Betty Broderick Quotes

“The combination of these things opened up the door for Linda, or someone like her, to come in. Dan was scared to death of growing up and turning forty. Peter Pan wanted to stay a young, carefree, party-boy forever, and maybe, too, he was finally cool enough to feel part of a fraternity, like the ones he hadn’t been a part of in College. Albeit his fraternity brothers were all middle-aged men with families of their own, but that’s just semantics. It’s the spirit, or in this case the spirits, of the thing that counts. We had four children and there I was, an ever-present figure expecting him to act his age and show responsibility, and I suppose from his point of view that was grinding. I’ve always said that Linda just filled the bar stool I didn’t want to sit in anymore. We weren’t twenty, and as far as I was concerned our days of hanging out at Henny’s over Irish coffees, just because, were long gone. I had piano lessons and soccer games and orthodontist appointments, and Linda didn’t have any of those. She was available after work to sit beside him in bars and laugh at his jokes and gaze at him like he was a superhero. As for me, I didn’t have the time or the inclination anymore to be that girl for him again. He was my husband and I was his wife, and we had children, and as wonderful as being young and drunk and free with it all before you is, I still thought that being grown up and part of a family with them all around you was even better. Dan obviously felt differently and Linda was right there to remind him that you don’t always have to be an adult, you don’t always have to do what’s right, and sometimes it’s okay to just do what you want. That was her sales pitch and Dan was a very interested buyer.”
― Betty Broderick, Betty Broderick: Telling on myself

“I couldn’t leave him and I couldn’t go home. All of my things were gone and I had nowhere else to go.”
― Betty Broderick, Betty Broderick: Telling on myself

“They were living a life I had chosen to leave back in 1982 when I had started going to Al-Anon.”
― Betty Broderick, Betty Broderick: Telling on myself

“time that I started calling him an 'asshole' to his face. Me doing that drove him crazy. Dan was a serious control freak and he had lost all control of me. Of course, the downside was that I had also lost all control of me too.”
― Betty Broderick, Betty Broderick: Telling on myself

“I read 'The Kite Runner,' and I understood 'defeated guilt' for the first time.”
― Betty Broderick, Betty Broderick: Telling on myself

“1983 through 1985 were the worst years of my life. They were harder than being dirt poor; they were harder even than being in prison.”
― Betty Broderick, Betty Broderick: Telling on myself

“Linda was right there to remind him that you don’t always have to be an adult, you don’t always have to do what’s right, and sometimes it’s okay to just do what you want. That was her sales pitch and Dan was a very interested buyer.”
― Betty Broderick, Betty Broderick: Telling on myself

“The sad thing is that by the time he had the money and time for all that, he did it with Linda and not me.”
― Betty Broderick, Betty Broderick: Telling on myself

“Women”
― Betty Broderick, Betty Broderick: Telling on myself

“decisions. I never thought it was abusive, I just thought he was a very high-strung, difficult man who was under enormous pressure all the time, some of it self-imposed.”
― Betty Broderick, Betty Broderick: Telling on myself

“always hated the forced gaiety and rampant drunken stupidity of New Year’s Eve anyway.”
― Betty Broderick, Betty Broderick: Telling on myself

“stuck to that decision no matter how much or how many times he tried to persuade me to change my mind, and thank God I did, because I still have that time when I belonged to myself to remember now.”
― Betty Broderick, Betty Broderick: Telling on myself

“was always afraid of my mother’s anger. Ever since I was very little, her screaming and yelling frightened me, leaving me with a strong  desire to please everyone. From an early age I learned how to walk on eggshells and to disappear from view, even if I was in the same room as my mom, all designed to avoid being the target of her rage. It was the perfect training for anyone aspiring to excel in the future as a doormat and a victim.”
― Betty Broderick, Betty Broderick: Telling on myself

“What most people experiencing difficulties don’t realize, or want to realize early enough to avoid screwing up, is that they’re just going on with their lives, coping with their circumstances, rather than using their minds to control the effects their circumstances are having on them.”
― Betty Broderick, Betty Broderick: Telling on myself