Why Didn't She Leave?

When I was 12, my mom got married for the second time. My little brother and I walked her down the “aisle”, in reality just the hallway of our three-bedroom ranch. Years later she told me she knew, even in that moment, it was a mistake. But with a house full of people waiting, she convinced herself it was just cold feet.

It wasn’t.

The abuse started quickly. My brother has more direct memories than I do because his room was next to theirs, but I remember lying on my bed one night, staring at the deer rifle in my closet, and wondering if I could stop it, thinking unthinkable thoughts. She made him leave once, after my sophomore year. But as I've shared before we wouldn't have been able to afford our home, and she rationalized letting him back in.

Two years later, on the day of my high school graduation, he hit her in the face twice in the kitchen after an angry confrontation with me about not mowing the lawn. For the first time, mom called the police. But it was the 1980s, and they just weren’t going to act. At 17, I pulled one of the officers aside and told him that if he didn’t make my stepfather leave, I would take my mom and disappear. He made him go to his sister's house to "sleep it off." That night we just went to graduation like nothing had happened. We told no one.

The next day, he came back. He cried. He apologized. And then he asked me, a 17 year old kid, for permission to come home. I said yes. I didn’t know how to say no. I spent decades feeling guilty and like I had let my mother down. It would be 2 more years before my mom finally left him for good.

The Question: Why Doesn’t She Leave?

Last week I listened to a speaker talk about domestic violence. She posed the ever-present question: “Why doesn’t she leave?” I think about my mom when I hear that. I think about the years she endured. I think about the very real fear of losing her home, her financial stability, her sense of safety in the only way she knew how to create it.

And sometimes I just cry for the years she missed, the years she didn’t want to talk about and acted as if they didn't happen.

What I Hope People Take Away

When we ask, “Why doesn’t she leave?” we miss the bigger picture. It’s not about a single moment of courage or fear. It’s about economics, survival, shame, lack of support, and the crushing weight of believing you have no real options. If you’ve never lived it, it’s easy to imagine what you’d do. But if you have, if you’ve been that kid in the next room, or that mother calculating whether she’ll still have a roof over her children’s heads, you know the answer is complicated.

So instead of asking why didn’t she leave, maybe we should ask:

• How can we make it safer for her to leave?

• How can we reduce the economic and social costs of walking away?

• How can we believe her when she tells us what’s happening, even if we can’t see it?

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For my mom, leaving took years. But she did leave. And for that, I’ll always be grateful.