RECOVERING

People often recover partly or completely from many physical, social, addictive, or mental illnesses.
It's a lot easier to do if they have support, love, good doctors or caretakers, and a strong desire to recover.

Battering interferes with that recovery in many ways:
*The batterer is not interested in his victim recovering. If s/he does, he loses control.
*The victim may need medical treatment for conditions related (or not) to the battering. The batterer isn't interested in the victim feeling better as s/he may become more independent and less amenable to his control in the process.
*The victim may have to put her children's medical, educational or emotional needs ahead of her own as batterers often take the victim's paycheck, refuse to let her work, or give her an "allowance".
*Victims are afraid to tell the doctors and other professionals what is happening to them or their children. Secrecy is demanded and maintained through the batterer's threats or actual malice against the victim, her children, or the family's pets.
*The desire to recover often gets submerged under the daily need to appease and please the batterer.
Depression and anxiety can paralyze the victim's sense of self, self-esteem, and self-preservation.

Recovery, under these circumstances, is almost a miracle and may require that the victim fight her way through all these problems so she can realize that staying with the batterer has become life-threatening.

If you are recovering from anything or anyone, think about the above. You may have had similar hard balls tossed at you. If you're reading this, and you've safely left your abuser, then you are the miracle.
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