Abuse victims find threads of hope at local consignment shops

After almost two decades of abuse, she made up her mind.

She knew she had to get away.

She tried to get to the van.

But he got in her face.

He grabbed her.

He wouldn’t let her go.

“I took my fist as hard as I could and I broke his nose,” said Mary Pool. And with a finality as sharp as the crack across his face, she broke free of the man who had dominated her life for 18 years.

And now, 12 years later, through her consignment stores, she helps other women break out of their abusive relationships.

Pool runs My Secret Treasures, a trio of consignment stores selling women’s and men’s clothing and accessories.

But more importantly, the shops unofficially provide battered women a place to turn.

“It’s a matter of coming out and talking about it ... you’re not the only one. You’re not alone,” said Pool, who told the Inter Lake she survived years of threats, intimidation and violence at the hands of her now ex-husband.

She said she lived in constant fear.

“It’s like somebody chasing you ... with a knife behind your back, chasing you down to take care of you,” said Pool. “That’s the way it feels.”

Now, her life is calmer.

In the bright, airy My Secret Treasures Annex, Pool flits about, sorting clothes with one hand as she laughs and talks with the store’s manager. She compliments customers and offers suggestions.

It’s not a counseling center or a crisis shelter. But it is a gathering place — a place where women feel safe enough to talk and find strength and support in each other emotionally, and work so they can financially break free.

Pool currently employs four women who have been in what they consider to be abusive relationships, and she allows women from the Abbie Shelter to work for her for a period of time to pay for clothes. For the needy, she will give clothes away.

Pool also is renovating a back office where women can feel more comfortable talking in a private area.

“A lot of people don’t know where to turn,” said Pool, who said she gently encourages the women she encounters to seek help and points them in the right direction.

Although providing a safe place for battered women came about organically, it seems ironically fitting.

After all, owning a consignment shop was a goal Pool shared with her high-school friend Laura Beyerly. But that was before Beyerly, as a teen, was murdered by her boyfriend in 1978.

In Beyerly’s memory, Pool followed through with their dream.

After moving to Kalispell in 2006, Pool opened her first shop in the Kalispell Antique Mall, closely followed by the original My Secret Treasures at 231 Main St. in Kalispell in June 2007 and the second store, My Secret Treasures Annex, at 260 E. Idaho in the old B & B Shopping Annex, in April 2009. The third opened last June at 6475 U.S. 93 South in the Whitefish Mall.

“So many women come into our store and they just open up to us,” said Linda Hile, My Secret Treasures Annex general manager and also a self-described survivor of abuse. “We just start talking, chit-chatting, and the next thing you know, they tell us their whole life story,” she said.

“Girls will come in with black eyes, they’re embarrassed,” she said. “We’ll give them a big hug, some new clothes ... they walk out with a big smile on their face.”

Pool agreed. “You can always pretty much tell when someone needs someone to talk to,” she said.

“I used to be there. I know.

“A little abuse grows to big abuse,” she said. Her now ex-husband didn’t hit her before they married.

Pool said that didn’t happen until five years into the relationship.

It started with little gestures such as thrusting his chest toward her in an intimidating way. Or throwing things. Or getting very jealous. Or subtle name-calling to break her down emotionally, which escalated to raising his fist and saying things like, “my dad told me you should never hit a woman, but you’re making me so mad” to the final, physically violent acts. 

According to Pool, those included yanking her from her car and throwing her to the ground, stomping on her stomach and slamming her body against the wall of the house.

“Well, you’d think that a woman who goes through this kind of abuse would leave her husband, but I sat there and I thought, ‘Maybe it was my fault’ for making him upset ... he’s always in your head,” Pool confided.

The psychological bonds were hardest to break.

“They apologize for everything that they did, they’d say everything’s going to be better, that we have big dreams. And everything’s fine for a couple of weeks, and then, bam! It’s all back over again,” she said. And it would escalate.

Pool said her ex-husband was arrested many times and served a jail stint in Linn County, Ore. Court records confirming the charges have been purged since the case predates 2003.

According to Penny Parnell, Pool’s friend and business associate who also says she is a domestic-abuse survivor, “The question that I’m asked a lot is, ‘Why did you stay?’ and as a woman in that situation, there’s a million reasons to answer.

“Because you love him. Because he said he’ll never do it again. Because of finances. Because of kids. Because you’re scared of what he’s going to do if you do leave.”

In the 8 1/2 years Parnell was with her now ex-husband, she said she left and came back around 40 times.

But she is free now.

And he is serving a five-year sentence in state prison on felony stalking charges.

“When I knew it was time to leave [for good], I had to fight the battle up here, in my mind, first,” she said, pointing to her head. “Mentally and emotionally, breaking your cycle is hard to do,” she said, “but once you get there, you think, ‘That was the best thing I could have done.’”

Emotional support is crucial, the women agreed.

“I wouldn’t have made it without my support system and family and friends,” Parnell said.

Pool encourages that support system through her store and its proceeds.

Consignors have a choice of donating the proceeds from the sale of their consignment items to the charity of their choice or redeeming the money for themselves.

After 90 days, Pool also donates unsold inventory to various nonprofit organizations, including the Abbie Shelter, Veterans of Foreign Wars, Flathead Industries and various scholarship programs.

She said the charity doesn’t negatively impact her business. “There are so many clothes out there, I don’t need to worry about it,” she said with a smile.

Reporter Melissa Weaver may be reached at 758-4441 or by e-mail at mweaver@dailyinterlake.com