We Can Stop Domestic Violence. The Question is -- Do We Want To?

Domestic Dispute, Leads to SWAT Stand-off with Topeka Police Department

[Tell me, how in the hell a SWAT stand-off,  for four hours with police,  of a man who kicks the mother out of HER  home, locking her out from HER baby girl, and the Topeka Police (and Community) call this Domestic Dispute???  

We have become so complacent in our society with violence against women that the "violence" has been dropped from "domestic violence". There is nothing Domestic about violence against women and children. Drop the "domestic" and charge as any other person crime, e.g. assault, battery etc.

But now..... we have "Dispute" replacing "Violence"? This is an intentional minimizing from the top of the chain, fed exclusively to the sheeple --- whom sadly, seem to kool-aide drink into this whole mind control - or, is it really that we do not want to stop the violence?] Actions speak louder than words.

Kansas -- is always decades late in promoting the newest, and best standards and practices for victims of (domestic) violence. Profit Over Protection - The Industry Of Abuse.

Why they can not just drop the word "domestic" from the violence and prosecute accordingly, is beyond me or simple common sense. Currently the word "domestic" is a "get out of jail free" card, to continue to terrorize women and her children. 

Currently in local news, several KC, DV programs and agencies are WRONGLY implementing and touting the "Lethal Assessment Tool". An out dated and dangerous tool to use. I am like, come on already. Its not that hard.

Apparently, it is.

 Why common sense can not just be implemented in violence against women and children. the DV industry, the profits? For what ever reasons, they do not help women and children who are subjected to violence.

Perhaps maybe, rewriting simple common sense will work for Kansas. Please take note of the Quincy Solution.   

(Ok, Kansas. So there ya have it, again. Actual real solution to address actual real issues. Please follow a common sense approach, and truly offer real resources and real support to woman and children who suffer from violence, needlessly. The information about the Quincy Solution will be published Oct.1, 2014. I highly recommend that agencies purchase, disseminate and model their approaches along these common sense guidelines. It really is not hard to stop violence against women and children in Kansas. We just have to want too.)

The Quincy Solution Will End Most Domestic Violence

http://stopabusecampaign.com/the-quincy-solution

A solution pioneered in Quincy, Massachusetts and perfected in San Diego, California and Nashville, Tennessee will prevent domestic violence and domestic murder, saving American taxpayers $500 Billion every year.

The original Quincy Model involved strict enforcement of criminal laws, protective orders and probation requirements together with practices that made it easier for women to leave their abusers and a coordinated community response when they did.

There were a few cases in which the complaining witness stopped cooperating with the prosecutor after the abuser sought custody.  This did not derail the success of Quincy because this was still a rare tactic.

Today seeking custody to regain control over victims is a standard abuser tactic and the Quincy Solution cannot be successful without preventing this tactic from undermining the efforts to prevent DV crime.  This could be done by educating and training court professionals based on ACE, Saunders and other research.  Sadly many courts are very defensive about criticism. (and why profit heavily by selling abuse victims into slavery with their abusers -cd)

The Safe Child Act requires courts to reform their practices and stop sending children to live with abusers.  This is accomplished by making the health and safety of children the courts first priority and by specifically stating this includes circumstances where children are placed in jeopardy such as witnessing domestic violence or separation from primary attachment figure. 

The legislation would also require the use of genuine experts and promotes a multi-disciplinary approach.

Trauma-Informed Domestic Violence Services Special Collection

In the last few years there has been incredible research and medical identification of trauma and measurement on the brain. The ACE studies opened the door for a shift in paradigm in the treatment of trauma on childhood abuse and domestic violence, also coined “complex trauma”. Years of enduring trauma in the “fight or flight” survival skills, in the trauma informed care approach, treats survivors from a strengths perspective and not one of a “fix” psycho-analytical “old-psych-school-voo-doo”.

In my research with the “trauma informed care approach” in domestic violence, I am pleasantly surprised to see that most of the new best policy's and practices are driven from the survivors perspective. And yes, it all from the loss of battered mothers children to the abuser when they file for divorce. Below is the framework for advocates and for survivors. What stands out the most to me is that throughout there is always a self check for the professionals and the organizations to change to meet the needs of those women and children who have endured years of trauma and abuse. Mothers, use this information to assist those who advocate for you, in and out of family court. The trauma informed care approach should be implemented in every setting. I am excited about the shifts in the paradigm to the “whole” and or holistic approach to trauma, specifically, Interpersonal and Family Violence (IPV) domestic violence & child abuse. The pendulum is swinging back.

xoxo –C

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Trauma-Informed Domestic Violence Services Special Collection

Source: National Center Domestic Violence & Trauma

Building on over 20 years of work, the National Center on Domestic Violence, Trauma & Mental Health(NCDVTMH) has put into practice a framework that integrates a trauma-informed approach with a DV victim advocacy lens. This new 3-part Special Collection, developed by NCDVTMH in collaboration with the National Resource Center on Domestic Violence (NRCDV), reflects this integrated perspective and brings together the resources on trauma and trauma-informed work that are most relevant to domestic violence programs and advocates, along with commentary from NCDVTMH to assist in putting this information into practice.

Part I Understanding the Framework and Approach provides an overview of the framework and research supporting trauma-informed approaches to working with survivors and their children. Part II Building Program Capacity provides practical tools and resources on building capacity to implement trauma-informed programs. Part III Developing Collaborations and Increasing Access provides resources for building collaboration to ensure that survivors and their children have access to culture-, domestic violence- and trauma-informed mental health and substance abuse services.

“Using a trauma-informed approach has come to mean that everyone working in a service setting understands the impact of trauma in a similar way and shares certain values and goals, and that all the services and supports that are offered are designed to prevent retraumatization and to promote healing and recovery.”

Profit Over Protection - The Industry Of Abuse. Spotlight "Kansas Batterer Intervention Program"

Author Note: When I began researching this topic, it was to be a broad and national review paper. However, to show the different views of what researchers thought were important in the successes of this program, I came across my own state's Batterer Intervention Program (BIP). The more I learned, the angrier I became. Although the state of Kansas really sticks out in this particular profit over protection,  BIP -- the nation it's self uses funding for all sorts of so called BS. 

The bottom line is simple. What all the organizations, all the same ole same, all the (fill in the blank) are doing, and the new - take their place fatherhood initiatives, and their by-organizations, are doing,  is NOT working. It is time to stop profiting and start protecting. Until that time, if ever it comes, domestic violence will never end. As you can tell, it is only getting worst. No longer are their just "punches" and "slaps". We simply have "dead' and more dead. Women and her children, being murdered daily.

When will we finally say, "enough is enough?" Until that time, like that program below,  profit over protection is all that victims can expect.

(hat tip to joel - for the term "Profit Over Protection")

-Claudine

 

 Are Batterer Intervention Programs Reducing Domestic Violence?

        Courts often mandate that ‘convicted’ abusive partners attend “batterer intervention programs” in addition to serving a probation term. Throughout the past twenty years, alternatives to battering programs and batter intervention programs receive funding through local, state and federal agencies. The very name of these programs implies that they reduce domestic violence.

         It is the consensus across the board with experts and scholars in the field of Intimate Partner Violence, that these programs, by varying names, since their inception more than twenty years ago, are not treatment modalities, they do not cure, and that battering is not a mental illness. However, due to the lack of prosecutions and the lack of consequences to the batterer or perpetrator, the increase in the use of ‘batterer intervention programs” have been implemented by almost every State in an attempt to further follow up with the perpetrator as part of his probation requirements in a domestic violence conviction.

        However, the National consensus and final conclusions, from the large body of objective data, research and studies, as per the National Institute of Justice, The Department of Justice, The Office of Crime Victims and other Leading organizations is that; “Batterer Intervention Programs Do Not Change Offender Behavior.” The recent National Institute of Justice report isa compilation of data and research over the past decade and as a result, the report spurred a joint committee sponsored by National Institute of Justice (NIJ) and the Family Violence Prevention Fund (FVPF) to have an “Expert’s Round Table” meeting in December 2009. The resulting meeting published in 2010 “Doing the Work and Measuring the Progress: Batterer Intervention Meeting Report,” in which includes, executive order and further recommendations.

      One of the major recurring themes in the research is that there exists a gap between “what researchers emphasize when they evaluate batterer intervention programs” and “what practitioners consider reflective of their program goals and accomplishments.”

For example:

      Oddly, or not, during this research paper, there currently does not exist an audit report in the State of Kansas on the Batterer Intervention Programs. In fact my research shows that the Kansas States “Batterer Intervention Program” – adopted  by the  Kansas Attorney General’s Office, as the ‘model’ for Domestic Violence and Batterer Intervention (KS Attorney General, Victims’ Rights)’ is one in the same as the “Kansas Family Peace Initiatives” (FPI) founded entirely by one person with his private business attached to it. The FPI claims an astonishing “81% success rate” in their Batterer Intervention Program and they simply state: “our success rate has been verified by private sources retained by FPI.”

     Therefore, we are to take the ‘word’ of the Family Peace Initiative’s own agenda, and platform. An individual, not a group, but a business, in that “they” claim is so successful, although no objective data or empirical research can be found to verify this, even though it would be the only Batterer Intervention Program in the Nation, to claim an “81 percent success rate,” when the rest of the Nation shows none. This gives rise to a whole other set of ethical issues and questions.  In that, from the Family Peace Initiative website, (www.FamilyPeaceInitiative.com) “they” now offer --“paid for” expert testimony, “paid for“ expert training, to which the “husband and wife”  team are currently booking ‘training's’ throughout  Kansas and Texas at $300.00 per person with a thirty person cap per class.  This, is in addition to the money earned not only from Federal and State grants, funding for the program its self,but also from the public and the clients/perpetrators who are court ordered to attend.

       However, since the Judiciary and Criminal Justice system have failed and continues to fail victims of domestic violence, the Batterers Intervention Program is all that ‘victims’ receive in the way of any type of validation and nothing remotely close to justice. It is also another way to keep ‘eyes on’ the batterer, in alleged protections of the victim, for those very failures. Imagine what should be a prosecution and incarceration of a severe person crime, that now has moved to “treating the batterers” and not the victim.

     In conclusion, with the overwhelming research readily available nationally, it is more than clear that Batterer Intervention Programs have had ‘minimal at best’ to ‘absolutely no effect’ at all, on reducing violence against women. It is clear from reviewing other perpetrator/victim crimes that prosecution alone is the single strongest deterrent in reducing violence against women. So this begs the question, “Why are we funding yet another wasted program where we “think” we should “treat” a perpetrator versus “prosecute”? And, further harms incurred by sending out a false sense of security from the Judges, to the public, and the victims - by what is essentially, further silencing victims of domestic violence by “treating” the criminal as if it were a disease.

   Batter Intervention Programs do not decrease domestic violence. Yet there continues to be an increase in the use of ‘batterer intervention programs”. I believe this program needs to be tabled and other sources sought out and implemented to decrease domestic violence.

Further reading:

Works Cited

Babcock, J.C., C.E. Green, and C. Robie.“Does Batterers' Treatment Work? A Meta-Analytic   Review of Domestic Violence Treatment.”Clinical Psychology Review 23 (2004): 1023-1053.

Edleson, Jeffery, L,.“GROUPWORK WITH MEN WHO BATTER: WHAT THE RESEARCH LITERATURE INDICATES”, National Resource Center on Violence Against Women, February 2012.

Feder, L., and D.B. Wilson. “A Meta-Analytic Review of Court-Mandated Batterer Intervention Programs: Can Courts Affect Abusers' Behavior?” Journal of Experimental Criminology 1 (2005): 239–262.

Gondolf, Edward, W,. “IMPLEMENTING MENTAL HEALTH TREATMENT FOR BATTERER PROGRAM PARTICIPANTS: IINTERAGENCY BREAKDOWNS AND UNDERLYING ISSUES”, Violence Against Women (volume 15 [6], pages 638-655), Sage Pub June 2009.

Gondolf, Edward, W,. “THE FUTURE OF BATTERER PROGRAMS ~ REASSESSING EVIDENCE-BASED PRACTICE” National Coalition Domestic Violence Sexual Assault, April 2012

Hench, David,. “IS ANGER MANAGEMENT A REMEDY FOR BATTERERS? A FEDERAL BAN ON USING DOMESTIC VIOLENCE GRANTS TO FUND THE PROGRAMS RAISES SOME QUESTIONS”   Portland Press Herald, October 10, 2004. Web.

J, S., L. Feder, D.R. Forde, R.C. Davis, C.D. Maxwell, and B.G. Taylor. “Batterer Research Report”, U.S. Department of Justice, National Institute of Justice, June 2003, NCJ 195079.

Johnson, Carolyn, Y., “MOST MEN RE-OFFEND, SAYS STUDY OF BATTERING – LONGEST LOOK TO DATE PAINTS A DARKER PICTURE” The New York Times, Web. November 9, 2006

National Institute of Justice. “Batterer Intervention Programs Often Do Not Change Offender Behavior” Interventions: Batterer Programs, Web. Research Report 2009

Pamela C. Alexander,. “Stages of Change and the Group Treatment of Batterers” Final Report to National Institute of Justice, March 31, 2007

Perotta, Tom, MANY IN DOMESTIC VIOLENCE COMMUNITY QUESTION BATTERER INTERVENTION PROGRAMS, New York Law Journal Online, February 23, 2006.

Travis, Alan, “OFFENDERS’ ANGER CONTROL CLASSES HELP MAKE SOME MORE DANGEROUS; COURSES AXED AS RESULT OF MONCKTON MURDER INQUIRY ~ KILLER'S TRAINING HELPED HIM WIN RELEASE”, The Guardian, Web. Manchester, UK: April 24, 2006.

Zorza, Joan. “VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN – VICTIMS AND ABUSERS – LEGAL ISSUES – INTERVENTIONS AND TREATMENT”, Civic Research Institute, Inc., 2006

A Nation of motherless children?

A Nation of Motherless Children? | Janie McQueen, Author and Divorce Gamesmanship Expert

A Nation of Motherless Children?
http://janiemcqueen.com/a-nation-of-motherless-children/

"In some of the more severely manipulated cases, the tables were turned on mothers who sought to protect their children from abusive fathers; they were punished in family court and by the abusive parent.

Many are limited to a couple hours’ supervised visitation every two weeks. They don’t have the privilege of shaking on the bleachers with the rest of us, who naturally take such excursions for granted. Many times there’s a protective order that would keep them from attending even public events such as this, when all they long to do is see their children in action, and enjoy a game to break up a brutal week of missing their children.

...What kind of man goes to every length and expense possible to deny his children a healthy, some would say critical, portion of motherly love in their lives? Or not even that–what kind of man begrudges his ex any meaningful contact with her own children? Is this not evidence he could be lacking as a father? If not, why? Sorry about that failed relationship, man, but the children from it remain. Lucky you to have a magic wallet to make it all go away.

It’s time to stop treating kids as chattel instead of children."

Janie McQueen's Book on How Family Court Is A Game:
Hanging On By My Fingernails: Surviving the New Divorce Gamesmanship, and How a Scratch Can Land You in Jail

In this daring, groundbreaking book, journalist Janie McQueen unveils the truth behind the "new divorce gamesmanship"--vicious tactics that thrust victims into complex webs of legal tangles that destroy spirits and hobble divorce cases.

These surprisingly common--and legally deadly--ploys can and often lead to criminal charges and trials, lingering records, heartbreaking child custody battles, embarrassing distortion campaigns, and even unemployment as employers increasingly trawl the Internet for background checks.

Memories: Past, Present, Future

Leaving The War Zone: A Battered Mothers Memoirs For He Daughter

Chapter 8 Memories, Past, Present, Future

Mother, daughter and granddaughter.

A strong and powerful maternal bond created by God

for mothers and daughters only. 

 

A  Mother Hold’s

Her Daughters Heart Forever

   

 

Nineteen and half years, that’s how long I have lived in hell on earth. I was four months pregnant when I was first hit. Pregnant with my dear daughter at age 30 a pregnancy that I was told I could never get pregnant-- one I would never have, one that proved to be life threatening not only to my daughter but to myself. Then, throw in all the stomach punches…. And as the pregnancy continued the violence only increased. Until Rikki was taken emergency c-section, the Dr’s saying - about my daughter “prepare, she may not live, in fact it highly unlikely”. You did. All legs no brown fat and several weeks in the neonate intensive care unit. You lived.

After your birth, nothing else mattered. I was determined focuses like no other and hence began the next 18 years. My fight to be free of torture, to free my child to believe in a beautiful world to raise her with the goal that there is no limits to what she can dream what she can do and who she is.

The most special and most beautiful person, born out of the ashes of pain and suffering to be a wholesome, loving smart and wise person.

 

I try to write to you. I try. There has been such a ‘block’. Awhile back I threw all the documents of court litigation away. (Most never scanned as it happened before the age of technology.) It was all my life, it was you. It was painful all the pain all the truth all the lies, I disposed of. Literally it filled a semi tractor trailer, representing millions of dollars - that is plural the millions - of the fight for simple justice that never came. The whole – “The truth will always win” - never came. Not in the hell of the judiciary any ways. Please always believe what the heart tells you there is baby an Ultimate Justice, a beautiful Justice and that Justice is eternal.

With putting the legal away (that part of life now over) I am now able to look at my memories before we were separated. It doesn’t hurt like it did. In fact I even smile. It is as it should be.

 

You are 18 now, as of December 12, 2012 -- but still you will be trapped until age 23. That is when my Social Security Disability payments will run out for your dad - as payee to you, my dependent child. At this date the amount is about $800.00 a month. But in order for him to keep it he must keep you, and so you will continue school in a local community college, still living under his control, his transportation his, his, his, his…

One day, you will leave - but only allowed - when he knows without a doubt - that his control remains complete - and that you will never think to attempt to reach out to your mother. But you will think-- and once gone your mind will begin to question (yes I know and unheard of thing - dare to question - but is normal) as no longer will the ‘punishment’ for thinking about your mom be physically there. It will be subconsciously - scary at first, as you have been conditioned like “Pavlov’s dogs” to avert all such thinking. Evan Stark writes about this in Coercive Control.

Do not be afraid baby, but at the same time do not push it. Let it happen as it may, let your defenses block when it is too painful. And for many years this is what will happen.

I too, am going through that. I had to - many years ago pack up all your photos, all the memories and store them in a place that was safe. Safe to not hurt me. Safe to survive, safe to continue the battle, to focus only on the task at hand. When I packed up all the legal documents unknown to me, eventually I was able to look at your photos, and was able to really see past all the red hot pain. I am currently trying to get all this up on line along with all the home videos Granny made, I still cannot watch those, the pain torturous. But slowly – literally as the years pass they are getting there. My goal to have it all up by your graduation. ( I can always view on line via mobile technology from anywhere in the world)

When you turned 18 December 12. 2012 - It was and I really did not expect this - was my freedom. The titanic was no longer chained to my neck; I no longer was gasping holding my head up for each and every breath. It felt good. To the normal person it would be like the child has grown, now let her go and let her spread her wings and fly--- fly high, fly free. Our mantra baby from all those years ago and here it is back again. It’s the beginning of your life and the last that I will be able to even watch you from a distance, like I have watched you grow quietly from the sidelines, just a blurred face, a stranger who was always there at all your events. Me - Your mother.

High School Track will be coming soon next month; I will be at every single track meet. Your last of High school. I plan to stay throughout them all - in years past the physical pain many times had forced me to leave before the end - most meets out of town lasting 8 hours on a cold hard bench. Since my lower back was kicked out of place, the vertebrae not breaking only twisting the pain of sitting standing becomes too much. But this year, I will sit front seat front row at all track meets.

After all, the last time I see the most beautiful woman in the world, my precious, my heart, my every breath - my daughter.

Then in May 2013 - your high school graduation. Again, I will be on the front row. I will not cower nor be intimidated or frightened. With your graduation a set of luggage, a new international cell phone, my 3 T external drive. I hope as well to finish the collage you and I started. It got ruined but will hand clean each and every image you and I placed then use new clean clear Hodge- Podge (the stuff I placed on it turned everything cloudy white L ) Not thinking how important they were – memories- I had mostly blown it off, I know that now they need preserved and finished with love.

When I met you in the parking lot of your school (27 seconds - after so many years of no contact) and gave to you all the stuff you had asked me to keep safe for you from all these years gone by – years before all our contact was ended, (you smiled like you would at a family reunion when meeting an uncle bob who gave you something— someone you may have met once in your life when you were 6) you were polite and with a smile you accepted your gift box….. all your stuff from granny - well the important limited edition stuff, heirlooms.

This is when I realized that you too had absolutely no memory. Of not of just the decades past but even from just a few years ago.

In talking with another mother who had contact w her daughter and even regained custody of her daughter, her daughter too has absolutely no memory of even a few years ago. This mother’s daughter started college out of state, the mother worried that the memories will come and incapacitate her. I thinking of you and even worst, no contact for the better part of the last 10 years of your life. No just hanging out with your mom, talking, laughing, shopping—doing everything and nothing, things that most mothers and daughters have. Each other.

You were denied that. I had not died, so even worst to keep us apart words, hate and shock conditioning were implemented from the time my baby you were taken from your mother at age 6.

It was never that we feared each other—it was the fear of the punishment of seeing each other that we knew would happen. We feared it.

Again Evan Stark’s coercive control – that power of consequence, even when no longer does it exist—well for you now it does, but one day it will not, but the stripping of that autonomy will remain. You can read much about coercive control on the internet. I have met w Evan he is an amazing person. He also touches on the taking of a woman’s child as has happened with us as just one part of the coercive control. Human rights.

He explains where words cannot, it is not the single physical attack, and it is not so simple to just leave. It is a control that has never before been seen in any other crime victim, a control that long holds its victims’ across space and time.

 

The memories will come. One day. This is why I try to write now. So one day you can be validated set free from that pain. The mother above I was talking to - her daughter too. But she has her mom, although it is painful, when she should need to - her mother, she now knows and she will be ok.

My daughter, they have stripped away not only our autonomy but for you, all that is left is just another memory - of your mother. A memory that through the years has been chipped away and replaced with inaccurate and falseness. I can only say baby, that when you begin (and I will hopefully have released all else that holds me down by your graduation, will also mark the end and beginning for me) that I will be able to seriously leave the war zone and seriously write to my own distant memory. You my daughter.

I do not know you - but I do know the strength of the bonds of a mother and daughter. I know this from my own mother and I. We were the most close in the last 20 years, because of you J my momma was there when my heart opened, for the first almost 7 years of your life you were endowed with incredible beyond words, wise, compassion, strength wisdom and a love like no other.

 

I did not understand it then but my mother your granny had said “However you are at age 7 is exactly who you are as an adult” - this is your core platform. She was then preparing me for what she must have already foreseen… that we would not be together that justice would fail.

I miss my mom, I miss her terribly. Each spring I miss her more. As it always takes me to the ‘feel-good’ I had when we went home to Texas - cold in Kansas, swimming pool at granny’s J Home….. That’s where we were and the most peaceful time of my life, the constant laughter of you baby and granny, the amazing invisible but seen and amazingly felt - the strong bonds between you and granny. Two peas in a pod. Two hearts beating as one.

I know that all you had loved has been destroyed and replaced in your memories. I will try to put more up about the two of you—you and Granny. I think that your 1^st know is the fact that if you have ever been told and then viciously dislike or think how evil or dangerous any one from your maternal family is—know that the worst—is actually the best. The more you were taught to fear someone the more that someone is very important and is to you. I would use that as a guide.

Incredible isn’t it? I as an old lady now, a smart one, even a psych nurse, could I have imagined the not only current placement of the years of torture but even the decades later. For you, for myself, for what was your maternal family. All but gone now. Granny, great gramps J he loved you so much! You him lol.

Memories, they are important when the mind is ready. No hurry no worry, just know that I unconditionally love you. When you were born my life changed, once a mother ALWAYS a mother, nothing else matters… everything I had ever done in my life the very full life as when I turned 18 I too was set free… and Baby I lived my life—the world was mine and I experienced it 100x more than the normal person… If I thought about something—I did it. J As for you my daughter - I wish this.

The sky is the limit!! I know that you recall that I used to sky dive… I know that for some reason you thought that was beyond cool. I guess looking back it was J but at the time it was just yet another of the beautiful things I experienced because I thought about it.. Think you want to do that. And do it - I did. You think it - baby girl and then it is yours – do it. Live life it really is a most amazing venture.

 

Then one day (I pray- a very long time away) you will become a mother. J and all that you have done will still be memories and there but as a mother God has connected you to your child and a daughter mother bond is even more profound because we are the creators of life, a magic if you will made into us, mother is humanity, that’s just how God made us and really baby although our experience has been nothing except harrowing, that golden thread is still there and one day we meet again and no words will be needed. Like I and my mother, we just picked up where we were…. (I had stopped talking to my mother ten years prior to your birth—I don’t even know why—some silly stupid-ness that seemed important when I was a bratty kid through the years I had long forgotten why--) But when we did meet, and Rikki it was you my darling, nothing else mattered.

 

My mother was and is my very best friend. The last time I saw her, I was able to see her as not just my friend, your granny but as a mother herself. The wooden statute – (I gave to you in your b-day box) a tree carving --- from the same tree branching into a mother and another branch into a daughter was the last xmas gift she gave me before she died. Instantly I loved it – thinking of you and I—and although my beautiful mother loved her daughter—me--- as I love my daughter –you. She said “You know, I too am a mother who loves her daughter more than anything”. My most treasured of all—but knowing that I needed for you to have this – as with all granny’s heirlooms- it was time to give to you.

 

I will never forget the pain in her face when she gave it to me—not from the painful terminal illness that took her soon after. But of the pain she felt because she was powerless to stop the pain of her daughter. Myself. I boarded the plane to come back to Kansas to as granny said “Fight for my granddaughter”. That was the last time I saw her alive.

It was also the last time you and I -- 2^nd and 3^rd generation had any further contact.

Though out this past 18 years, we were allowed only a few supervised visits -in a year – many years not even that…. This is how you grew up. Perhaps with the paid hours of supervised visits maybe combined a Month? Then again perhaps not even that….. In all your 18 years.

But like granny said, we are bound and it is always there. All through eternity.

 

"Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the oppressed.

Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.

Sometimes we must interfere.”

- Elie Wiesel, Holocaust Survivor

www.AngelFury/org

www.AmericanMothersPoliticalParty.org

Claudine Dombrowski's Voice

The following was sent to me by a law student, she had chosen the battered mothers custody issue as topic for her paper. Thanks hon for forwarding the work of so many mothers with your paper we have forged out finally the Battered Mother and Custody Litigation. Thank you.! xoxo Claudine


Claudine Dombrowski's Voice