Not a Victim. Not a Survivor.

One of the things I've always been bewildered by in the field of domestic violence education and recovery is how focused it all is on the abuser and what he did. Support groups, books and social media—it all talks about abuse and the person who did it. Once I got through the part of recovery where I was no longer rationalizing, excusing, or being blind to the abuse; I started to get annoyed by the idolatry that is infused into what's supposed to be healing.

There's an awakening that happens when you sit in a room of women who have been through what you've been through. When you've lived through domestic violence, you feel separated from everyone else. You feel like an alien or that you're walking around with leprosy—you feel alone. My time in the domestic violence support group was one I will never forget and will forever be grateful for. However, as my healing progressed, I started to feel like I was wearing a wool sweater in the middle of summer when I would go to group. The constant conversation of the abuser and the abuse was making me feel anxious and uncomfortable. There was no progress in the growth of self because it was so focused on him. Teaching women what abuse is, is important, extremely important. Society’s collapse entails many things but the destruction of love, peace and safety between men and women is an ingredient needed for satan’s goals. If you don’t know what abuse is, you can’t protect yourself and you’ll continue to accept the pain as normal. Since there would be new girls in the group almost every single week, there was tremendous value to revisit what the realities of domestic violence are. Wisdom is freedom and being able to learn of the insidious ways of abuse is life-saving. It allowed me to let go of my husband because I was able to let go of what I hoped he would become and accept the reality of who he chose to be. But once I was able to break through and have that realization, I didn't want to talk about him anymore. My healing journey was about me, not him. Domestic violence is so focused on the abuse and the abuser that it forgets that there was in fact a woman who endured it all. And that woman became a victim not because she loved the wrong man, but rather because she loved herself the wrong way. That’s the conversation we should be having.

I remember when I would try to talk to my ex-husband about his behavior and the abuse and he would react by saying, "It's always YOU! YOU! YOU!". He was angry that I was calling him out and in return, he would play the victim by acting like I was always blaming him for the problems in our marriage. HE was abusive. Who else was to blame? But as I healed and strengthened my walk with God, I started to see everything differently. The first time I told my ex-husband that he was being abusive, should have been the last. Any mature, loving, kind, healthy and responsible person would feel absolutely crushed at the idea that they hurt someone that they love to the extent that it was abuse. The mere idea of causing pain at that level would compel a person to repent and completely change their direction in life. But abusers aren’t mature, loving, kind, healthy and responsible. They are broken men suffering from soul wounds and if you love them, you will be punished for the wounds caused by others and/or themselves. That’s the unfortunate cycle of abuse that they choose to perpetuate. But that first time, when I actually had the courage to call it like it was and tell him that what he was doing to me was abuse; he had the chance to change. He didn’t. In fact, it all just got worse, and yet I stayed. That, and the reasons why I got together with him in the first place, is what healing from domestic violence should be about. When I knew I was being abused, he had the chance to change, but so did I. The quote, “We accept the love that we think we deserve” is the basis for why women stay in abusive relationships. If you don’t love yourself before him, you will accept the same from him.

The systematic approach to recovery for domestic violence is awareness and education. If women are still in the relationship, escape plans are taught and help is provided to put them into place. After we get out, we go into support groups and therapy. That is, those of us who get help. The majority of women don’t and instead, they just get into another abusive relationship and some become abusers themselves. Those of us who seek support and help are met by systems created by other survivors. It’s my opinion, based on my experience, that those survivors are still just surviving hence the reason why the system (in my opinion) is severely flawed.

I mentioned earlier about how I felt that there is idolatry in the realm of domestic violence recovery. When you’re in a relationship with an abuser, you abandon yourself. You give everything up to survive and appease the abuser. Your sense of self, your personality, hobbies, likes/dislikes, opinions, dreams, goals… Everything becomes about them. You don’t realize it’s happening until one day you feel dead inside. As a Christian it should be God -> Husband -> Children -> Everyone Else. But in an abusive marriage, not putting your husband first comes with painful consequences. I put my husband in my God spot for the false sense of safety. In my mind at that time, I thought that if I put him on a pedestal, maybe he’d stop hurting me. When I finally fled the marriage and focused on healing, that idolatry was transferred to being a “survivor”. That label, and the focus on him and his abuse, was fighting God for His spot in my life. Thankfully, that wool sweater didn’t feel good and I was quick to recognize what satan was trying to do.

When we put all of our focus on other people and what they did to us, it means that we’re refusing to look at ourselves. Was I a victim of domestic violence? Absolutely. Did I survive an abusive marriage? Yes. But my life isn’t defined by that man and what he did. Who I am isn’t wrapped up in a label. It’s when we set our eyes on the wrongdoings of others and the labels that go with those crimes that we put those things in our God spot.

Idolatry, in its simplest definition, is the worship of an idol as a god or deity. More broadly, it can refer to the immoderate attachment or devotion to anything that is not God. When a woman proclaims that she’s a domestic violence survivor, and that’s how she sees herself, then that becomes what she worships. She sees herself through the lens of what happened to her rather than who God made her to be. When support groups only talk about the abuse, they’re inevitably lifting the abuser up, “This is what he did to you, this is what you are now.” That wool sweater feeling I started to have while going to the support group was God’s way of telling me that I’m His daughter, not a victim and not a survivor. I rejected the conformities that the system of domestic violence recovery required and after 6 months of attendance, I chose to “graduate” myself out of the group. I refuse to be trapped in any system, much less one that is ultimately designed to keep you held hostage by labels that reject God. That’s exactly what being called a victim and survivor is—it’s a rejection of truth. I’m not those labels because I’m the daughter of the King of Kings and daughters of Kings aren’t victims or survivors, they’re Warriors.

I’m not what the world tells me I am because of something a man did to me nor will I worship the crimes of others. True healing means you see yourself as God made you, which is His beautiful masterpiece. Not a victim and not a survivor. When we embrace the truth about who God says we are, we reject what the world tells us we should be. There’s no honor in staying a “survivor”. Eventually, you need to see the truth and graduate yourself to become who God made you to be.