We think of violence as a physical, demonstrable thing that can leave behind evidence: a bruise or a broken limb. When the wounds left behind are emotional, we tend to discredit the victim as being hypersensitive.

How bad could it have been?

people say when I talk about the climate of fear I grew up in. 

He never hit you, did he?

But he never had to hit me, because I was always scared of him yelling at me. I didn't worry about the weapons called his fists, which he used against other people (mostly before I was born). I worried about the weapon called his voice. And without question

THE VOICE IS MY WEAPON

and I struggle with it more than any force on earth. I commit acts of emotional violence with my voice every day––within my family, within my workplace, within the privacy of my car, within the privacy of my own writing room. I want to change this more than anything in my life. I rend the fabric of the world when I let the animosity in my heart spill out through my voice, and when I hear that voice coming out of my mouth 

I ALWAYS REMEMBER MY FATHER'S.