Physical abuse gets all the press. We can see the cuts, bumps and bruises. We have heard the excuses that the victim gives for her, or his black eyes as walking into doors or cabinet panels. We can tot up the days off sick, but psychological abuse is harder to quantify. Most people couldn’t even describe what it is.
According to Wikipedia encyclopedia, it is a form of emotional abuse that is caused, usually by a person, group or organisation in a position of control against another person or persons in a position of dependency. It is generally practised as a non-physical form of abuse, but its effects can be just as devastating, or worse than physical harm.
In my neighbourhood I am witness to an on-going situation by two families who live on either side of me. In the one home, consisting of six adults and four children, everybody screams at one another. They don’t seem to know what normal volume is, and the way that they get their point across is to shout the loudest. Those people are simply nuts, although I have learned to get used to them.
In the other house it’s a very different, and far more serious matter. It is so serious that I wonder whether I am watching the commission of a crime in slow motion.
The situation is that a father lives with his 31 year-old daughter, who has the mentality of a 7 year-old. The father is totally incapable of dealing with her, as she is very hard work. At times she will simply burst into tears and get into a binge of crying and no-one can do anything to get her to snap out of it. The family bought her a goat as a pet that seemed to work wonders on her temperament. It was something that she could love and focus on, but then one day its usual cries were no longer heard. Seems as though they ate it.
She lived at home with her mother, father, and brother. Recently, her mother died and the brother moved out, leaving just the father and the girl to survive. The father always left the girl to her mother, and now not only does he have to fend for himself, he has to care for the girl who really should be in social services care. Why no-one in the extended family seems to be trying to bring this about is hard to explain. In case I’m wrong I apologise, but it is my belief that nothing is being done to alleviate the situation.
Every day brings more screaming and bullying from him, and more crying from her accompanied by vomiting. I could not be paid to enter that house, it must be in such a state.
The harassment goes on for hours, although there is no indication of physical abuse. Her crying is really something awful to hear. It’s of the wailing-retching type, overlaid by the bellowing of her father.
My question is how will this all end? Does he have an agenda? Is he trying to get her to take her own life? I hardly think she could work out the details. She must live in a state of constant terror, yet here is Spain so many people yell and scream at one another as a matter of course, there would not appear to be any laws being broken that would merit the intervention of the police.
For we foreigners, this is a very frustrating state of affairs, but one in which we have no justification to intervene. The girl has family who are all aware of the situation. None of the relatives want to take her because she will turn their lives into a living hell. She’s the responsibility of her father and he is stuck with her.
I can only hope that social services will somehow be called in to assess the situation and to take her away to a kinder care environment than her father can give. Meanwhile, this continues as the worst case of psychological abuse that it has ever been my misfortune to encounter.
Copyright © 2008 Eugene Carmichael
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