Q: My husband was a poor provider who blamed me for everything. When there wasn’t enough food, it was my fault, not his. I learned never to ask for money, even for things we really needed, because it ended up in a big fight. Once, after I asked for money to buy underclothes, he came after me with a piece of firewood, hollering at the top of his lungs, “I’ll kill you, you old dog.” And this in front of our kids who by then were in their early teens. One of them, now 40, still cries if he talks about it.
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I left my husband several times when our boys were younger. The last time, I meant business. But my in-laws came with the preacher and his big Bible, and he kept saying about how wrong it was to get a divorce.
I was too shy to speak up and tell him the truth about what kind of marriage I really had. I tended cows, cattle and chickens during my pregnancy, even having labor pains on the milking stool, rushing to hospital and having the baby born 10 minutes later. Four days later, I had to make supper, milk the cows and do other chores, plus tend to a newborn.
Years ago I went to visit a neighbor one afternoon as the children were all in school. My husband came home early before I returned. He was very angry. He said I had no business going there, and because I did, I was often referred to as a whore, or other abusive animal names after that. I did go back, even though he got very mad.
I’ve heard him tell my step-daughter how I go away, don’t tell him where I am going, but hang around the hotels and come home after midnight. I could write a book on abuse, betrayal, cruelty and lies. I’ve suffered a lot but often wondered if the kids would have suffered more if I had left him. But then, where did you go 40 years ago? I don’t know if it would have been better for me to have moved out then, or even now.
Years later, we moved to the city. I worked out of the home and could then buy myself things I needed. I did all the housework for my husband. He had a full-time job. His salary went to the bank, and all of a sudden, it was gone. I dared not ask where or why! He’d go into a rage if I even asked.
A: Thanks for sharing about the impact that an abusive husband had on both you and your children. There are now, thankfully, many more resources for abused women, although still not enough safe places for women and children to go to when necessary. Many men will deny they’ve been abusive, saying, “I never hit her.” But threatening and terrifying, refusing to share the family finances fairly, refusing to help your partner with household or farm chores, swearing at them, running them down and accusing them of untrue and unfair things, are all abusive behaviors.
In Saskatchewan, and now hopefully in other Canadian provinces, there is legislation, the Victims of Domestic Violence Act, which can protect a woman from her husband by issuing a restraint order preventing him from being in or around the home for 30 days, and this can be done without a criminal charge having to be laid.
I also wish all churches had a better understanding and respect for how destructive spouse abuse is to a woman’s life. Many churches have improved their understanding of abuse and improved the training of their clergy.
However, some other churches that interpret the Bible narrowly and see things as being only “black or white,” still tend to treat women the way you were treated many years ago.
