Getting back on your own two feet

BY JULIE ASH

At 16, Bernice Morris appeared to have the perfect life. Growing up in the seaside holiday town of Narooma in New South Wales, she was a straight-A pupil and had just starting dating one of the hottest rugby league players around.

Gary, a tall, well-built 21-year-old, appeared to be every girl's dream. But for Bernice he was a nightmare in disguise. After knowing each other for a year, they moved in together and her life went from carefree innocence to one of constant fear, never knowing when the next blow to the head, bash to the face or body slam was going to come. Things got so bad she cried for him to end her life when he put a gun to her head during a heated row.

But her story has something of a happy ending. She escaped her abuser 10 years ago, moving to Wellington with her two children.

But many others are not so lucky. Last year at least 41 New Zealanders died at the hands of family members. The Government acknowledges family violence is a big problem in New Zealand and has spent $12 million on a four-year "It's not OK" campaign to raise awareness.

New advertisements have just been introduced, encouraging family and friends to help when they know someone is in a violent situation. Campaign spokeswoman Gael Surgenor says research shows people often want to help but are not sure how to. "Some of that is breaking down the notion that it's private and that people don't have social permission to ask the question are you OK?"

Detective Sergeant Penelope Gifford, head of the Wellington family violence team, says the campaign appears to be helping, with more and more victims coming forward sooner.

"We are still seeing homicides nationally but people's willingness to talk and seek advice means we are now seeing people that would have never spoken to the police before coming forward – people we would have visited that would have shut the door in our faces.

"The high-end serious stuff we believe is reducing and we are getting a lot more of the lower end. Police being engaged or parties are being engaged before it gets out of control and that's exactly what we are wanting."

Unfortunately that wasn't the case for Ms Morris, now 37. It took her 10 years to break free. "In the initial years I stayed because I thought there was hope and I loved him. There were good times and in those good times it was really good. We were a great family.

"At the start it was just things like stopping me from having male friends. He would say: `Oh, they are not good for you, they will try and break us up'.

"Then it went on to telling me what to wear. `Don't wear that or you don't have to dress up in that, you don't need to wear makeup'.

"He always wanted me to wear track pants and a T-shirt and no makeup. I would really get into trouble if I was wearing makeup."

Ms Morris said she would never forget the first time he hit her. "He knocked me to the ground and just walked away. I remember thinking what happened there, why did he do that? Then I sort of justified it and thought, OK, maybe I pushed him too far. I shouldn't have said what I said, don't push him so far next time."

The beatings increased from one a month to three or four a week. Anything would fire him up. "Jealousy was huge. If I went to the supermarket and the person serving me was male and asked how my day was and I had a conversation with him that would get me a hiding."

The births of their two children – in 1992 and 1997 – provided no reprieve. She recalls a time when she asked him to go with her to pick up their daughter from her stepmother's, so they could have a bit of family time. He wanted to go to the pub so yelled at her to "shut your mouth" and "don't tell me what to do". He then punched her so viciously that her front teeth were knocked out and she suffered a shattered nose, a fat lip and two black eyes. "He said to me: `See what you made me do ... if you had just shut up'."

She had to go to hospital and told doctors she had been struck in the face by a car door.

"In the initial stages he would come back and say he was sorry, but he never meant it. There were nice times in between the abuse but towards the end those nice times disappeared and it was just all abuse."

The turning point came when police were called to their home after neighbours complained one day about the racket. A police officer took her aside and told her they knew what went on in her home and they were "prepared to one day find her dead".

Ms Morris and her children took shelter in a women's refuge. She then moved a good seven hours' drive away to Erina, north of Sydney.

But Gary wasn't ready to surrender his family just yet.

"One day he just arrived with his bags and said, `Let's have a fresh start'," she said. "I was lonely, it was a new town and I didn't have any friends and when he arrived it was a bit of adult company. He said: `Tomorrow we can take the kids out, I can get a contract up here, this could be a new start for us'."

She agreed and the pair got back together. But Gary's promises went by the wayside and the abuse started again – more physical than ever. It wasn't until her mother, who was living in Wellington, persuaded her to bring the children to visit her that the cycle was finally broken. "The minute I got on the plane and it took off I felt free."

She never returned to Australia. Her possessions were left in the house she shared with Gary.

"I looked at my daughter and thought: I am setting her up to think this is how she should be treated and I am setting my son up to think this is how he should treat women. As a parent it was my responsibility not to do that."

AFTER 20 years of psychological abuse, 52-year-old Susan (not her real name) left her husband three years ago. The couple's three children, who were also abused, suffer from mental health problems. One child is self-harming and suicidal.

"I spent the last five years working out how to get out but not knowing how to do it," she said.

The final straw came when her husband – who often spent money frivolously – used what was supposed to be a mortgage repayment on a holiday. "People like him never love you, they just use you."

But Susan said kicking her husband out was the easy part. Since then she has struggled to get child support from him, battled with government organisations, and spent more than $12,000 on legal fees. "Financially we are just destroyed. There is no support for you. There is no counselling. If you can't afford $100 an hour for counselling, it is very hard to get anything.

"There needs to be free legal service and more financial support for people."

A group of domestic violence survivors, who go under the name "It's STILL not OK", say Susan's battles are all too common.

They say many women end up feeling as if it was easier to survive in the relationship than out of it. They say there's not enough support for victims to help them deal with problems such as protection orders, financial hardship, custody battles, health matters and lengthy court cases.

"They are spending all this money saying they want us to leave, but then when we do, there's no support," group spokeswoman Lisa Close says.

The group are calling for an agency or some sort of "one-stop shop" to be set up to help those who leave abusive relationships.

"The problem is there is this kind of assumption that once you get out you can get yourself together and move on and everything will be fine ... but that's not how it works," Ms Close says. "If things are falling apart, where do you go, who do you turn to?"

Family violence researcher and campaigner Ruth Herbert agrees there are huge gaps. "We have to make sure women and children can live safely, and to do that if it's harder for them to survive when they leave than when they were there – what are we doing for them?

"Don't do these sorts of programmes unless you know you have got all the other pieces of the programmes linked up."

Associate Social Development Minister Tariana Turia, who is chairwoman of the Family Violence Ministerial Group, says family violence is a complex, inter-generational problem that requires a long-term, multifaceted approach.

She says the Government has shown its commitment to this problem through the establishment of the Family Violence Ministerial Group and continued support for the Taskforce for Action on Violence within Families.

"There has been considerable achievement over recent years, but we acknowledge that much more needs to be done."

For Ms Morris, the pain will never go away, but it has subsided. A map of Australia on the wall is a reminder of where she has come from and pictures of her happy, healthy children are a sign of how far she has come. "I feel like I am who I want to be," she said. "I am not who someone else wants me to be any more."

GETTING THE TOOLS TO GO FROM RED HOT TO LUKEWARM

John Hatsell stood back and looked at the pain etched on his daughter's face – pain he'd inflicted after he hurled her across the room, slamming her fragile 16-year-old body into the wall.

As the teenager slid down the wall bruised and bleeding, Mr Hatsell fell to his knees. "I started bawling my eyes out. I didn't even know how to say sorry."

Mr Hatsell had a history of family violence; his mother used to beat him. "She used to beat the hell out of me, kick me and try and stab me. While she was hitting me, she was belittling me saying I was a useless fat **** or this and that. If it wasn't enough she was kicking me in the head, she was calling me names as well.

"But she had her issues too, bringing up nine kids, and my Dad was an alcoholic."

Mr Hatsell met his partner 25 years ago. They have four children. While he never beat her, he would yell and scream or smash things around the house.

He did hit his kids. "Not very nice eh? I used to be 200kg so getting a backhander from me was like getting a knockout punch."

His anger was also causing problems at work. His dislike of a colleague constantly had him at boiling point. The turning point came when his work began offering drug and alcohol courses. Mr Hatsell suggested they consider an anger management course, admitting he "was always angry".

They agreed and he did a six-month violence intervention programme. "We all get angry and we all handle it in different ways. If you can get the tools to help you go from red hot to lukewarm, it may save you from hurting your family. I just talk about everything now, tell people how I feel. I still get angry and fly off the handle every now and then but I can cool it down very quickly."

He strongly advises anyone with anger management issues to seek help. "The help is out there, go and look for it. You don't have to feel like you are a little man because you are going to anger management.

"People laughed at me all the time but I didn't care, I wanted to get help. I went and did it and it worked out really well for me. My life is so much better now. "

If you're in a violent situation or know someone who is, you can call the family violence line: 0800 456 450.

THE GRIM STATS

Last year at least 41 New Zealanders died at the hands of family members.

On average 14 women, six men and 10 children are killed by a family member each year.

Nearly half of all homicides are a result of family violence. Police recorded 86,545 family violence incidents and offences in 2008.

They are called to 200 family violence situations a day – one every 7 minutes.

It is estimated only 18 per cent of family violence incidents are reported.

Women's Refuge had about 50,000 crisis calls in 2007-08, and provided services to 11,295 women and 6996 children.

One in three women experience physical or sexual violence from a partner in their lifetime.

- © Fairfax NZ News