Condensing The Story

I suspect that, even though I have been condensing the story of abuse that my sister has suffered at the hands of the “monogamists”, perhaps I have not been condensing the story enough. Mary-Beth’s life of suffering is very similar to the stories of other women living through abusive situations, so perhaps I will shorten her story a bit more.

As food supplies became extremely low, Mary-Beth had to stoop to begging. She was still working part time, with the odd full day of work, but Lorne spent all the money on entertaining his friends. If she protested he would threaten to take the baby and leave her. So to get food, Lorne had her beg from their church. Even though their church gave them food, the food was not free. Mary-Beth had to work it off by doing odd jobs for the church. Now, she was working part-time for her uncle, part-time for the church, then going home and taking care of her daughter and growing a garden. It was too much and she was exhausted. The food that she begged from the church came with far too high a price tag. Every time she begged, she felt a piece of her break, and she would cry. She promised herself that she would starve before ever begging for food from the church again.

To some readers, this next thought may seem too extreme to be real, but just imagine having to live daily through abuse at the unrelenting hands of a “monogamist” sociopath.

After coming home from work one day, and seeing her child crying softly, Mary-Beth’s heart sand, and she quickly, but quietly because Lorne was in the room, asked what was wrong. Softly and abashed, the child whispered that she was hungry. With tears in her eyes, Mary-Beth went outside walking around and praying for food for her child. She was so distraught that she began trying to get up the courage to cut off one of her own fingers to make a soup to feed her child.

It is easy to starve yourself, but to stand by and watch your child starve will drive people to extreme measures. Those who are outside looking in, who have never lived through serious abuse, will never understand the oppression and fear that a victim lives through.

At this time something changed inside her and she broke again. She knew that if she went back to begging from their church, that she would be controlled and humiliated by them, and they would treat her as if she were worthless. She would have to spend even more time away from her daughter. And she could not bring herself to sell her body, though the thought was more acceptable than being sold into slavery to her "monogamous" church.

Then she happened to notice the wildlife all around her, so she decided to learn to hunt. She knew it was against the law to poach, but she did not know what else to do. Eventually though, she did get her hunting licenses and hunted legally for the most part.