I will forever be haunted by the passing of Mrs. Haley. On the final days of her life, I was deemed her best, last support, because I knew something about the dangers of control. Or so I thought.
Work that changes you.
‘I will know, and you will pay’
One aspect of having a diverse occupational history within the mental health field is that you take something with you from every experience. However, there was one job that I wanted to walk away from clean, having taken nothing. Prior to becoming a nurse, I worked as an advocate for a domestic violence shelter. The position involved community education, outreach advocacy, supportive therapy, and violence prevention school programs. Those five years of my life were a relentless and eye-opening study of the dangers of control.
Domestic abuse or intimate partner violence is all about control, about an unhealthy balance of power in an intimate relationship. Advocates in the shelter provide a voice for the victims who suffer from domestic violence. Anyone can be vulnerable, regardless of gender or identification. According to the CDC, one in four women have experienced intimate partner violence (and one in nine men). Intimate partner violence remains a pervasive undercurrent in our culture, one still supported in many cases by laws, social tolerance, and institutions.
After five long years of focused work in this world, I began to experience it as all-encompassing. I decided that it was time to move on—not because it wasn’t a worthy venture, but because it was so heart-wrenching. I approached my supervisor at the shelter and said, “I can’t do my job anymore. It’s becoming too personal for me.”
She smiled and said, “You can quit, but you will always be an advocate. That part of the job will never leave you.”
‘No one knows.’
So I went to nursing school and became a mental health nurse in home care. Several years had passed when a coworker referred a hospice patient she had in a personal care home. Mrs. Haley was in her nineties and was believed to be experiencing elevated depression and anxiety related to her failing health and the approach of death. The staff at the personal care home described her as guarded, refusing to speak with a social worker or other counselors.
During our session she remained dismissive and repeated, “You can’t help me. No one can. No one knows what my future holds.”
Then, towards the end of the assessment, she asked me about my background. I mentioned that I had worked for a women’s shelter advocating for abused women. It was then that she finally opened up and shared her story.
‘Every minute of every day.’
Mrs. Haley revealed that she had been in an abusive relationship from the time that she was married, at seventeen, until her husband’s death at seventy. After a chance meeting on a bus, Mr. Haley immediately declared his love for her. They were quick to marry. Then he carted her and her pet cat, Mittens, away from friends and family.
Terribly jealous that his new wife would leave him, he locked her in his home. He accused her of flirting with any male she encountered. The accusations turned into violent episodes. Whenever the postal carrier would deliver the mail, Mrs. Haley would hide in a panic for fear that her husband would think that she was having an affair.
Mrs. Haley tried to leave once. That was when she discovered her cat Mittens frozen to death in their freezer. She never tried to leave again.
On his deathbed, Mr. Haley made a promise to his wife. “After I die, I will continue to watch over you every minute of every day as I wait for you, in heaven, to join me. And if you ever dishonor me, I will know and you will pay.”
The long reach of psychological control.
We were incorrect in assuming that her anxieties were related to her dying. It wasn’t the fear of death that was plaguing Mrs. Haley, but rather the fear of what was waiting for her in the afterlife. I had never witnessed a control so venomous it could reach beyond death. I could find no adequate words of support to offer. Her deeply internalized fear was more than I could handle alone, so I called my old supervisor from the women’s shelter and asked her to help. We made a plan to have their best counselor come out the next day to offer her some added support.
Mrs. Haley died during the night. She died thinking that she was going to spend another eternity in hell. Mr. Haley’s last dying breath still held control over Mrs. Haley’s last living breath. And it will forever haunt each breath of mine. My supervisor was correct. I will always be an advocate.
Stephen Cooper, BSN, RN, is a school nurse at Winchester Thurston School, North Hills Campus, Allison Park, Pennsylvania, and is studying for a master’s of nursing degree.
I was deeply moved by your experience with this Mrs. Haley. I was moved because I could only imagine the level of manipulation and psychological control that she must have experienced her entire life. Her husband’s control over her was even extended after his death and she even feared greatly for an encounter with him in eternity! I can see why an experience like this has marked you, especially with your background in helping women (and perhaps men) who have experienced domestic abuse. True life experiences like these inspire me to help women in these circumstances in any way that I can. Perhaps as a nurse, I cannot provide the counseling they need because they will more likely receive it from survivors, psychologists and counselors, but I can provide a vital connection to the resources that patients need if I ever come across a woman in this situation. Although, I have not had any type of work with victims of domestic abuse, I love how when knowledge and experiences are passed on, we can also learn from the experiences of others and also become advocates for these important causes. Your story can serve to help nurses reach out to their patient’s so that unlike Mrs. Haley, they won’t have to life an entire lifetime in an abusive relationship.