No way out?

That June night when Vici Kelley finally left her husband started off like many others in their household.

It was dinnertime, and he was mad.

She had rushed home when she got his phone call demanding his meal, afraid of the consequences of being late.

But nothing she suggested for dinner appealed to him, so she went to fold laundry in the living room. When he realized she wasn’t making his dinner, he stalked over to her and threw her down on their couch. When she got up, he threw her down again.

It wasn’t the first time in their 11-year relationship that he had lashed out at her, Kelley said.

But it would be the last.

For years, the 5-foot-5-inch brunette had lived in growing fear. When her husband didn’t like the dinner she’d prepared for him he’d throw the plate and make her clean it up. He would kick her if she said or did something that displeased him.

“He thought nothing of punching me so hard I would see stars,” she said last week in an interview with the Weekly.

Despite the violence, she never talked with outsiders about her troubled marriage.

“I didn’t think it was as bad as it was because I didn’t end up in the hospital,” Kelley, a 47-year-old high-tech worker, said of her secret life. “I never told anybody. No one had a clue.”

Throughout Santa Clara County, statistics cry out about domestic violence even if victims can’t. Nearly 24,000 crisis and information-and-referral calls are made annually to three nonprofit agencies that work with victims of domestic violence — Support Network in Sunnyvale and Asian Americans for Community Involvement and Next Door Solutions to Domestic Violence in San Jose.

Last year, more than 3,100 domestic-violence complaints, including 1,100 for restraining orders, were filed in court, according to the Santa Clara County Domestic Violence Council.

In Palo Alto, 109 incidents were reported to the police.

But those are believed to be only the most visible part of a much deeper, sometimes fatal, problem.

While there were only three deaths attributed to domestic violence in 2008 countywide, down from a high of 21 in 2003, this year so far there have been 10.

Two Palo Alto women with histories of being abused died in the past six months. Jennifer Schipsi, a 29-year-old real-estate agent, was found dead in her home Oct. 15. Her boyfriend has been charged with her murder. He was previously convicted on domestic-violence charges.

Heather Russell, also 29, committed suicide on the Caltrain tracks in Mountain View in May, but her friends and co-workers allege she had been habitually beaten by her boyfriend and was driven to end her life.

Half of all women who are murdered in the United States die at the hands of their partners, according to a 2003 study published by the National Institute of Justice. A woman’s attempt to leave her partner triggered 45 percent of the murders of women by men, according to another 2003 Institute study.

The enduring issue affects not just adults but children. But despite its prevalence, when a victim dies a shock wave ripples anew throughout the community. Friends, family members and even strangers are left trying to figure out what happened and how it could have been prevented.

Often, their search for answers leads them to a single, haunting thought: “Why didn’t she leave?”

The question actually incenses survivors of abuse and those who work with them.

“‘Why she’s not leaving’ puts the emphasis on her, when she’s the victim,” said Karen Pyles, the shelter manager for Support Network. The question should instead focus on why the abuser won’t take responsibility for his actions, she said.

Domestic violence is an escalating pattern of behavior in which one partner in an intimate relationship attempts to control the other through force, intimidation or threats, according to Support Network staff.

The need for control is at the heart of abuse.

Factors such as poverty, unemployment and drug use increase the likelihood of domestic violence, but the problem cuts across societal boundaries, according to the National Institute of Justice.

Women and men of all social, economic, educational, ethnic, sexual orientation, cultural and age groups are victims of abuse at the hands of their partners.

Though the majority of victims are women, not all are. About 7 percent of heterosexual men reported being assaulted or stalked by a female partner and 15 percent of gay men by a male partner, according to a 2000 National Institute of Justice study.

An abusive relationship follows clear and recognizable stages, according to Pyles, citing research.

The relationship may start off positively, but the couple becomes serious very quickly. The partner who later becomes abusive has an intense desire to be close, Pyles said.

Then the abuser begins isolating the partner, discouraging contact with friends or family in order to cut off potential outside influence or support. The abuser may spark fights with friends or family members or may demand the victim choose between them and him. He may claim the victim needs to spend more time with him under the pretense of strengthening their relationship.

All these elements were true for Zoe Kunstenaar, who at 16 moved into a West Marin flat with her boyfriend. At first, his obsessive attention flattered her, said Kunstenaar, now a clinical psychotherapist with Silicon Valley-based Guidance for Growth.

“It felt like Romeo and Juliet. We had this agreement that we were surviving only for the good of the other,” she said, recalling her dark-haired, slender, 18-year-old “first love.”

But soon he began to complain that she was not paying enough attention to him, that she was spending too much time with friends.

Thinking they had communication problems, she convinced him, one year into their relationship, that they should see a couples counselor.

The therapist asked the boyfriend how much of their free time Kunstenaar should be allowed to spend away from him.

“How about 20 percent?” the therapist asked.

“No, that’s too much,” he replied.

“How about 10 percent?”

“No!”

“How about 5 percent?”

Then came the crucial, revealing question: “Why should she ever get to spend any time away from me?”

That’s when Kunstenaar says she realized his obsession was not about a Romeo-and-Juliet type love. It wasn’t about her happiness at all.

His behavior — isolating her from her friends, the angry outbursts, the physical intimidation and sexual coercion — formed a pattern.

She was being abused.

Domestic violence can take many forms, but the result is the same: fear. It’s a fear for one’s safety, victims say, a fear of being belittled, of triggering a partner’s anger, of losing one’s children, home or career.

Often, the abuse starts small: A critical comment may be dismissed as a joke or an angry word elicits a quick apology.

“It’s a slow and insidious process,” said Lorraine Michelle, volunteer-program director for Support Network. “Abusive individuals don’t walk around with a sign around their neck, ‘Get into a relationship with me and I’ll be abusive to you.'”

In the earliest stages, hope keeps some people from leaving their partners.

“The victim loves him. He’s not a terrible person all the time,” Pyles said. “She remembers how he was when they first started dating, the life they planned.

“He says, ‘I’m sorry. I love you. It won’t happen again.’ … Maybe she thinks he will go to counseling.”

It’s all part of a cycle that characterizes many abusive relationships — a cycle in which a couple experiences a honeymoon phase, then rising tensions and then an explosive incident, followed by all out control, abuse, threats and violence.

For Kelley, the honeymoon phase came with many promises — that her husband would get a job, stop taking drugs and see a counselor.

“He would be really sweet, then tension would build over time, and then it would come back to him being the raging, abusive person,” she said.

The cycle could take place within a matter of minutes or weeks, depending on external pressures in their lives, she said.

Some victims try to keep the peace with their partner, according to Pyles.

“There’s always this perception that ‘There’s something I can do to mollify him … (and) keep it nonviolent,'” she said.

For example, a victim will read her partner’s demeanor, noting when his behavior is about to escalate, and take action such as keeping the children quiet or promising to make his favorite food.

“She’s trying to find ways to make it so this isn’t happening. But it doesn’t work,” Pyles said. “It’s not something the victim can control.”

The false sense that it’s possible to keep the peace is perpetuated by the abuser, who excuses his behavior by blaming the victim: “If you only made a good dinner, I wouldn’t be mad.”

That’s a lie, Pyles said. “It’s not about dinner. It’s his choice to escalate.”

Going through the cycle is exhausting ñ so exhausting that it’s hard to break out of, according to college professor Lara Smith*, an abuse survivor.

In the mid-1990s she was living in the United Kingdom with her now-ex-husband, a fellow academic. They had met and enjoyed a whirlwind romance, marrying after eight months and buying a house. But after his career faltered he increasingly took out his frustrations on her, she said.

Because he had insomnia, he would yell at her during the night, depriving her of sleep. At other times, he would shove her against a wall or pin her down. While driving, he would suddenly slam on the brakes and threaten to throw her out of the car.

“I would be terrified any time he would come home because I didn’t know what mood he would be in,” she said. If she tried to talk to him she couldn’t be sure of the response she would get.

“It’s totally exhausting. You end up fearing for your safety,” she said.

As the main breadwinner in the family, she had little if any energy left over for planning an exit strategy.

She tried to get help from police and local anti-domestic-violence agencies, but to no avail. The police could arrest him, but his name would be published in the local newspaper, causing both personal and professional problems for her. Unless he caused serious harm to himself or her, there was little police or agencies could do, she said.

Feeling she had nowhere to turn for help, the abuse took its toll.

“It was getting so bad I couldn’t drive,” Smith said. “My panic and anxiety levels were through the roof.”

Like Smith, abuse victims say domestic violence is a complex situation that entraps. Ashamed, many fear they’ll be judged as failures if others were to find out. Isolated financially or socially, they worry they will end up homeless if they leave. Some are afraid they could lose their children in a custody battle or their children will get physically hurt.

If they’ve tried to leave before or speak up for themselves, their partner has threatened more severe harm if another attempt is made. Whether staying or leaving, it can feel like a lose-lose situation, they say.

Victims do try to escape, however. Many leave an average of seven times before they are able to get away permanently, according to domestic-violence counselors.

Smith, Kelley and Kunstenaar were all able to extricate themselves, but leaving came with a price for each.

Smith, now 41, stayed in the marriage even after she realized she was being abused, afraid of losing everything she had worked for — her career, her home.

It was a colleague who helped her to see that life would go on.

“Everything will be completely topsy-turvy, but you’re resilient,” the friend told her.

“I knew she was right,” Smith said.

She made her plans to move back to the United States and in 2001 told her husband that she was leaving. She couched it in a way that implied he could follow her, perhaps to restart his career in America — but she knew he would not come.

It took her nearly five years to re-establish her career in academia and overcome the debt she incurred while relocating. Her life today is completely different from what she envisioned for herself as a young graduate student.

But the experience showed her she possessed strength she hadn’t known about.

“When I look back, oh my goodness, I can’t believe what I went through,” she said, recalling moments when she was being attacked and had to think on her feet to defend herself.

She has since remarried and calls her new husband “fantastic.”

“I’m very happy with where I am now,” she said.

Kunstenaar, 39, stayed in her relationship for one more year after the pivotal visit to the counselor’s office. She took steps to stop her boyfriend’s abusive behavior, with the help of her parents and friends. By the time she broke up he was no longer abusing her, she said.

But fear lingered. He stalked her after the breakup, and she alerted the police when she went to retrieve her belongings from their apartment, in case he showed up.

In the years since, she has become a clinical psychotherapist, teaching her clients — some of whom are couples involved in abusive patterns — how to address their problems and treat each other with respect.

For Kelley, the night she left will forever be seared in her memory. It turned out to be the same night Nicole Brown Simpson was murdered.

“I knew had I not left that would have been my fate,” she said solemnly.

After her husband shoved her onto the couch, she told him she would go to McDonalds for him. Fearful to leave her 3-year-old daughter at home, she went to get her only to have her husband crawl into the girl’s bed.

Kelley called police, but in the end, her husband said he would trade the girl for Kelley’s wedding ring. She agreed — and left.

Today, Kelley volunteers as a speaker on behalf of Support Network, which helped her after she left her ex-husband.

“I gave it every chance that I could,” she said of her marriage. “I wanted things to be right for my daughter.”

In the end, however, it was her daughter’s safety that prompted her to leave.

Now more than a decade later, she enjoys quilting, photography and other creative pursuits. She said she feels like she’s coming back into her own.

“I’m becoming who I was meant to be. It’s a really good feeling.”

Related material:

■ How to help

■ Where to turn for help

■ It’s Palo Alto’s problem, too

■ Do hard times mean more domestic violence?