Impaled on the Horns Of the Devil
The Development of Vulnerability to an Abusive Marriage
by
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I was so mad at Floyd, for getting me in such a mess. I remembered that big fight back home. I realized this wasn’t the first time Floyd got me into a big rhubarb with my folks. I felt like there was a smoldering peat bog fire in my brain.
I hate myself for letting him control me like this. I’m a real basket case. What would it be like to really crack up? Who would take care of me?
If he doesn’t come back soon, it will be time to go back to school. I can hardly wait. At least there I’ll be back in a safe and sane classroom with my kids. I sure miss them.
*****
Floyd showed up about three weeks later. He expressed only contempt for my weakness when I tried to describe my agony while he was gone. He saw no reason for me not to have been content in Aberdeen all by myself, or to be angry-jealous while he flew back home for Christmas. Then he totally devastated me.
“Right after Christmas I wanted to take a little vacation so I went down to Florida for a couple of weeks.”
“YOU DID WHAT? YOU WENT ON A LITTLE VACATION? WITHOUT ME? YOU LEFT ME HERE, AT CHRISTMAS TIME? ALL BY MYSELF? WHILE YOU WENT TO FLORIDA AND LET ME SIMMER IN MY LONELINESS?”
“Bonnie, it didn’t occur to me that you would be so selfish and think only of yourself! If you really loved me, you wouldn‘t deny me a little fun, would you?”
“ME? SELFISH! And here I was dreaming of all of the traveling we were going to do together! We were going to see the world together, weren’t we?”
“But Bonnie, something good came out of it, while you were just laying around here wallowing in self-pity!”
“And what might that be?’
Then I really came all apart. I was simply mute with disbelief when he told me that in Florida he met a “dance hall girl” and befriended her. He lived with her in her apartment for the 2 weeks he was there, and found out that she was very needy trying to raise her little girl by herself. He felt so sorry for her that he gave her all of his money as he left, and flew back to Seattle with empty pockets. He thought I should be proud at his efforts as a social worker and counselor.
“YOU MOVED IN WITH A PROSTITUTE?”
“Now, Bonnie, there you go again! Don’t you have any compassion for people who are down and out?”
“DON’T TALK TO ME ABOUT ’COMPASSION’! WHAT ABOUT YOUR WIFE? DID YOU ALREADY FORGET THAT YOU’RE MARRIED?”
With arrogance he said he saw nothing wrong with sleeping with another woman and didn’t know why I was so hurt. He said that what he really wanted was an open marriage anyway…
OH, God! This is the first I’ve heard about that!
He can’t be serious!
God, how did I get into this mess?
Then, as I calmed down a little bit, my silent response was Polly Anna-like:
Thank you, God, for Floyd‘s return. I pray that he didn’t bring a venereal disease home to me. I know I‘ll make this marriage work when we‘re living together as husband and wife in Seattle. Won‘t I?
I retreated into MY bedroom sobbing. I locked the door, threw myself into the middle of MY bed, and cried myself to sleep.
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About the Book
With courageous confession, the author describes her high school romance, laced with parental opposition, the pull of premarital sex, and an awareness of guilt before God. After less than a year of marriage to her high school sweetheart, when she begins to recognize her parents’ concerns as valid, she meets a man who becomes a destructive force in her life. He encourages her to divorce her husband and instead, become dependent on him for emotional support. With painful honesty she relates how he gains manipulative control over her emotions and moral standards. She joins him in defying biblical commandments and societal conventions. Readers who have suffered through failed marriages will understand her struggles.
The author winds up her memoir by observing what in her background contributes to vulnerability and control by a man who seems to represent the devil. She tells how she eventually escapes from him and an emotionally abusive second marriage. She offers insight to parents and teens about both positive and negative relationships between them, and how those relationships powerfully influence the lives and marital decisions of young adults.
About the Author
Barbara Boatright, (BS-Indiana University, MA-The University of Chicago) took an early retirement from teaching in California. After intensive training in counseling she served as a lay counselor in her church.
Throughout her life she enjoyed journaling as recreation or used it as emotional therapy. She drew on her journals in writing this book. She said the only justification for exposing herself so candidly and sharing her memories with such honesty was the hope that others would learn from her mistakes..
In addition to her writing she currently is active in women’s groups and in her retirement community. She and her husband live in San Marcos, a rapidly growing city in north San Diego County, California.