Battered by Juanita Ray

Battered by Juanita Ray

Monsters do not lie under your bed. Monster do not live in closets. They go to church. They go to school. Some teach in schools. Some are mothers, fathers, sons and daughters.

My monster was the married mother who lived two doors down. She moved in as the housekeeper and later became my father's wife.

I was starved, beaten and held captive on our property, but after eight years of torture, I survived the monster. When a story, like mine, hits the news, most of us ask the same questions: Why? How?

• Why would a child, attending school, endure eight years of cruel torture and starvation, yet not run for help?
• Why did my twenty-one year old brother not move out earlier or call the police?
• Why didn't the six of us gang up on her?

To understand the answer to these and many other questions, you have to live the abusive lives we lived. You may ask what fuels a monster. Greed, jealousy and control are three big factors. According to recent NCANDS data the majority of the perpetrators, half a century later, are still women.

So how could my father, not mutually engaged in the systematic sadistic torture of his children, allow it to happen on a regular basis? That answer is simple. Somewhere back in time, my father lost his spine.