'Till Death Do Us Part: Love, Marriage, and the Mind of the Killer Spouse by Robi Ludwig, Matt Birkbeck Read Free Book Online Page B

dismissal of what the woman has offered to the marital relationship.
    Ehrenberg added that when husbands offer wives a materialistic accoutrement, at least that is something they can point to and say, “Look what I gave you, a mink coat, a diamond ring,” and so on. It is this imbalance of power, Ehrenberg believes, that in some cases makes certain couples vulnerable to spousal homicide. The result is that the stalker’s actions (at least in her own mind) can often be justified in the name of love. She feels that her honorable intentions justify her extreme actions. Such stalkers are also guided by a cultural script that promotes the idea that persistence encourages romantic success.
    Love is believed to be one of the most important and exciting experiences a person can have in life. On the other hand, to be rejected by someone after you let him know over and over again who you are and how much you love him is particularly devastating to a person’s self-esteem. It’s as if the rejecter is saying, “Now that I really know you, I’m no longer interested in you.”
    Sometimes rejecters feel guilty for their lack of desire and inability to return the other person’s loving feelings and affections. Unrequited love leads to a feeling of low self-esteem, and the need to protect one’s self-esteem is basic and powerful. The rejected can feel inferior, unattractive, and unlovable. The later in the relationship the rejection comes, the more intense and powerful the humiliating message is. For Betty, this message was “You’re old and not deserving of someone as attractive, wealthy, and successful as I am. You were fine on the way up, but now I can do better, so I will.”
    This is a particularly harsh message in a society that does not seem to value women as they age. Older women commonly fear being replaced by a younger model, a model perhaps capable of bearing children. Older, successful men may want to advertise their success by acquiring a young and glamorous wife. It’s a signal that they have arrived and are doing well in the world.
    Once Dan Broderick chose another woman to love, there was nothing else he could do for Betty other than die. Betty Broderick was going to make her husband keep at least one promise he made to her, a promise he made long ago when they stood before God. That was the promise of “till death do us part.”
    Betty loved him to death. He was hers whether he knew it or not. If he could not keep his promise in life she would have to help him keep it in death. Apparently the only way to make him keep his promise to be loyal to her was to kill him. Only then could she agree to move on. But even so, she was totally unprepared to live life without her husband.
    With nothing to do now but think about her actions, I do think that Betty may well be far more intact and happier now, knowing that Dan is out of her life. Gone are her feelings of rejection. If she couldn’t have a positive relationship with her husband, she needed to have a negative relationship with him.
    On a final note, it’s also interesting that Betty killed both Dan and Linda in their bedroom. In the unconscious the bedroom symbolizes sex and sexuality; in their case being in the bedroom could have led to Dan and Linda having children together, which would serve to devalue the one thing Betty felt she did so well, giving Dan beautiful children.
    Dan’s murder was a crime of passion, motivated by feelings of abandonment and betrayal. Betty couldn’t believe, after all these years, that Dan wouldn’t come home. Betty’s version of reality was more powerful than the real reality. Dan was hers, only nobody but Betty seemed to know it. Now he would be linked with her forever.
     

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    The Control Killer
    C ONTROL killers are men and women who micromanage and monitor every action of their spouse or significant other, demanding to know the other’s whereabouts at all times, who he or she talks to, socializes with, even what the other