Some shocking news: My best friend called me yesterday morning while I was at work and told me that a girl we knew had passed away over the weekend. It's much, much worse than that, though. She was allegedly murdered by her abusive boyfriend.
You can read about the story here.
I first met Amber about three years ago when my best friend and I were out on a Saturday night. She was with her friend who my buddy was talking music with, and I was chatting with Amber at the bar. We hung out as a group a few more times, but I saw her very infrequently. More often than not, I'd hear small updates about her during small talk with our mutual friends, which brings me to about a month ago.
I was out one night celebrating my buddy's birthday, and one of my friends that night mentioned how Amber had been in a horrible car accident. She was laid up in the hospital for several days recovering from her injuries, and even lost her job for not showing up. My initial reaction was that her job had opened itself up for a wrongful termination lawsuit, and Amber would collect a pretty hefty payday in the settlement.
Turns out the "car accident" was only a cover story, and Amber was in the hospital after being beaten up by her boyfriend. I understand why the cover story was cooked up since cases like this one almost always involve lying so as not to reveal the embarassing and awful truth.
I never met Amber's boyfriend, and truth be told I can't even remember the last time I would've seen her. I'm sure it was at least two years ago. I can't really refer to Amber as a friend either because I didn't know her that well; she was much more of an acquaintance. But I am very close with her friend who was with her in the bar that night we had all first met, so this is still very tough to handle.
From what I know of her boyfriend, he was the typical super nice guy when they were out together. He would buy drinks for people in the group, help people out with errands, and be very outgoing and friendly overall. I guess that's the front that always shows publicly in abusive relationships like this one, and the true colors only show themselves behind closed doors.
I've known several women in my life who had abusive relationships in the past, and even dated a couple of them. The emotional scars from relationships like those almost always last much longer than the physical ones since they cut much more deeply. It's truly tragic that these relationships exist, and most times it takes years for a woman to muster up the courage to leave an abusive husband or boyfriend for good. Even if that happens, women still need years sometimes to really be happy again. Those emotional scars carry over and affect future relationships for years to come.
There's no way for me to know or find out if anyone reading this post is currently in an abusive relationship, but if you are out there, let me say this: There is hope. You CAN get out. You may think you're in love with this person who beats you and/or calls you all sorts of horrible names, but you're really not. You're in love with a fantasy, an idea of what you think this guy could be like if he'd just stop hitting you. You may think you're trapped with him because you have one or more kids with him. The reality is he won't be a good father to his kids if he doesn't respect you. And if your kids see how he treats you, they'll think that behavior is acceptable later in life. You wouldn't want a son of yours to grow up beating his future wife or girlfriend, and you wouldn't want your daughter to be a human punching bag either.
As tough as it might be to talk to a family member or close friend about such a relationship, the potential end results more than justify the actions. If you need a stranger to talk to - and I understand how talking to a stranger who isn't personally invested can be beneficial at first - there's a great website for the National Domestic Violence Hotline (http://www.thehotline.org/). Give them a call.
And if you're abusing your wife or girlfriend and reading this, there is also hope for you. Beating her doesn't make her want to submit to you; it makes her afraid of you. You aren't a "real man" if you hit your wife or girlfriend, and no amount of money or gifts will make things okay. The only time it's too late to change your ways is if your wife or girlfriend ends up like Amber. Deep down you may truly love your wife or girlfriend, and she may still forgive you for what you've done if you show her you're willing to change.
The small comfort to Amber's story is that police have already arrested her boyfriend and charged him with second-degree murder. Still, I can't fathom what her father would have said or did when he got the call about her. How does any parent handle outliving their own child? How do they avoid going berzerk and seek some kind of vigilante revenge? I'm only an uncle, and I can tell you that if my niece was ever beaten by some boyfriend of hers, nobody would find that kid's body. I pray that Amber's family does eventually find some source of comfort in this ordeal; perhaps knowing that the man who killed her has already been arrested and faces murder charges will work towards bringing closure.
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