An affair with Domestic Violence: A short note

Domestic violence plays a very crucial role in one's personality development particularly when you're on a victim side. For types of domestic violence, check: Domestic Violence in India

My family faced domestic violence due to my father. I'm 26 and since the very first day, I started understanding worldly affairs I have witnessed my father abusing my mother every day. She has endured a lot. He has always been an alcoholic and a loser in his life. He married at the age of 22 when my mother was 18 and after one year I was born. My brother was born after two years. Post-1992, my father never took responsibility of my family. He was in an automotive spare parts sale and repair business in which he lost hold with time and started drinking too much as a solution to face failure. It was a daily routine of my family wherein he would come home and ill-treat my mother. A lot of times my mother tried to support him so that he could stop drinking and focus on starting something new but eventually, she realized that he liked molesting her. She lost hope in him and looked forward to giving the best education to her children.

Both of my parents have attempted suicide. I could say about mother's reasons but don't know why the hell my father attempted suicide in the first place. That's a different and a long story. Moreover, till date, he has not explained the reason for that. Every day my father would abuse and beat my mother who was working as a cashier in a school where we both brothers completed our primary education. My maternal grandfather had always been a constant support to my mother and us because my paternal grandfather and family detained us because of my father's behavior. Instead of becoming accountable, my paternal grandfather told my mother to take care of children and my father as well. My uncle used to tease my mother that we both brothers would follow the same things as my father did. It was my mother who always survived the pain that her in-laws gave her and never lost hope in us.

My father doesn't know how the hell I and my brother have managed to get a good education and started doing well in our life. He still says that he doesn't care about us because he is too busy in his drunken lifestyle. Whenever I go home, I still find him scowling at my mother after getting drunk, but now the difference is that I have started facing him. I have not spent a single stay at my home without fighting my father over the same issue. He says that I have gone mad because I'm doing good in life and I'll fail soon because I don't respect him. I don't understand this when he doesn't even know how hard I have managed to spend my whole life without his guidance that any other child gets from his/her father. I have attended events where it was asked to me that how your father has shaped your life and I know how difficult it is to explain to others that having a non-existent father pains more than anything else in the world. But I know how to get self-motivated and that's the only reason I could spend my life with success and defined goals to date.

My trust in God and myself has helped me to take a lead everywhere. My mother still cries that she was not able to give us all the opportunities that she wanted to give but she doesn't know that she has taught her children a lesson which is hard to get without facing problems in life. My mother started her job with a pay of mere ₹ 500 per month, twenty years back and today I'm working for one of the top 20 conglomerates of this nation after completing a Masters from one of the best institutes of this nation again.

My brother is doing very well in his field and managed to make my mother prouder than what I did for her. This was because my brother caught a long depression just at the age of 15. This happened because he was not able to digest domestic violence and started sleepwalking. He used to cry at nights out of the fear in his dreams. He has become a difficult child who has achieved a lot and even I'm not that accomplished in my life than he has been considering the situations through what he had been. He has faced depression, difficulty to face people, difficulty to make friends and understand others but still managed to do well. God has been kind to him and me as well. 

Whenever I see this word "domestic violence", I get reflections which were far stronger earlier when I was still studying. My father wanted me to start earning after clearing primary education so that I can take care of family and he could live his life in his own way. Even my paternal grandfather abused my mother that why had she enrolled me in a science program after 10th. I don't know how she got too strong that she fought back and took loans from people so that I could study. Thanks to all the scholarships because of which I managed to study at Thapar University. Even leaving my job for an MBA was a very difficult decision for us. My mother was concerned, but she trusted me and let me do that. I'm very thankful to God for giving me the strength to do well in this competitive world.

I'm not writing this post to get sympathy from others, but to get myself stay motivated in the future as well. I want to let those people know that if they have been through the same pain then the end isn't always bad. Things happen and get the hell out of this pain to show yourself a success. I'm not sure what would happen in the future because I have just started my career, but this journey has not been easy and that means a lot to me. A lot of people will judge me after reading this and would try to give a lot of advice. And the best part is that I have been through this already and need no sympathy. I'm just one of the thousands who face such problems every day and has not seen any ray of hope.

Writing words on paper, let you move forward and this is what I have just done.

|| Sarbat da Bhla Krna Waheguru G ||

Excellent stories covered by theguardian.com: The most dangerous time - Five women tell their stories of leaving an abusive relationship