Who Spares A Thought For Abused Women?

In the last few weeks the UK papers have reported the
cases of two white, professional, well paid men who visited horrific domestic
violence on their wives and were treated remarkably leniently by judges. One of the two was a doctor.

Dr.
Stuart Brown
walked free from court, but was ordered to pay his wife a
paltry £500 ($1,000). He had thrown her
to the floor and punched her at least 24 times after an argument about a new
car

The
magistrate decided not to jail him because he had no prior convictions and was of
previous “good character”. The
magistrate told the wife beater: “No punishment this court could enforce could
come anywhere near the impact you feel this had on you, your profession and
your colleagues.”

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What will you do?

In my new home I notice my pace of life has changed
a lot. Truth to tell, it has slowed
down. I, who have always raced from one
task to the next, find myself lingering over breakfast because I sit where the
sunlight comes in through my window.

It took me a couple of weeks pottering around
cleaning my already clean hob, or polishing the kettle (and pinching myself
because I only ever did that stuff under duress) to understand what was going
on. Because I am no domestic goddess,
you understand.

What I was really doing was being happy. And what I discovered was that this kind of
happiness, which is all about contentment and being at peace, takes time.

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What do you know that isn’t so?

This week I was struck by something a young friend friend
F. said. She said: “I know that my life
will always be hard. I’ll always have
bad relationships with men.” F., poor
soul, is young enough to believe there is something deeply romantic about
troubled relationships that end in heartbreak.

So is she right that she will always have bad
relationships with men? 

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I don’t really belong to the group of abused women

"Dear Annie,

I very recently (last week) "ended" an emotionally abusive relationship. As
I struggle to recover, I turned to Google for help and stumbled upon your
blog. I have found your words very wise and inspiring , and that is why I am
writing this email. I will definitely spend the next few days reading most
if not all of your posts, but I know already that these posts are targeted
towards the major group of emotionally abused women, of which I am not a
part.   In other words, I am hoping that perhaps you are able to offer me
some advice that you haven’t offered on your blog."

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