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(November 18, 2010) There is so much promise in a new romance. Courting is fun and exciting. A wedding day can be filled with such joy and hope for the future. And yet one-half of all American marriages end in divorce. Recent research shows that only 40 percent of those couples who do stay together are happy about it. And sometimes things get physical.
There are usually early warning signs of trouble. There can be an unsympathetic attitude toward another’s feelings, or a tendency to unilaterally override a spouse’s wishes. Verbal abuse is a common prelude, or jealous fits — even a brief show of violence that is brushed aside with pledges that it won’t happen again.
But sooner or later it does happen again. One in four American women is a victim of domestic violence during her lifetime, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Ninety percent of domestic abusers are men, and 50 percent of those men also abuse their children. It is a hidden national epidemic, but it is especially concentrated here on eastern Long Island.
“There is a direct correlation between people losing their jobs, people losing their homes, and family violence increasing,” said Jeffrey Friedman, the executive director of the Retreat domestic violence services on Goodfriend Drive in East Hampton. “In the last 12 months we have seen a 56-percent increase in domestic violence service requests. Our phones are ringing off the hook.”
When people are under such stress, they turn to alcohol and drugs. Family violence increasingly emerges in desperate times. As a result, families that might never have known violence in the past now have police and legal involvement in their personal lives.
Stereotypical notions about abuse must be checked at the door, as domestic violence crosses all socioeconomic lines. It affects the wealthy and well educated as well as the poor. There is no typical profile of the perpetrators; they come from all walks of life.
Heroin is now the hot topic across Long Island. Though people will talk about heroin, they will not talk about domestic violence. Perpetrators as well as victims feel tremendous shame, and so the abuse is carefully kept behind closed doors.
Domestic violence is all about control — controlling the victim, controlling the finances. Victims will tolerate much abuse to continue to have access to property, food, and money. They need clothes, shelter, and support, especially in this bad economy. Many victims are seduced by an abuser’s apologies and remorse, only to have the violence return again.
There is also a sense of failure for many women when they consider leaving a relationship. Where alcohol, substance abuse, and violence are almost glorified in society for men, the role of the forgiving caretaker is often the heroic path for a woman. It may be hard for her to surrender that role.
Seventy to 80 percent of abusers saw their fathers beating their mothers when they were children. Many were beaten themselves. It is something familiar, almost expected. That does not excuse the behavior; it only helps to explain the cycle of inheritance. Sixty percent of those at the Retreat’s shelter are children under the age of 14. With intervention and proper support, they do not have to be part of the next generation’s pain.
Mr. Friedman confirms that there are hard data to support the notion that the East End has more domestic violence than other parts of the state. Though it is considered rural, there were nearly 5,000 incidents of domestic violence in the region in 2009, far outnumbering other areas per capita. The Retreat alone received about 2,000 calls last year on its hot line.
Challenges for victims of violence on the South Fork include limited public transportation, limited affordable housing, and geographic isolation. Many victims must be transported out of state to protect them from their abusers. Some have to be given new identities and new Social Security numbers.
Protecting abused families is not entirely safe work — threats of violence hound the Retreat. There are on average two violent threats against the organization per week, with the facility having to go on security lockdown, including heightened police surveillance, about once every couple of months.
The Retreat works closely with schools, substance abuse programs, mental health providers, youth services, and East Hampton Town’s human services division. The police departments are vital allies for the Retreat.
“We are very fortunate to have a chief of police in the Town of East Hampton who is tremendously supportive of what we are doing,” Mr. Friedman said. “Chief Ecker has made it a priority for the town and works very closely with our staff to protect the residents of the community. The police and judges are doing a terrific job.”
Despite the obvious importance of this work, funding for domestic abuse services is in peril more than ever. “We have seen our government funding cut and private donations drop at the same time that we have a big increase in demand for our services for women and children,” Mr. Friedman told me. “It’s the worst financial pinch I’ve seen in my 20 years in social service. We really need help.”
Victims of domestic violence cost the national economy over $1 billion in direct medical expenditures per year. Sixty-nine thousand people access domestic violence services each day, yet 10,000 people per day cannot receive help because of a lack of funding.
“All that is required for evil to prevail is for good men to do nothing,” said the Irish statesman Edmund Burke. It can always be somebody else’s problem, somebody else’s responsibility. The Retreat gives women and children hope — a map for how to stay safe in the short term and for how to be safe in the long term. There is another way for these victims to live.
On one normal day in America, four women were murdered, two women miscarried as a result of domestic violence, seven children were murdered by their fathers, and seven babies were born to mothers living in shelters.
In the words of Gen. Napoleon Bonaparte, “There are only two forces in the world, the sword and the spirit. In the long run the sword will always be conquered by the spirit.” Only courage to make a change can break the cycle; only courage can lift that conquering spirit.
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The Retreat’s 24-hour help hot line can be reached at 329-2200.
