A battered woman writes

[Erythronium]

Powerful and distressing. Women stay with men who beat them, because they're scared that if they leave, he'll kill them:

www.theparisreview.org/blog/2019/06/26/one-word-striking/

She's right, the most dangerous time is when you leave.

I wish more people would understand this.

"But why didn't she just leave?" gets said far too often.

Unless they're willing to stand between the victim and her attacker and take her beating themselves, they have zero right to ask that question.

I agree. There was a very good Panorama on a few years ago about DV and how the police used body-cams to gather evidence at the time they make the arrest.

A DV expert on there said "She can't leave - she might be killed" and made the point of coercive control preventing her leaving: "that's what 'control' means" So simple, and so true.

It's very very hard to get away from an obsessive manipulative abuser. Very hard indeed.

The part where she said she couldn't risk glancing at the door aka plan an escape route from the violence, was absolutely chilling.