A Voice in the Night: Silent Abuse, The Early Warning Signs That Could Save Your Life

By Erin Ireland

This is a book to find your peace and to know your rights as a human being. This truly is “A Voice in the Night" for all who wish to be happier in their relationships or simply happier without their abusive relationship. Are you not sure whether your mate is actually abusive? Erin Ireland has laid it out for you. When you finish reading this book you will know the ingredients for a solid relationship and the specifics of when your mate has crossed the abusive line.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Erin Ireland
• Release date: Aug 20, 2014
• ISBN: 9781311679482

Erin Ireland

Erin Ireland writes for those who feel they have no voice. She is a woman who has spent many years observing the abuse of others. Her experiences have been many in the direction of others who suffer in silence with isolation, controlled obsessions, verbal abuse, Superior attitudes, deceit, jealousy, physical, and sexual assaults, and many more indignities suffered everyday by beautiful people.

Book preview

A Voice in the Night:

Silent Abuse

The Early Warning Signs That Could Save Your Life

By

Erin Ireland

A Voice in the Night

By: Erin Ireland

Published by: Erin Ireland

Smashwords Edition

Copyright © 2014 Erin Ireland

A Voice in the Night © 2014. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever, including Internet usage, without written permission from the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

Cover image courtesy of Jmpaget & Dreamstime.com

Cover by Joleene Naylor

Disclaimer: The author has strived for accuracy, but cannot always guarantee it due to the ever-changing nature of the internet.

Dedication

I dedicate this book to all of those who are not sure they are being abused, and to all who know they are, but still have the courage to pick this book up and read it.

You will be forever changed when you realize your worth. I know through these pages you will find your safe ground to dwell upon. It is for you to whom I have written A Voice in the Night.

For Whom This Book Was Written

This is a book to serve many. A book that will enlighten you on how the treatment you accept from others is a huge factor to whether or not you will be happy in your life.

This is a book for young people to find a safe ground to stand on. It is a book for all ages to take notice of the treatment they allow from others. So many never realize how much abuse they do submit to thinking they are merely sucking it up for the betterment of the relationship.  

This is a book to find your peace and to know your rights as a human being. This truly  is A Voice in the Night  for all who wish to be happier in their relationships or simply happier without their abusive relationship. 

Are you not sure whether your mate is actually abusive?  Erin Ireland has laid it out for you. When you finish reading this book you will know the ingredients for a solid relationship and the specifics of when your mate has crossed the abusive line.

About the Author

Erin Ireland writes for those who feel they have no voice. She is a woman who has spent years observing the abuse of others. Her experiences have been many in the direction of others who suffer in silence with isolation, controlled obsessions, verbal abuse, superior attitudes, deceit, jealousy, physical and sexual assaults and many more indignities suffered everyday by beautiful people.

Erin Ireland has suffered abuse in her own life and writes from her heart when explaining what she feels is an inappropriate act against another. Her passion for the subject of abuse runs deep and reflects in her sometimes overpowering expressions of what she would like to change in life for you.

Erin Ireland is a nom de plume in order to protect the innocent. She will always speak her mind and the truth for the betterment of all those who seek answers and comfort.

This is a book to help others bypass the long suffering that can be eliminated if they can learn to view the traits of an abuser early on.  

She wishes for her readers to find their safe ground to stand on before they have spent their entire lives wondering: what it is that they have done to deserve such demeaning treatment?

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments

Foreword

Chapter 1. How We Determine Abuse

Chapter 2. What is abuse?

Chapter 3. Know You Are Abused

Chapter 4. When is it Okay to Swallow What Makes You Unhappy?

Chapter 5. How Abuse Begins Early On

Chapter 6. Are You a Child or an Adult?

Chapter 7. Why is Abuse Tolerated?

Chapter 8. The Power We Possess Over Physical Abuse: Kick Butt and Get Out!

Chapter 9. When We Enable Our Abusers

Chapter 10. Making the Break

Chapter 11. How to Find Help for Yourself

Chapter 12. A Time for Healing

Afterword

Acknowledgments

I would like to acknowledge my dear online writing friends and fellow authors, Gail Delaney and Susanne Drazic, who never stopped supporting me through all of my trials and who were always there for me no matter how down I felt for two very long years. Whenever I was able to get online, awaiting me were messages from both of them, always encouraging and always letting me know things would get better. My grand appreciation goes out to both of you for keeping me in your prayers. May God pour His blessings upon these two beautiful, spiritual women.

Love and many thanks to my beautiful son for inspiring me and for helping me write this book. Your support has always been invaluable.

Love and hugs to my beautiful daughter for all her help getting this book published, and with marketing and social media. God Bless both my children for they are the treasures I have received from God.

My thanks and love to my brother, his mate and family for taking me in when I found myself in desperate need of shelter. I thank you both for your kindness.

I would like to thank Nancy Carty Lepri, author of Tiny Angel, Tommy’s Amigo and illustrator of many books for all of her help in getting this book edited and for making A Voice in the Night a better book for all who turn these pages.

To Dr. Bob Rich, author of Ascending Spiral and many other works, I would like to say how much I appreciate your input, edits and your invaluable advice that has made A Voice in the Night a better book for all.

Last but not least, I would like to thank all who participated in the feedback readings of A Voice in the Night in order to make this book a lamp along the path of those in need

May all who turn these pages find peace in knowing you have a right to live the life you desire.

Foreword

I am a voice to be heard, a voice to heal woes, for I have maneuvered through the darkness and found my way through the muck of human ugliness. I have the right to tell what has happened to me and give warning to all who wish to listen. What harm can come to me if I tell my story? It matters not if someone now, can hear me. It matters not, if someone now is made to see, if someone now finds help through me.

I have earned the right to write and tell my story. I have been homeless. I have lived with the spiders and the worms in my bed. I have slept where most would not prefer. I have taken refuge in my car that radiated like an oven, slept with my coat on, endured the wet, the intense humidity, and was forced to give my little dog away to a stranger. I have experienced the 100-degree heat while living on the street. I have experienced the freezing cold while being forced out into a snowstorm. I’ve been stripped of my dignity and I have lost things I held dear.

The life I established in my 62 years was ripped from me. I have been degraded, humiliated, insulted, doubted and discarded like yesterday’s trash. But, what I have left is my voice! I am a voice in the night. I will now thunder.

I invite you to come, make the rumble of awareness with me. When you are suffering and no one understands or even wants to hear your cries, know you are entitled to the right to be heard. You have earned the right to speak out. Abuse shall live on as long as the courts, the police and the lawyers continue to protect the guilty. Abuse will live on as long as we continue to endure it; as long as we do not stand up and say no to the inappropriate treatment of others.

Silent Abused, I want to be your comfort in the night. I want to tell you what I have learned through my suffering. I want to speak and tell you about the strength you possess within yourselves. Listen and you will hear. Give it thought, and you will see; you are so much more than a dumping ground for those who care not what you feel. This book is my voice, calling to you to take a new road, where you will find yourself a new life, new joy, self worth and no more abuse. Empower yourself, and know you are worthy of so much more than the degradation inflicted on you by others.

Homelessness was something I endured for a time, but did not become my permanent way of life. No one believed my abuse or made an effort to understand. This was a world where help was given me at times without consideration for my emotional state. Help was given only after I suffered for many years begging for anyone to listen. My education on how mankind responds to those in need has truly enlightened me.

Please take to heart the content of these writings in A Voice in the Night, for they speak to you out of Truth, Love and Concern. This book is my small way to reach out to others who have also suffered the indignities I have experienced these past years. I hope you will listen and take to heart the words within these pages. They contain an important message I wish the abused to hear. That message is that you are special, you are entitled to an abuse-free life, and that no one finds happiness if they do not have complete freedom over their own being.

You can make it to freedom; you will make it to freedom. I am sure of this, because at 65-years of age, I am proof that anyone can.

Chapter 1

How We Determine Abuse

It’s never easy to give concrete meaning to an abstract concept. However, for the purpose of the content written within, a hard line needs to be drawn. My intention as a writer is to help those reading this to recognize abuse in their lives and break free of the attitude that accepts it as normal. My hope is that what is absorbed from these pages will plant seeds of empowerment and self-worth in those who’ve been trained to feel powerless and worthless.

I have expressed my thoughts here for those who have spent a lifetime being used, belittled, dismissed and degraded. These essays are intended to build awareness of the beauty and brilliance that exists in all of us and to show that no one has the right to try and strip us of that. This isn’t so much a book about how to find happiness. Rather, it’s simply about recognizing you are entitled to happiness and about shedding relationships with people who would deny that entitlement.

And so, let our definition of appropriate treatment be anchored in what promotes one’s sense of health, dignity, happiness and self-worth. In contrast, let abuse be considered every form of treatment that stands in opposition to those things. Learning to tell the difference is the first step toward living a truly free and positive life. But before that can even become a possibility, you must take the step of knowing YOU DESERVE such a life. You deserve it for reasons that transcend the petty symbols of wealth and status we typically use to organize people into some hierarchy of importance. You deserve dignity and joy for no other reason than you are a living, thinking creature of this world.

You entered this world no differently from any other human being. You eat and breathe and bleed and feel no differently from others. You’re no less a part of this world than anyone else. And, in the end, you will leave this world no different than anyone else. Simply put, you belong to one of the most beautiful, complex and intelligent species to ever grace the face of this earth. It’s taken me a lifetime to understand that all our beliefs about superiority and inferiority are merely that—beliefs. They’re not real, and they exist nowhere outside of our minds.

Unfortunately, it’s usually never enough to simply tell someone this. There’s a very big difference between understanding something and actually feeling it at the core of your soul. A menu is not the actual meal. A sign-post is not the actual destination it points to. This book is meant to be both a menu and sign-post in the hope the reader will follow its direction and reach the deeper experience it points toward.

Questions like, What is abuse? are as abstract and deeply philosophical as asking, What is love? Or, What is beauty? Or, "What is