Hope In The Woods

It was a decision I had to make and the only option I was left with. Leaving my infant daughter with her abusive father sounds counter intuitive, but when my phone was taken from me and every attempt I had made to escape with her or call for help was thwarted by him body slamming me to the ground with her in my arms, the safest way for her, the safest way to freedom was for me to flee.

Shuddering between sobs, I pushed the wet clumps of hair from my eyes. A large buck flashed in front of me. My bare foot slammed on the breaks as the buck and I momentarily seemed to rotate around one another in a dance, both of us running for our lives.

With a shakey hand I fastened my seat belt and I pressed on ignoring the throbbing pain coming from bite marks on my right cheek.

I arrived at the police station in a thin tshirt and joggers. I remembered a pair of wool clogs in my back seat and stumbled through the entrance arms folded in front of my braless chest.

Two officers slowly approached a sobbing red faced woman.

“Ma’am do you need an ambulance?”

“My baby needs help!” Is all I could blurt out.

They sat me on a bench as the events of the night spilled out of me in spurts.

“Where did he hurt you?” They asked

“Everywhere.”

The ambulance arrived. My arm was splinted and my bruised neck put in a brace. I recognized the EMT. I think we went to highschool together. The bumpy trip felt eternal as I repeatedly asked about my baby.

I had heard a woman’s voice on the officer’s radio “do we have consent for forced entry?” I nodded to the officer and I exhaled when he replied “affirmative”

The exam room filled with nurses. The questions were endless and when I described what I endured the room went silent. An officer seated next to me questioned me for the next hour and I thought only of Astrid. I was handed a phone. The town sheriff told me my daughter was safe and was being carried to the ambulance while we spoke. I heard her little cry and sobbed awkwardly with the neckbrace in place. The questions continued endlessly as the nurses cared for me and told me it was time for my CT scan. As my bed was wheeled down the hall I saw a cluster of cops huddled around my child and heard her coos. I struggled for a glimpse of her as I passed by. Again, I wept.

As the giant donut shapped CT machine rotated around me, I closed my eyes. The red lights flashed around me and the machine hummed.

Memories of the night replaying juxtaposed to memories of what seems like a different person. I recalled the pain of my hair being gripped by the scalp and head repeatedly being slammed against a wall. I replayed the moment I was curled in the fetal position, my daughter held against my chest, while her father repeatedly kicked my back. His mouth pressed to my ear screaming obsenities and verbal abuse. “I AM NOT YOUR RAPIST” he screamed while bending my legs back towards my shoulders. Astrid and I both wept in fright.

Then a memory of him tenderly wiping my brow during labor offering me a drink of water between pushes.

I felt the memory of choking on my own spit as he strangled me an eternal 15 seconds. I kneed him in the nuts, but that was punished with my face being bitten til my skin broke and my arm being twisted unnaturally, awkwardly, and painfully begind my back, while I held onto my screaming daughter with all of my strength with the other.

A memory of our first kiss.

Then the dehumanizing moment he called me a whore. He pushed my thighs open near my hips with all of his weight. He pushed them until they couldn’t open further and I heard a painful “pop”. He said I didn’t deserve to raise our daughter and that she would be a slut like me as he digitally penetrated me over my jogger pants.

Memories of him holding our daughter while she cooed back at his smiles.

I thought about how he abused me JUST enough where I usually never had bruises. No evidence. And yet the acts were horrendous.

I took a breath bringing myself to the present qnd said “STOP. We need to stop”

After confused and frustrated nurses tried to suggest I go on with the exam, I explained my neck wasn’t badly injured and that what I needed was to hold my daughter. After a long back and forth, The doctor okayed my decision. After another hour of questions and forensic medical photos of my body, my sleeping baby was placed in my arms. The doctor examined her and told me she was healthy and unscathed aside from some minor bruises and abrasions.

I asked the officer if her father willingly gave her to them. He paused before explaining “it’s my understanding she was left alone on the changing table naked.”

I felt my heart break and chest tighten. I couldn’t breathe thinking of how scared my baby was. They could hear her crying from outside the house when they arrived and kicked in that door to get to her. They changed her diaper, they clothed her, and wrapped her in her pink blanket. I can only thank the gods that she didn’t roll off the belly high changing table to her death.

The moment before I fled, I knew I had to subdue him during his assault. I reasoned with him that I just had to change her diaper. He pried my arms apart as I clung on for life, but he was stronger than me. She tumbled from my arms from the distance or me crouching above the carpeted floor and he snatched her away taking her to her nursery to change her.

My one chance. He didnt know that I had stashed my car keys in the diaper bag earlier. I ran. I ran like a bad dream where your body feels strange and your feet cant move fast enough. He was at my heels and I lunged into my car. I wasn’t fast enough. My door swung open before I could shut it and he held it open as I tried to reverse. “If you run over my feet, I will tell the police you attacked me!” He shouted. I laid on the horn feeling thankful in that moment for my nosey neighbors. He stepped back returning to the house. I drove off not caring that my windshield was frosted over.

Knowing that he made the decision in that moment to leave her on her changing table with her dirty diaper beside her when he fled. Knowing he couldn’t take a moment to put her safely in her crib, is what angers me the most.

By the time my daughter was put in my arms, it was 6 am. My mother picked me up from the hospital and took us to the house to pick up some things. He returned my phone to it’s usually spot under my pillow and had left a text message on it at 3 am reading “how’s our little bean? 🥺😘”. Was he attempting to fabricate a scenario reading that it was I who abandoned our infant daughter and he had never been there?

I was notified that he was in police custody. In an effort across two counties, he was found an hour outside of town at a hotel. I felt like I could breathe again.

We are safe. But I feel shame. I feel fear of judgement, Of friends and family “I told you so’s” of blame. This isn’t the first time he abused me, but it was the worst time. Abuse is slow. Abusers are charismatic and charming. They love bomb you with affection and grand gestures following their gaslighting. They find ways of gaining control over you financially and emotionally. We all say “ that would never happen to me.” Surviving abuse is not a reflection of our strength or intelligence. We are not weak nor naive for trusting someone to not harm us. If you are being abused, you are not alone. People care and there are resources to help.

Carved cow skull by Sylvan Bones (me)