Meher Qadri
“They are the images or words or ideas that drop like trapdoors beneath us, throwing us out of our safe, sane world into a place much more dark and less welcoming. The past is not dead, triggers have been waiting there in the darkness, working out, practicing their most vicious blows, their sharp hard thoughtless punches into the gut, killing time until we come back that way” – Neil Gaiman
The sequelae of violence against women are far broader than its immediate impact on the survivor, and it progresses to affect their intimate and immediate relationships. In cases of intimate partner violence, there is increasing evidence of the negative impact on the children who have been exposed to violence in the family.
“More than the honour of the victim, it is the perceived honor of the enemy that is targeted in the perpetration of sexual violence against women; it is seen and often experienced as a means of humiliating the opposition. Sexual violence against women is meant to demonstrate victory over the men of the other group who have failed to protect their women. It is a message of castration and emasculation of the enemy group. It is a battle among men fought over the bodies of women,” writes Radhika Coomaraswamy at the Asia Pacific Forum on Women, Law, and Development (APWLD).
Armed conflict across the world has forced brutality, enslavement, forced prostitution, and forced pregnancy have used women as tools to propagate and push forward agendas and weaken the beliefs of the men in the society. The violation of women erodes the fabric of a community in a way that only assaulters can.
Violence and abuse can be devastating because of the strong communal reaction to the violation and pain stamped on entire families. The harm inflicted in this case is often termed as cultural and inter–personal attacks, as in many societies, women are viewed as repositories of a community’s cultural and spiritual value.
Viewed as an unfortunate outcome of the war, rather than crimes, they have been popularly explained in terms of aberrant behaviour by men under harsh conditions of war and separation from their families and communities, according to a UN Special Rapporteur on violence against women.
Thorne J McFarlane.
Why Do We Do This to Our Women?
“Husband murdered wife over domestic dispute”
Witnesses say they heard yelling getting clearer. The community was shocked and never expected this terror.
A husband was angry over losing his kids to his wife. He drove eight blocks to take her life. He broke into her house and broke many things.
She came downstairs and the fat lady sings. He knocks her down to the carpet. At three in the morning, the air remains scarlet.
He strangles her on their couch. Blood filling up in her mouth. At three in the morning, she left this life.
Why do we do this to our women?
Domestic violence affects all who are exposed, from the perpetrators, victims, to the children who witness the violence. It is important to understand how complex domestic violence is to effectively understand the systems that are affected by this crime.
Children who witness trauma exhibit an array of emotions when it comes to coping with witnessing domestic violence. These emotions include sadness, anxiety, and fear. It is critical to understand the coping skills children respond with, so there is an understanding of the varied experiences that children face and how these relate to their well-being.
There is variation in coping methods used by children, it is either problem-focused or emotion-focused. Problem-focused meaning coping is focused on problem-solving and emotion-focused meaning acting in a way, so as to alter the level of stress being experienced or attempting to manage the emotional distress associated with the violence.
According to Judith Herman (1997), “Trauma inevitably brings loss”. She continues to describe how those who are lucky enough to escape physical abuse, they lose psychological structures. Those that are physically abused lose a sense of themselves and their body integrity.
When discussing the traumatic events with a child victim, it inevitably causes the child to experience profound grief. The loss and grief experienced by children can lead to the child having to change homes often. The impacts of domestic violence help explain the difficulty that many experience in parenting as well as in intimate relationships.
Sarwat Mir, a 25-year-old banker from central Kashmir’s Srinagar district recounted her experience of being a witness to this violence as a child.
“I seem like any other girl on the surface but there are traumas under the surface that terrify me. Understanding violence at a very early age shapes your consciousness in an aberrant way. Rage becomes the foundation of every other emotion. This rage is nuanced. Being trust deficit, the inability to comprehend any other reality becomes your defence. A quiet fear looming inside overpowers everything. Sometimes I fear getting out of bed in the morning, I fear walking out of my house. I tremble when I talk to anyone out of fear and uncertainty. I have this innate disgust for everything human. It has also shaped my faith differently than others”.
“Everything has turned me into a bitter being. I fear my anger, and everyone else’s, even when there is no anger involved. I fear rejection. I fear success and failure. My chest starts to ache and I feel tingling and numbness in my arms and legs every day. It is almost every day that I get cramps ranging from menstrual cramps to intense pain. I just really hurt most of the time. I feel that I can’t go on. I have headaches, followed by anxious tremors and panic attacks. The disorientation is so unreal. The shortness of breath, racing heart, it paralyzes me”.
“Most nights, I stay awake thinking what god would let this monstrosity prevail?”.
Sarwat witnessed domestic violence firsthand as a kid and now lives with confused and contradictory feelings. She worries about the safety of her mother, constantly, living in the trajectory of fear.
At the tender age of six, Sarwat first witnessed the abuse that her mother would incessantly be put through physically, emotionally and psychologically.
She says “I used to think that at the age of six, a mother was the one who should be protecting her child from all evil and harm. I lived through a role reversal; I protected my mother. Because of the dysfunctional environment I lived in, I made no friends, never went out to play with other kids. I had to be there to protect my mother. I saw my people who were abusive as generous and loving some of the time, and terrifying and dangerous at other times. I never felt that my loyalty was caught in the middle. I knew with a shaking voice and shivering heart that my mother needs to be protected from everyone around at that time. I would stay up till late guarding her whilst she slept”.
She often struggles with how specific the information can be about the domestic violence she saw her mother go through. Elaborating on the structure of violence and the impact it had on her life, she told The Kashmiriyat, “I’m always cold, and I have dry mouth. I have trouble swallowing, with absolutely no energy or motivation, and when I do accomplish something, I feel no sense of satisfaction. It is this overwhelming paranoia of confused, lost, helpless, and a hopeless self every day. These uncontrollable outbursts of rage that I have now, I wish I could use it back then”.
“Often when my mother would be beaten black and blue, with no mercy, I would physically pivot myself between the perpetrator of the violence and my mother. Imagine being a 10-year-old girl and having to maneuver yourself a human wall between an abuser and the abused, the aftermath of the abuse, where I would tend to my mother’s bruises and wounds. So purple. Her silence — that is something that does not let me sleep”.
Sarwat after witnessing the violence as a child,
now has trouble balancing her life. She said, “I keep re-visiting the violence when I am asleep. I turn and I toss until I pass out from crying and fatigue. It is almost borderline funny that I relive images, sensations, and memories of the abuse. I try really hard to let them go. But they haunt me and have latched on to my soul forever. I avoid situations, people, and reminders associated with violence. I even try not to think or talk about it. But I feel as if I am cut off from normal life and other people”.
Domestic violence is, by its nature, chronic and ever-lasting as the perpetrator of the traumatic experience is a loved one or a parent.
Sarwat said, “It took me years to understand that it is okay to feel more than one emotion at the same time (such as anger and love). It is normal to feel angry at either or both parents when violence happens. It is okay to love both parents at the same time. It is not your fault or responsibility”.
“There was this one-time during winters in Kashmir, my paternal family was over at our house for lunch. My mother fed the family, got them blankets, kangri and nun chai to warm up and sip on, as they critiqued the detailed Tilla on my mother’s Pheran. It was green in colour and the Pheran smelled like dewdrops on an early morning. Soon after they were done, my aunt due to a disagreement with my mother, walked up to her as she was helping me with my homework. She picked up the kangri next to me and over-turned it on my mother’s head. My mother held on to me for our dear lives. The coal and ash did not burn me, but it left my mother and her Pheran with burns”.
On reacting to reminders of the domestic violence in the form of sights, smells, tastes, sounds, words, things, places, and emotions, Sarwat added, “I can not stand the sight of burning coal. It churns my gut. The embers transport me back to the time they tried to burn my mother. I still have that beautiful pheran. I could never really wear it though”.
“I can never really remember the reason ‘why’ my mother was abused and beaten to pulp at times. I can never bring the recollection of the ‘why’ to my acknowledgment. I know that bruises and cuts may leave no scars sometimes, but the memory does. It did. It will always will’.
Sarwat said that the effect of the violence she witnessed as a child, has scarred her forever.
“The authority my father’s family thought that they had, to march over and beat my mother with no pity and mercy, angers me. I can not look at their faces. And can never forget the trauma it caused me. The relationships that I had and will have, remain affected and stained with my scars of emotional and mental abuse”.
Domestic violence continues to be a problem among families. It is clear that exposure to violence places a great burden on children across all developmental stages, from all cultural and socioeconomic backgrounds.
It is possible for families exposed to this to overcome the issue and not go on to abuse others. Unfortunately, the effects of family violence are likely to produce long-term intergenerational cycles of abuse if not treated early.
The response of the community has a huge impact on how the traumatic event is overcome by the victim. Oftentimes, domestic violence is looked at by the community in a negative view, leaving the victim to be re-victimized and to feel shame.
Children are often affected by domestic violence on witnessing it and become traumatically and repeatedly victimized. It is possible to break the cycle of violence and prevent children from being exposed to this epidemic.
Ultimately, there is a need to create a social climate that breaks the code of silence on domestic and intimate partner violence and continues to bring this issue into the public light.