The many diverse faces of abuse

Certainly women are most often abused, but don’t forget the faces of other victims

There’s been a lot in the news — a tsunami you might say — about women.

The abuse they’ve suffered at the hands of men has fallen under an international spotlight, further illuminated by Dr. Blasey Ford, the #MeToo movement, by Bill Cosby’s incarceration, and by any number of examples across the globe. India for example, has the highest rate of suicide worldwide among women, attributed, like some giant tsunami itself, to punitive, arranged marriages and endemic rape. Hamilton, too, provides an example: the presence of shelters in the city protecting women (and their children) all speak to a situation that’s reached a critical mass. They’re often full and beyond capacity.

To say it’s a serious issue is to minimize the problem.

There is a small danger in this conversation however: that we genderize (if that’s a word) the problem, assuming that most or all abuse is suffered by women. While the face of vulnerability most often (and correctly) assumes the appearance of a woman, it’s not its only face.

Let me give you some examples from my practice years. The names are made up and the people are often composites but — believe me — they’re real.

The earliest I encountered was BJ, on a visit to a rescue mission for men in the city; you’d know its name, I’m sure. Its story is almost as interesting as BJ’s; the place smelled of grease and Lysol, of despair and kindness. BJ wasn’t like the others you might expect to see in a homeless shelter — not elderly, not without financial resources. At 17, he was the product of a reasonably well-off Ancaster couple. Drug addicted. Argumentative, trying hard not to bond with people, especially a family doctor who looked just a little older than he. Shaky, looking for his next fix. Unkempt. Black, overlong fingernails. On one cold, rainy morning I was allowed to see the real BJ: the sexual abuse survivor (plus mental and physical abuse of course — how can they not be entwined, like some sick, triple-stranded DNA?) The discarded, castaway stepson.

“What do you want from life?” I asked at one point, trying to mend years (years!) of abuse with words. What do you wish for?

“To stay alive,” he said.

Later, in my Burlington practice, I met Jalal, in his early teens, loved by his newly-immigrated parents, hating school. Bullied. In Jalal’s case, it was his skin colour that was different, but he could have been anyone modified by these adjectives: awkward; gay; effeminate; introverted; nervous. In the land of teenage uncertainty, different is a red flag. Jalal and all the boys and young men his name conjures were not just bullied by other boys (the majority for sure) but by girls as well. Girls, Jalal said, were often the worst.

Last, in Toronto or Hamilton I learned about Petr, an elderly Ukrainian-Canadian, living alone for many years, going slowly though not entirely blind. Frail, unable to fend for himself, he was shuttled between rooming houses in the city, watched over infrequently by an overstretched social work system, and because of his advancing years, by our clinic. Our residents (training doctors) made a house call on him, I forget why. I’ll never forget the image they described though: he was alone, sitting in a room with one chair, one table and one small bed. With one radio. There was one light in the room, hanging from the ceiling, its bulb long-ago burned out. The light had probably never worked. When city social workers pointed out this remarkable neglect to the landlord, he responded, “Well, he’s blind isn’t he? Who cares if the room is dark?”

Petr, not entirely blind, did. So did we. For sure there are success stories of single men, coping with life and their differences, their aloneness.

Steve, the single, 60-plus Polish guy with little English who worked his way across the country on the trains and back again, whose biggest treat was lunch in a restaurant (a greasy spoon, the same one) every day; terrible for his diet (and his doctor who was trying to get this cholesterol to below explosive levels), great for his social interaction. Johnny, whose mental age was arrested, able to get movies from the Burlington Library (“For free!” He told us) and watch them on the weekends. Lloyd, the 80 year old, divorced or never married, who got up early every morning to watch a pot of Easter tulips open and, once a month, regular as clockwork, to take a young woman he met at the bank to lunch (and even pay his share) because, like him, she looked lonely. All he wanted was social interaction. As for the others? Jalal did well finally, was last seen working on Bay Street in Toronto; many other preteens and teens coping with their differences have also thrived in a more open, accepting and diverse world. Petr’s rooming house was changed and his care improved immeasurably. BJ moved on, was lost to the mission shelter I met him in; I am not at all sure that he got his wish.

Also for sure, the cases of women’s abuse way outnumber those few about men and boys I’ve shared here. But if nothing else, my stories have shown me that vulnerability is not just the domain of one gender or race, not one culture or social status. Not one colour or orientation.

The tsunami of abuse — and its survivors — has many faces.