Feeling trapped is only in our own mind

Over the years, I've observed many of my friends in their relationships.  I've seen happily married, not so happily married, miserable, inequitable, brow beaten, emotionally deprived, physically deprived, worshiped, spoiled, treated with respect, mistreated all around...well, basically, I've observed everything and in various regions of the country and even the world.  It's kind of hard to tell someone they should or shouldn't be in a relationship when no two relationships are exactly alike.  I might tell one of my best friends what I honestly think.  But someone who is a friend or casual acquaintance?  I'll probably be more likely to tell the casual acquaintance than the friend.  The truth is a lot of people don't want to hear the truth from their friends, let alone their best friends.  I even, and God knows a couple of them read my blog, will pull punches with my best friends.  Sometimes, you're not ready to hear the truth, no matter how open minded you are to your friends opinions.  But this isn't about friendship...well, not exactly.  It's about relationships and deciding what is intangible.  

See the problem is that most of us are truly on our own when we are trying to decide on what is or isn't good for us in a relationship.  People always have an opinion, but as the saying goes "everyone has one".  It's actually easier to see what is going on from the outside looking in, always.  The fish never has a clear view of the world outside the fishbowl.  Of course, there's an irony behind that saying too.  Truth is there is never a 100% clear view of what is inside the fishbowl either.  The nature of curved glass doesn't allow for it.  Our minds adjust what we are looking at and focuses on what we see as the fish and ignores the bends caused by the glass.  Honestly, that is exactly the same with anyone's advice on a relationship we may be in.  Their view of our relationships is skewed with their own experiences, both in their lives and with our significant other.  They may have very positive experiences with an abusive spouse and find it difficult to picture the abuse that is going on.  Or they may have a very negative view of the person and it negates any positive that they may see.  Generally, when listening to advice, I try to only listen to those people who are looking at the good and the bad equally.  Of course, for them to be able to do that, they really have to know what actually is going on in the fishbowl.  The only way that happens is if the fish shares the view--in our cases, verbally.  Only our children observe what we actually live through.  So advice is only as good as we can communicate ourselves.  

Of course, nothing speaks louder from someone that we don't know very well than their own experiences in their own relationships.  I know a lady who dated a man who moved in with her when he got thrown out of where he lived.  It was, according to her, supposed to have been a temporary arrangement.  He was lazy, worked only half days, bitched and whined and complained about money while basically never helping with any bills.  She had felt trapped and yet saw no way out.  When she finally was free of him, rather than feeling a sense of loss, she felt a sense of relief.  Her observations were that a lot of men are like this guy--mooching off of women and treating them like crap.  Basic psychology 101:  people that take advantage of someone must keep the person feeling insecure.  That was what he had done to her and her observations of the men that she has perceived as taking advantage of other women are probably fairly accurate.  Except most men are probably not like that.  No one, male or female, is like all others.  Her story was not meant as advice.  It was a story of her experience and nothing resonates louder.  

A good friend of mine has been in a miserable marriage for years.  She would often tell me to get out of this relationship or that relationship.  It's not hard to dish out advice when you've been so brow beaten over years and years to feel that you have the market cornered on advice.  She's not the only friend that I have like this, although I've realized for all her talk, her advice is basically worthless.  She's still in that miserable marriage and it's because she truly does love her husband.  "True love trumps all," Grams used to say.  Yep, awesome, good, bad and downright ugly--it sure does.  But it also means that if that love is that strong, we're going to be willing to put up with a lot more crap than we would normally and some people will put up with so much crap as to make everyone else wonder what the hell is wrong with them.  While her husband can be a very wonderful guy every once in a while, most of the time she lives on pins and needles.  Her advice to me, in pretty much every relationship I have ever had, is run like hell.  But it's so difficult to take her advice seriously...she's still there.  So what's more important in those cases?  Well, their advice is completely opposite of what they are doing, so it's that they are trying to advise based on what they probably know now that they should have done a long time ago.  They just lacked the strength to do it.  

My Grams, God rest her soul, used to say "no woman needs to be under a man's thumb" because that was what her generation "had fought for".  That fight still goes on and on.  My Grams was a strong woman, amazing.  My Granddaddy was the most awesome man ever to me.  But that was years and years after making my Grams, the most awesome woman ever to me, as miserable as miserable could be.  The skeletons in family closets, particularly before women could get divorced and child support, are probably scarier than any horror movie that Rob Zombie can dream up.  A little known fact, at least to most of the people that knew my grandparents, was Grams tried to divorce Granddaddy in the 1950s.  Basically, my Granddaddy was a complete asshat to my Grams.  He was an abusive drunk.  In today's world, my Granddaddy would probably have ended up in jail for domestic violence against both his wife and children.  Grams, unlike many women of her time, did not medicate to cope with his indiscretions, his drunkenness, his cruelty or abuse.  Grams used to say that the women that medicated were far worse off, which was probably true.  The drugs they used back then were highly addictive and often permanently mind altering.  Of course, my grandparents had 5 kids and there was no spousal or child support when most women didn't work or make enough to help support themselves, let alone their children.  My Grams could teach, but a teacher couldn't make enough to support 5 kids.  The judge told my Grams that he would have to take 3 to all of her children, because he would not order any kind of support.  He also was kind enough to point out that as a divorcee, my Grams would not be likely to find a teaching job.  After all, who would want a divorcee teaching their children?  It could permeate society.  So my Grams, this strong, independent, abused woman, relegated herself to the life chosen when my Granddaddy first courted her.  My Granddaddy always seemed to treat my Grams like gold.  Of course, over the years, he got older and eventually more dependent on her to take care of him.  Yet, on his death bed, literally 3 days before he died, he told her she could have her divorce now.  In a moment of triumph, she simply told him that he was going to die and she would live another 10 years to enjoy everything that he "had worked so hard for".  My Granddaddy might have been the most awesome man to me, but years and years of abusive behavior towards my Grams were not able to make him awesome overall.  My Grams only told me this story when she thought I had gotten into a relationship that I was feeling trapped in.  Feeling trapped is no longer a judge telling a woman, or man for that matter, that we are stuck and cannot go anywhere.  Feeling trapped is only our own mind's eye.  

What does this all add up to?  Well, there's no reason for anyone to put up with someone putting them down.  My Granddaddy was verbally abusive more than anything, my friend's husband has been both physically and verbally abusive--yet, verbally was more constant and daily, and the acquaintance was purely abusive--or she doesn't want to share the physical abuse part of it.  Physical abuse is unacceptable and we all know it, whether we are the victims or the perpetrators.  But verbal abuse is damning.  It is one of those things that cannot be seen visibly.  It changes a person--it weakens them, it makes them guarded, it puts them on edge.  It can make the fishbowl a very dark place and no one should have to live in that dark place.  Obviously, there is a strength that someone develops over time--like Grams or the friend I referenced.  Still in reality, no one should have to live that way, be broken down and then have to dig deep to find their own strength.  The truth is that not everyone finds and develops that strength and it should not be necessary.  This applies to men just as much as it does women.  Maybe true love does trump all, but it should never trump someone treating one of us like a lower class human being for whatever pathetic reason they can come up with.  That trap may start of their making but after time we can only blame ourselves if we stay in a relationship like that.