The Phone Call

For almost twenty-five years I lived in fear on a daily basis. My husband would go into rages without warning that made absolutely no sense to me. He would walk into the house and with one swipe send everything on the supper table crashing to the floor. Televisions would be raised above his head and smashed down in front of me. Or I would be beaten, as everything was ‘my fault’, in the midst of me not knowing exactly what I had done. I learned how to lie, how to move, how to react, how to dress and so on, in an attempt to protect myself and my children. Every day I walked on eggshells, not knowing what was coming next.

At a certain point, early in our marriage, I came to the realization that there was no way that I could ever develop a true relationship with this man. I didn't understand why at the time, but I knew there was nothing there. However, we already had three sons and I was pregnant with our fourth. I spent a whole night walking, trying to determine what I could do. In the end, I decided to stay with him because I knew he would not give up looking for us if I left. It was just too dangerous. In the meantime, I would do my best to provide the type of home I had grown up in, in spite of the absence of love and respect that I not only wanted, but also felt I deserved.

Twenty years into our marriage, I finally learned his secret and realized that the rage he carried had absolutely nothing to do with me. It was all triggered by exposure to input from his past, which was then fueled by his tendency to protect himself by creating a fantasy world in which, in these instances, I was the guilty party. At that point I realized that nothing I could do that would change the situation. I quit responding in guilt and stopped trying to make things right. This only made things worse.

Six years later I fled. I had reached the point of suicide and he had made two attempts to kill me. At that point both of us realized I would not continue to live if I stayed. He left first, but found himself unable to stay away. I had to do it for us.

One day the phone rang. It was my husband. As I held the receiver in my hand, listening to him rant, the familiar feeling of fear flowed throughout my body. My first thought was that I have to move, to find somewhere else where I would be safe. In the midst of that thought another came. How did he find me? I went through the short list of people who knew where I was. Who I had trusted? Who was not trustworthy? I realized that when I moved on. I could not let anyone know where I was. I would be all alone. And then in the midst of this thought, I suddenly knew that if I ran again in fear, I would be running and hiding for the rest of my life. I refused to do that.

As a family therapist, I had learned that there are two types of anxiety that lead to fear. The first is acute anxiety, in which you are dealing with an actual threat in the present moment. A thief is holding a gun to your head, demanding you hand over your money. You have no money to pay your bills and the creditor is calling. The pantry is empty and there is no food to feed your children. You have cancer. The bombs fall around you. A storm rages. A forest fire approaches. This is real anxiety to which one must respond in order to survive.

The second type is chronic anxiety. This anxiety is not real, but created in your mind. It may come from messages you receive from others or be generated through actual experiences of your past, but it is NOT happening in the moment. The thief might return. I might run out of money. A storm may destroy our home. I might catch Ebola or hepatitis. I might lose my job. The terrorists may attack! Sadly, so much of what we hear through the media these days is of the chronic anxiety type. There are many in the world who want us to live in fear; who profit from our fear in one way or another. The question becomes whether we choose to fall into this trap or not.

The fact that he had found me meant that I was dealing with both types of anxiety at the time. Yes, he knew where I was (acute). Yes, he was dangerous (acute). However, he was not near, as his job kept him hundreds of miles away from me (chronic). He didn't work every day. He could show up at any point without warning (chronic) but in the present moment this wasn’t happening. I decided to talk with my family to discover who I could not trust. They informed me that none of them had shared anything with him. Instead, he had hired a detective to find and follow me. I threw up my hands in disgust. If he was willing to go that far, there was nothing I could do. I decided to get on with my life, in spite of him.

The next few years were not easy. He quit his job and moved to the city where I lived. Although I the apartment building was locked and the residents were careful not to allow anyone enter that they didn't know, there was always the possibility he might get in. My sons would phone to let me know he was on the warpath, giving me time to leave the building or at least go to the apartment across the hall and watch him banging on the door or trying to climb up onto my balcony. He took a golf club to my car, smashing all of the glass, not realizing, I'm sure, that it wasn't even mine, but owned by the company I worked for. I would often glance in the rear-view mirror, while driving, to see him following me. I chose not to let any of this bother me, using my intellect to get me to safety instead of responding in fear. In the midst of this, I was so thankful that I hadn’t left when the children were small. I am certain that we would have ended as another statistic of extreme family violence had I done so.

It's been many years since I stood holding that phone and decided not run and hide. At this point, I no longer allow myself to live in fear of any kind. I wasted far too many years doing that. I am free! It’s a good place to be.