for the people stuck in these situations. It could happen to anyone.