Abuse Beaten by Crystal Mary Lindsey
Genre: Biographical
Read: 11th February 2019
(FREE)
★★★★ 4 stars
Firstly, let me say, I was married to Crystal/Cara's eldest son and like his father before him, he used intimidation, threats, violence, lies and accusations and humiliation on me also. When Crystal/Cara left "Paul", my ex constantly hounded me that I was just like his mother. Accused me of being unfaithful "just like his mother" and I was going to leave him "just like his mother". I remembered him hitting me one day quoting scripture at me saying "Spare the rod and you spoil the child!" and that I was like a naughty child who needed to be punished. When he was committed to a psychiatric unit the first time, he told his doctor that "God told him to kill me for being unfaithful." There was so much more I was victim to but luckily for me, after leaving several times, I finally had the courage to after he stabbed me with the car keys. We weren't married very long, but it was a hellish and difficult time for me. After I left he used other family members to call me and try to coax me back. I had a restraining order against him so he couldn't contact me direct. But he watched me. I was so scared for my safety I moved interstate to escape him.
By the time I was seeing her eldest son, their marriage was already about over. When Cara left, Paul always found her and her phone number because my ex believed what his father told him and gave his father her address and phone numbers. I told him not to but he didn't listen to me. While I never knew the extent of Cara's story, I knew something wasn't right. I remember one day when my ex and I were visiting "Paul" laughingly made a comment that he "was a playboy". It seemed from this story, Cara's story, it wasn't far from the truth. While I never visually witnessed any violence, there was one night I was staying over in one of the spare rooms - the youngest daughter's old room, I believe - whilst my ex was in his room. The youngest son returned home very late on this night, being a mid-teenager and a little rebellious against authority as teens are. But what I heard both shocked me and frightened me. I heard "Paul" in the hall outside my bedroom door yelling - both in his native tongue and English - as well as verbally and physically abusing their youngest son. I heard him hit him, throw him against the wall and the door; it sounded like he was beating him. The boy wasn't only 15. I've never forgotten that, it frightened me so much. I never spoke of it and pretended the next morning that I never heard anything.
Crystal/Cara's story is one which many women live. And while the 30 years Cara was with Paul was not a happy one, but rather a lonely existence, I could see she adored each of her children. I remember when she left Paul. Her eldest son and I were holidaying down the south coast in Merimbula when he received a phone call from his father saying that his mother had left them. It ruined the rest of our stay, as the shadow of his mother's leaving was cast over our lives as well. If I'm honest, his abuse towards me started when she left his father. He was convinced I would be just like his mother and leave. And quite honestly, it was never my intention to do so. But sadly, for my safety and my sanity, I had to 2 years later.
Many people who have never lived in an abusive relationship/marriage often ask "why don't they just leave him?" And from an outsider's perspective it really does seems as easy as that; but in reality it isn't. Cara stayed for almost 30 years before finally gaining the courage to leave. I left after a couple of years. To be fair, it is a little easier to leave these days than it was in Cara's day. Don't get me wrong, it is still incredibly hard to do so, but what I mean is that there are a lot more facilities available now to help the victim leave her abuser than there was 30 years ago. We are taught that marriage is for life, for better for worse for richer for poorer. To me, to Cara, and to many other women, they are not loose words just meant for the wedding day. They were vows for life. And long before I married her eldest son, life was a lot different in the 1960s, 1970s and even into the 1980s. You didn't leave your husband just because he knocked you about a bit. In those days, it wasn't even a criminal offence. The police didn't get involved as it was "between a husband and his wife". In many ways it was seen as "you made your bed, now you must lie in it". Fortunately a lot has changed in that regard. Women and children should not be made to live in fear. Their home is meant to be their sanctuary, not their prison.
Reading Cara's story was an eye opener in that I had been a part of this family and never knew the extent of her pain. I remember when I first met Cara I found her to be quiet, reserved and even a little unhappy. She didn't smile a lot, but when she did it was genuine. When my ex brought me home through the internal door from the garage to the kitchen and introduced to me for the first time, I remember her welcoming me into their home with arms outstretched and a genuine smile. With Paul, I always kept my distance. I was never completely comfortable around him but I put that down to the different culture, of which I was not accustomed to.
Cara speaks of feelings of isolation throughout her marriage to Paul. I felt that in his presence also. Being of an ethnic culture, the families were always together, at each others' houses, it was like not being part of one part of the family, but the entire extended family. For they were never far away. Again, I put that down to the culture. But I remember being at one of his brother's homes with my ex one time and I was sitting at a big polished round table (my ex had gone out for a cigarette) and I was left alone at this table with Paul and his two brothers. Did any of them talk to me? No. They acted like I wasn't even there and to add insult to injury, they continued to talk amongst themselves (though still loudly enough for me to hear but knowing I wouldn't understand) in their own native tongue. I had never felt so isolated. So I can understand that feeling to an extent. Life was going on around me, around Cara, and we were shut out of it. I never learnt the language, only bits here and there, so for Cara to learn and become fluent in her husband's native tongue was a feat to be proud of.
I never saw Cara as weak or as nothing. I saw her as a strong woman in a difficult situation. She had a difficult time of it over those years of marriage, and yet she still made the best of it as she could. She didn't buckle under Paul's threats, violence or intimidations. She left, she made something of herself and she survived. That didn't make her weak or useless or nothing or even a failure as a wife or mother. She did what she had to do to survive. And I understood that.
For obvious reasons, after the breakdown of my marriage to her eldest son(it's very hard not to slip and use real names), I lost touch with Cara. But I had heard she'd moved to Queensland and that later the rest of her children moved up there also. I never knew what became of Paul. If he is still alive he will be 80 this year. And Cara is a year older than my own mum.
By the time I knew the family, Paul's parents had long since passed. I knew his mother spoke little English but I had no idea she was so hateful towards Cara. How lonely that must have felt, for even the family into which you had married most of them hating you. My heart ached for Cara reading this. But I wondered, did Paul's family or any of Cara's family know of the abuse he inflicted on her? I could see her brother and sisters being by her side as they were all such loving people. His family, I couldn't see them believing her had she spoken out. I know when I spoke out, they didn't believe me. Not even Cara's second eldest sister. I remember her telling me "He would never do something like that!" I don't even think Cara or her other children believed me either. But in all honesty, if I have learnt anything through my experience and journey through abuse, is that no one ever knows what really goes on behind closed doors. Someone who can appear so loving, so friendly and such a wonderful person can also be an intimidating abuser. To the outside they are one person, but once those doors are closed they can be someone different entirely. My ex was unwell, and I don't say that maliciously. But I think growing up in the environment he and his siblings did could never have left them untouched. I think each of them were scarred in their own ways. How can children witness something like that and not be?
To say Cara's story didn't touch me would be a lie. It did. And it pained me to think that I had been a part of her family and never knew. Never saw. When she left, she never said it was because of Paul's constant abuse or lack of love or anything like that. All she said was that she just had to leave. And while that may be true, I can also see that in her children's eyes it could seem like a form of abandonment. The daughters may well have been closer to their mother than the boys were but I could see the damage it was doing to my husband - her eldest son - and by her own admission in this book how her youngest viewed it also. My ex clearly thought he had abandoned both him and his father. He was staunch in his belief that marriage was forever and her place was with his father. The toll it took on him overflowed into our marriage and he became obsessed with the fact I was either unfaithful or was going to leave him. When I married him, I didn't take my vows lightly. And only broke them after much heartache after he had broken his.
I remember returning from the funeral of a childhood friend who had finally succumbed to his cystic fibrosis. My ex was out the back having a cigarette and when I walked in he accused me right away of having been with another man. I told him that I had been to my friend's funeral which he flatly refused to believe. In his eyes I went out that morning to be with another man and he dropped me off around the corner so he wouldn't catch him, which was why he never heard me come home. My friend drove me home and couldn't come in because her baby was asleep in the car and she didn't want to disturb him. To live in constant fear of being accused for something you never did, of being intimidated into submission, of being ignored for hours on end, or of being beaten for daring to disagree with him was a constant nightmare. Reading Cara's story was like reading my own in part. While many aspects were completely different, the cycle of abuse, the pattern of abuse, the forms of abuse was exactly the same.
I guess reading Cara's story brought a lot of what I had put behind me to the surface again. I just hope that in telling her story can help other women/people in similar circumstances. As alone as you might feel, you are not. I know it's trite to say that, because I remember feeling completely alone when I endured it. No one, unless they have lived it themselves, can fully understand just how lonely or debilitating such an existence is. I know I wasn't married to my ex for as long as Cara was to Paul, but it affected me deeply and over 20 years later, it still does. I'm not as strong as Cara. I've not made anything of myself. My biggest ambition in life was to get married and have a family. Nothing more. I have since remarried but I never had that family. It was just not to be.
The book itself is not a long book. I read it one sitting in just 2 hours. But it is hauntingly familiar. The editing is a little poor I found with words in sentences that didn't belong, making them appear to not make much sense. I had to read a several a few times over to remove or replace the inadvertent word to make some sense of it. I also found the story jumped around a little and didn't have that usual flow. Whether this was because of the time that has passed and these memories are just fragments or pieces Cara has put together over time or not, I'm not sure. But I did find that and the poor editing a little off-putting. For someone who struggles with reading may well struggle with the form in which this has been written. I was surprised to see the use of American English rather than the UK English we in Australia have been taught, particularly given Cara is Australian. But that's no biggie. Just a surprise is all.
Despite those small aspects, I do not NOT recommend this book. In fact I do recommend it to those who may know of someone in an abusive situation. It may help give them an insight into what it is like for the abused, and maybe help to help them. No one has the right to abuse another. No one has the right to raise a hand to another. To intimidate, threaten or humiliate them. No one has that right. Every one has the right to feel safe.
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