I'm glad I don't understand

Abusive relationships, thankfully, are fairly foreign to me. I do have the suitcases full of baggage from the emotional and mental abuse that I allowed (and occasionally embraced) in my life over the years, mostly from one or two people in particular. And I do understand how one can be so wrapped up in the need to be loved that they will endure just about anything to attain that. However, I have never suffered the kind of physical and emotional abuse that would land me in the ER. Thank God.

Maybe it's because any man I've ever been involved with, or been related to, has understood the rarely spoken rule I have about touching me in any way that I might interpret as hostile or threatening. Generally, I have only had to say it one time for the brevity of my statement to sink in. If you ever lay a hand on me in anger, it will be the last time you ever do. Now, for the sake of not incriminating myself should such a situation ever arise, I will leave it at that.

This ruined, pathetic wisp of a woman came in today. And we had to make her come, put her on a hold and everything. She didn't even have the self-preservation mechanism left to seek medical attention on her own for her severe head injuries, multiple new (and old) bruises, and bite marks. I guess she must have had some fight left in her at some point, because the white, frothy penile discharge of a husband she has had to tie her up at the crack of dawn to be able to beat her throughout the day. With his feet and closed fists and a metal pipe. As gut-wrenching as this was, what was worse is that the PD has been called out for the exact same thing more than once before. And each time, she refuses to go to the court hearings, to follow through with the charges.

After her story and the way she looked drove a number of us nurses to tears, there was one resounding theme that remained: maybe if we pooled our money, we could bail him out of jail....as much as nurses know about saving lives, it sure isn't a far stretch to know how not to. Watch out, all of you who think it's okay to hurt innocent people. Someday you will run into a person with a sense of justice that outweighs their restraint.