A Tell: Elder Intimate Partner Violence
I told my story today to the women of the Reform Temple at Century Village.
They opened their meeting with a reading from the book of Micah:
“[W]hat doth the LORD require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?”
Experts on elder intimate partner violence say that the most important thing to help elderly women leave battering partners is having support in believing that they can have a life of peace instead of violence.
Support.
They nodded as I shared my story.
We listened to each other as they told their stories during the Q&A.
Stories of leaving with nothing. Stories of defending themselves with their fingernails and their feet. Stories of their daughters who stayed too long, their granddaughters who witnessed violence and now struggle with relationships and drugs.
Afterward they told me, one-on-one, stories that none of their friends knew.
We told.
The power of telling lies not only in the telling but in the being heard.
In support.
1 Comment
wholly jeanne
i get goosebumps reading this powerful, powerful post. far too often we overlook the elderly. i think there are all sorts of reasons we don’t think about elderly domestic abuse, and i thank you for bringing this to our attention, for telling your story and giving them a safe place to tell theirs. tell. telling and listening can change the world.