I met a pair of bloodied shoes today and by the end of the day I needed a gun. A gun to put a bullet between my eyes to get me out of my misery! I work a little part time work at times and they just hired some new staff for the summer. I worked with one of the new girls today. As soon as we were introduced she began to vomit all over my shoes. Vomit her entire life history. I was a total stranger to her.
And it was not any old vomit, it was domestic violence vomit. In a nut shell she has been married 3 times and is in the process of getting a divorce from the third husband. She is a battered woman who stays long in the relationships that the husbands/fathers are hurting not just her but the kids. Obviously she has battered wives sydrome as she is repeatedly seeking out abusers in her relationships. The first husband kidnapped her and tried to kill her and the kids before she finally left. The 2nd husband took a baseball bat and bashed in the entire right side of her face and took if off with the beating he put on her skull with the baseball bat. She finally left after that and the threat to kill the kids. (She has kids from all the husbands. )
Bloody shoes has been living in fear of the2nd husband. He keeps hunting them down to kill them and she has to keep moving. She has moved about 15 times to get away. She says he does not know where she is now. (For NOW) She has just moved to the city she is in now. She has just moved from another state. The third husband, in a restaurant not too long ago, took a fork and opened up the left side of one of her kids. Just jabbed the fork in and began to rip open the childs side. For the other child he took a tray of hot food that was just delivered and poured that on the other child face and head. Bloody shoes has just moved away from that.
Now being a person who has a healthcare/social worker background, I am very used to dealing with domestic violence. However, having to hear stories from a total stranger for EIGHT solid hours was just too much. I could not get away from her. Our computers were right next to each other. I was trapped!
No amount of changing the subject worked. No amount of pretending not to hear her and to be engaged in thought at my computer would deter her. She would ask, if I just heard what she said. No amount of smiling and nodding worked either. Now people can spill their life secrets in a blog but that is a little different. You can choose to leave and not read. All I did was say hello and the spewing began!
The job was not the place for all that. It is very clear to me after listening she still has some serious issues. She say she is happy being alone and trying to provide some stability for her kids but unless she is getting some therapy the cycle is going to repeat again. And her therapy cannot be spilling her guts over and over again to evey coworker she comes into contact with. Plus the scariest thing Bloody shoes has said is that her 2nd husband has been hunting them for years and he keeps finding them. Can we say film at 11? Man with gun kills wife and innocent employees in rage of domestic violence.
These controlling men do not play around. I have had my share of them when I was a case worker dealing with women and kids who were living with domestic violence. They are crazy. Insane even. I even felt I was a risk doing a few home visits with some past clients of mine.
I am only hoping that she only tells her story once. I now know her whole life history and hopefully I will not have to hear that again. As far as her being on the job, I do not see her lasting too long. She has too may issues... Child care at night for her as she works full time at this place where I work part time and full time people have to work nights also. She was telling me about her sitter...who has a restraining order against her x husband. Bloody shoes is concerned about her kids being safe with the sitter because of the sitters x husband.
She is also concerned about the 3rd husband coming to get her also. She just has too much going on. I do not see how she will be able to focus on the job with all that personal drama happening. We can all have personal drama in our lives but you have to know when and how to keep that separate from work. Work is work and home is home. The only good thing out of meeting her today is that I have forwarning of a crazy man who might just show up with a gun at work looking for her.
What I do is kick them in the pants with a diamond buckled shoe!
~~Aileen Mehle~~
