I was struck by this poem (below) at the beginning of the Vulnerability Knowledge and Practice
Programme (VKPP) Domestic Homicides and Suspected Victim Suicides 2021-2022Year 2 Report. Why? Probably because it rang so true for me as a coercive control survivor and expert in coercive control. I have, many times, felt the hopelessness and helplessness of coercive control and trying to get it recognized by those I thought would help me... but never did.
This poem gave me chills!
Domestic abuse homicide and domestic abuse suicide follow a pattern. Jane Monckton-Smith's research uncovered 8 stages of domestic violence that lead to homicide and/or suicide. In this article she wrote about the 8 stages of domestic abuse suicide, which include coercive control as the main feature of stage 3. (If you would like to read it for yourself, I suggest starting on page 20). Here is a brief overview of the stages.
Intimate Partner Suicide Stages: (Monckton-Smith, 2022)
1. History - Victim has a history of vulnerability / Perpetrator has a history of domestic violence
2. Early Relationship - quick intense involvement
3. Relationship - characterized by coercive control
4. Disclosure - discloses the abuse, usually to family member or friend
5. Help-seeking - reaches out to the system for help / often the system is unhelpful
6. Suicidal Ideation - in the victim and/or perpetrator
7. Entrapment - "In most cases the victim considered, and had said, they were trapped in a situation from which they felt there was no escape (Monckton-Smith, 2022)."
8. Suicide - Victim dies by suicide
After you read the stages, I recommend reading the poem below. I think you will SEE, and if you are a survivor, you will probably FEEL, the 8 stages mounting, and the #PsychoSocial Quicksand of #CoerciveControl increasing.
A 999 call, there’s a body on the beach,
Please listen to my story, I have so much to teach.
Are there any identifiers, do we know who she was?
My name is Lyndsay and I have so many scars.
Policies and protocol, reports to complete,
You’re not listening or seeing me coz my life’s obsolete.
We’ll have to tell the family, is it your turn or mine?
I was abused and belittled, broken in spirit, body and mind.
Have we got all we need here, witness statements and things?
I’m sorry for my suicide and the trouble it brings.
Telling the family is not easy at all,
We have listened and if missed anything just give us a call.
You’ve not listened to anything, you don’t know my life.
You’ve got what you need though, next of kin and the like.
You’ve got someone to identify the body on the beach,
But you’ve missed the desperation in my family’s speech.
They are begging you to help me, to know who I am,
I’m a mother, daughter, sister and friend but I’m also the wife of a cruel, monstrous man.
I fought for my life, fought with all that I had,
But I was coerced and controlled and abused so bad.
I was left feeling worthless and scared and sad,
The abuse left me thinking that I was going mad.
Should we question capacity, could that give us a lead?
Please don’t insult me. Question abuse, that’s what I need.
You see, if you ask the right questions and understand who I was,
I’m no longer a body, crime number or report, I die as a victim and that’s who I was.
By Laura, for her twin sister Lyndsay (Home Office, 2022)
