With courageous confession, the author describes her high school romance, laced with parental opposition, the pull of premarital sex, and an awareness of guilt before God. After less than a year of marriage to her high school sweetheart, when she begins to recognize her parents' concerns as valid, she meets a man who becomes a destructive force in her life. He encourages her to divorce her husband and instead, become dependent on him for emotional support. With painful honesty she relates how he gains manipulative control over her emotions and moral standards. She joins him in defying biblical commandments and societal conventions. Readers who have suffered through failed marriages will understand her struggles. The author winds up her memoir by observing what in her background contributes to vulnerability and control by a man who seems to represent the devil. She tells how she eventually escapes from him and an emotionally abusive second marriage. She offers insight to parents and teens about both positive and negative relationships between them, and how those relationships powerfully influence the lives and marital decisions of young adults.

Impaled on the Horns Of the Devil

The Development of Vulnerability to an Abusive MarriageBy Barbara Boatright

AuthorHouse

Copyright © 2011 Barbara Boatright
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4567-5367-2

Contents

Part 1. Impaled ..............................................1Chapter 1. The Seduction......................................3Chapter 2. Coffee Klatch......................................6Chapter 3. The Storm, Inside and Out..........................11Chapter 4. From Around The Kitchen Table......................18Chapter 5. Johnny, On Campus..................................25Chapter 6. Married, At Last!..................................28Chapter 7. Finances...........................................32Chapter 8. Family, Now?.......................................35Chapter 9. Springtime In the Dunes............................39Chapter 10. Wintertime In Iowa................................43Chapter 11. Misery............................................46Chapter 12. Incompatibility Spring, 1951......................49Chapter 13. Divorce May, 1951.................................52Part 2. Impaled on the Horns ................................59Chapter 14. Sneaking Around...................................61Chapter 15. Valparaiso, Indiana...............................64Chapter 16. The Confrontation.................................68Chapter 17. The Explosion.....................................72Chapter 18. Independence......................................74Chapter 19. Counseling, Conflict..............................78Chapter 20. Counseling, Religion..............................84Part 3. Impaled ... The Escape................................89Chapter 21. Counseling, Moving................................91Chapter 22. Westward, Ho!.....................................95Chapter 23. Seattle, Washington...............................98Chapter 24. Aberdeen, Washington..............................103Chapter 25. Deep Sea Fishing..................................106Chapter 26. Getting Acquainted................................112Chapter 27. The Cake..........................................116Part 4. Impaled On the Horns of the Devil.....................121Chapter 29. Manipulation......................................126Chapter 30. Pike Place Market.................................130Chapter 31. Pizza?............................................135Chapter 32. Prelude to a Wedding..............................139Chapter 33. I Do, Again!......................................144Chapter 34. Downtown Aberdeen.................................148Chapter 35. Christmas Agony...................................153Chapter 36. Moving to Seattle.................................158Chapter 37. Facing Reality....................................163Chapter 38. The Phone Call....................................166Chapter 39. Suicides?.........................................170Part 5. Impaled, Interlude....................................177Chapter 40. Sue Takahashi.....................................179Chapter 41. Camp Minidoka.....................................184Chapter 42. Japanese Americans................................187Chapter 43. The New "Me"......................................190Chapter 44. Dungeness Crab....................................192Chapter 45. The Other "Me"....................................196Chapter 46. Happy Birthday!...................................199Chapter 47. The Letter Home...................................202Chapter 48. Now, That's the Life..............................205Part 6. Impaled, All Over Again!..............................209Chapter 49. Back Home Again In Indiana........................211Chapter 50. In a Dark Alley...................................214Part 7. Impaled ...In Conclusion..............................219Chapter 51. But Why, Lord?....................................221Chapter 52. My Hearing Loss...................................226Chapter 53. Teaching..........................................229Chapter 54. The Battleground..................................233Chapter 55. I Believe ........................................237

Chapter One

The Seduction

Wintertime, 1951, Gary, Indiana

His left arm brushed so lightly against mine that I knew it was an accident. We were sitting in a hot and stuffy classroom and it was filled with desks. Each desk had a small writing table attached to its right arm, and every one of the desks was filled with a student. Since we were very crowded, some physical contact was inevitable. I tried to ignore his elbow on my armrest, and to concentrate on what the teacher was saying. The teacher was very interesting, I told myself ...

* * *

I returned for the next class meeting and, as usual, I sat in a desk on the right side of the first row so that the teacher was speaking on my left and so that I would be able to hear as well as possible. That same guy sat next to me again, on my right. He made me nervous being there because my hearing was very poor, especially in the right ear. If he tried to talk to me I would have a hard time understanding him, and I'd be embarrassed, as usual.

Oh, well, we'll be so busy listening to the teacher that we won't have time to visit. Besides, what I had seen of him so far, I couldn't care less.

Some minutes later, after the teacher began talking, my neighbor shifted position in his desk, and he "invaded" my space again. I continued to look straight ahead, totally ignoring him and he seemed to ignore me. Finally, my curiosity got the best of me and I began to steal furtive glances at him, all of the time appearing to give my full attention to the teacher. He wasn't much to look at, really. He was kinda short, not at all muscular. His thin light brown hair hung limply but it was cut in a conservative manner. He wore dark dress pants and a muted colored sport shirt, when everyone else was wearing jeans and just plain tee shirts. He looked like he was a non-conformist and that he deliberately dressed differently than the rest of the fellows in the class. He concentrated so hard on the teacher, that I assumed he was a sincere student like I. I really wasn't interested in him, just curious, that's all.

* * *

In class several days later he touched my arm with his in a much more deliberate way. I became aware of a strange twinge every time he "accidentally" touched me. In my naiveté, I wondered what was going on, but I didn't do anything to stop it. This was something new to me, and in a strange way it was exciting. He always looked away, focusing on the teacher. He pretended to be totally unaware of me. Then he accidentally rubbed his elbow along the full length of my forearm that was resting on my armrest between us. I finally realized, because of my physical reaction and my involuntary blushing, that he was engaging in a muted form of very suggestive flirting, and that I was letting him do it! It seemed more exciting because we were so secretive; no one else knew it was going on, not even the teacher just a few feet away.

I was feeling like a silly little teenager. The truth of the matter was that this all was taking place in college, in a night school class, and that we had signed up to learn about abnormal psychology. I was on my way to learning first hand a whole lot more about abnormal psychology than I wanted, and I wasn't going to be learning a lot of it from the professor!

* * *

We began to visit out in the hall during...