Photo By Michael Strasser | Members of the Fort Drum community attend the performance of “23 Bruises: The Lisa...... read more read more
Fort Drum, N.Y. (Sept. 21, 2018) -- After the performance of “23 Bruises: The Lisa King Story,” at Fort Drum on Sept. 18, Linda King stood up from her front row seat and turned to answer questions from the audience. Some of them tried to fight back tears, but then sobbed as they spoke to her.
The visceral response to the heart-wrenching play was new to King, because this was the first time her performing arts group presented it in public, as part of the Fort Drum Family Advocacy Program’s Domestic Violence Awareness Month campaign.
King lost her 28-year-old-daughter after a nine-year cycle of domestic abuse by her husband that led to her death in 2001. Since then, King and her husband John co-founded the nonprofit organization Fix the Hurt, and they have poured their emotions, experiences and desire to help into stage productions that have informed thousands about domestic violence.
“I knew that I didn’t want to see another mother suffer,” she said. “I didn’t want to see another family endure the pain we endured through those nine years. We learned about controlling mechanisms, we learned about isolation, we learned about how manipulative abusers can be. We made it our mission to have information to give to those who need our help.”
“23 Bruises” takes the audience through the torment that Lisa and members of her family suffered while also conveying how an intelligent, confident and otherwise happy woman could be manipulated by a person she loved. Riding a rollercoaster of fights, beatings, breakups and reconciliations, Lisa remained hopeful that the physical and emotional trauma wouldn’t last – that she could trust that her husband would someday reform and be a better person.
The title of the play is taken from the autopsy report that revealed the 23 sets of bruises on Lisa’s body, in addition to other injuries.
King told the audience that she doesn’t know what she could have done differently.
“No matter what we did, my belief is that we could not have saved Lisa’s life,” King said. “I felt like we could have done things better, but I don’t know if the outcome would have been different. I know I should have done a lot more listening and a lot less talking.”
King said that she spent too much time berating the offender and telling Lisa that she was wrong to stay with him.
“All she was hearing from everyone is that she wasn’t capable of making her own decisions,” King said. “And so, you have to be very careful about criticizing the abused.”
Shawn Jensen, a victim advocate at Army Community Service, said that she could empathize with King.
“I felt the mom’s pain because I am a mom and I would never want my daughter or son to go through something like that,” Jensen said. “As an advocate, I saw in that play everything we see with the victim and offender. We see the victim going back, over and over again. And just like in the play, some feel they can change them or heal them.”
Jensen noted the offender’s fixated behavior on King’s daughter, and she believed that even if Lisa survived that last beating, she probably never would have been free of his obsessive control over her. It’s something
Jensen sees firsthand in her job, but she said that educating others with events like this are invaluable.
“I think this training is great for Soldiers and spouses,” she said. “It is presented in a way that you get the point of domestic violence. I know the impact it had today because my co-workers were crying quite some time after it was done. Some had to walk out … so, yes, it’s impactful.”
King said that she sat by her husband’s side while he penned the play, which originally was going to be a book. They would share in the writing process by exchanging recollections and memories of their daughter.
“We knew there were Powerpoint (presentations) we could put together and speeches we could give, but my husband said ‘Let’s write a play,’ and so we began putting together the things that we’ve learned over time, and putting together things in different packages,” King said.
The Fix the Hurt actors also performed “Domestic Violence: The Musical?” to hundreds of Fort Drum community members. This production emphasized that domestic violence doesn’t discriminate – its victims and offenders are both men and women of all ages, races, religions, political preferences and nationalities.
King said that it has been staged at educational institutions, military installations and prisoners throughout the country, and once at a Marine Corps base in Japan.
“We try to impact those people who are still wondering about what is happening and who don’t understand domestic violence,” she said. “Why someone like Lisa would keep going back, or why even when someone tries to help, that help is refused.”
King said that “Domestic Violence: The Musical?” was written before “23 Bruises,” and they worked with a playwright to develop it.
“We knew we wanted to use the performing arts all along,” she said. “We had the content, but we didn’t have the skills to put it into musical lyrics. We felt a musical would be a more marketable project that could be used for education and training, but it’s going to be entertainment as well.”
It was on Lisa’s birthday several years ago when they agreed to write a more personal play about their daughter, which would become “23 Bruises.”
“At first, John and I acted in it, but we were limited with our acting skills,” she said. “But we felt it needed to be told from our perspectives. There would be times when I would become very emotionally, especially in the death scene. It was very hard for John to be the person who was beating her. It’s always healing afterward to see the impact that it had.”
As she had done at Fort Drum, King said that she always sits in the front row, or offstage where she runs the music, and so she never gets to see how audiences are responding to the performance. However, King said there was one show inside a gymnasium at an Air Force base where she was able to gauge the reactions from service members. She said it was a “mandatory attendance” crowd, and she could tell how interested they were in this training event by the way they took their seats. King saw their gradual transformation from nonchalant attitude to “leaning forward in their seats” and active listening.
“They became really engaged and I could see how their body language changed so much, and you knew that you got them,” she said. “I only see the audience when I get up to talk, and in many instances, a lot of them will ask questions or talk about themselves and then I see the tears.”
She recalled one performance when a woman came up to her and said that she was an abuser and didn’t know how to stop. Another woman asked King to sit with her while she broke up with her boyfriend by phone.
“There will be people who have sons or daughters in a relationship that’s not healthy, and so I talk with them one-on-one,” King said.
King told the audience that she received an email several months ago from a woman who had attended high school with Lisa. In it, the woman told King that she had dated Lisa’s abuser at a time when the couple had broken up. Lisa confided with her former classmate that she had been beaten physically and emotionally by this person, and told her to be careful.
“The girl said that she never went out with him again,” King said. “She said, ‘when I heard about what had happened to Lisa, I really felt that Lisa had saved my life.’ For that email to come to me, so many years later, tells me that Lisa made an impact.”
King said that she hopes the Fix the Hurt stage performances will have similar impact, as she told the Fort Drum audience.
“What happened to Lisa changed us forever,” she said. “It changed our way of thinking, it changed our priorities and it changed our appreciation for one another. Hopefully, it will change you, and change the way you think about domestic violence.”
Derrick Ellis, Fort Drum Family Advocacy Program manager, said that there are many resources available on post for people to receive the support and assistance they need. These services include crisis intervention, coordination with emergency services, assistance in requesting protection orders and accompaniment throughout the medical, investigative and legal processes.
Family Advocacy Program victim advocates are located at Army Community Service, Building 1780 on Restore Hope Avenue. To schedule an appointment, request assistance or to receive information and referral, call (313) 772-5605 or 772-8934.
The Fort Drum Crisis Hotline is (315) 955-4321 and will connect callers, 24/7, with a trained professional victim advocate.
To read about Fort Drum’s Domestic Violence Awareness Month activities, visit https://www.dvidshub.net/news/293881/domestic-violence-awareness-month-program-set-inform-educate-and-connect-with-fort-drum-community-members.
| Date Taken: | 09.21.2018 |
| Date Posted: | 09.21.2018 10:42 |
| Story ID: | 293917 |
| Location: | FORT DRUM, NY, US |
| Web Views: | 169 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, Stage performances depict the ugliness of domestic violence to Fort Drum audiences, by Michael Strasser, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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