AboutEugenia Springer, Ph.D. Expertise I can answer your questions on how to stop being a victim, and/or how to stop being an abuser. My ability to help you, however, would depend on your willingness to assume full responsibility for helping yourself.
Experience From the 1970s to the present, my life has been a search after knowing my purpose, knowing myself, and knowing God. I talk about this search in my 2002 book, "Further Insights Into the Journey".
After years of teaching biology at university, I became a radio Family Life Counselor, and a newspaper columnist, responding to callers on radio, and replying to letters from the public, in the newspapers.
My book for the adolescent girl, "Girl, It's All About You"(Review & Herald Publishers 1980, and out of print) was my attempt to marry my field of training--biology, and my adoptive field--interpersonal relationships.
"Further Insights Into the Journey" is about my search for personal freedom--a search for freedom from external controls; for freedom from fear. Through very instructive experiences, many sorely trying, I uncovered that freedom within me, and found myself progressively experiencing increasingly greater measures of peace.
To get your copy of "Further Insights Into The Journey" email me at hftpproductions@tstt.net.tt.
Currently I am the host and producer of two weekly call-in radio programs. You can access our station online at www.power102fm.com. My programs are:
(1) "Life & Living/Soul to Soul", Wednesdays, 11:00 AM to 12:00 Noon; and
(2) DIALOGUE, Wednesdays 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM. DIALOGUE connects our national radio audience with our Trinidad & Tobago/Caribbean Diaspora, and other listeners beyond our shores.
Access Dialogue by going to www.power102fm.com from 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM local Trinidad and Tobago time on Wednesday nights. Communicate with callers and studio personnel through our message board; or call any of the four telephone numbers listed: Toronto, London, Miami, and New York. Call through the number nearest you.
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Question I have been married for 30 yrs...my husband has abused me physically, verbally & mentally. He has cheated on me more then once...I don't have the guts to leave him! First our children were small, then they grew up...we became grandparents we both loved our children and grandchildren. But I just can't take this I love you but I verbally and mentally abuse you get use ot it! Everything is under my name since, on his last affair we just about lost everything. We are now behind on everything almost 70,000 on debts...most on my name. I just about had it...don't have guts to commit suicide but have tried more then once. I don't know how to tell our friends, family and relatives since they see us as a happy couple and financially ok.
Help!
Thanks!
A desperate Grandma
Answer Dear Anna,
What your family and friends think of you when you make decisions about your wellbeing is really their business, not yours. Your responsibility is to love, cherish, and honor this vessel, called your body, which is where the divine dwells.
You have survived, and for this you must be thankful, but you have paid a very high price for survival so far. You gave your right to be in control of your mind and body, to your husband, a man, who from what you say, has been incapable of managing his own life. If you ever have to give power to anyone, let that one be only God, not any human being. Your husband is abusive because he feels rotten about himself. He must feel like a nobody, unimportant, and weak. He should be in therapy. He needs to learn to appreciate his intrinsic worth. Because he feels weak, he looks for someone he could control so he could have a (false) sense of power. And you have fitted nicely into his need for someone to control, because you also have (wrongly so) felt weak.
You should have been talking with a Counselor, on a regular basis. It is not too late, but whether or not you talk with a Counselor, you have to make some changes. Nothing will change unless you do something differently, and I suspect that you have just about reached the stage where you realize that you DO have the guts to make some decisions in honor of yourself. You said, "I just about had it". You even tried to separate the Spirit from your body. That is plenty frustration.
Again, what your friends and family think is not part of this equation. You need, and deserve, to spend the last years of your life in peace, and you are capable of making a decision in your favor. Because you would need a social group to give you the support you need, I suggest, that even now, you join a church and get involved with a prayer group. Participate in their activities, and give yourself a life.
