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Health & Fitness

National Domestic Violence Awareness Month: Speaking Out / Helping Other Women

October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month. Teresa Wright-Johnson wants to help raise awareness and help other women.

Today I am blogging about a very important issue to me as a woman, a mother, and a survivor of domestic violence. The month of October is National Domestic Violence Awareness Month. Please spread the resources and some of my personal story I am about to share. I hope in sharing some my story and maybe some of you by passing my story on to others we can together help other women out there get out of a terrible  situation or not get involved in such a situation! The first thing I want to say is I have been told almost warned that I should not openly share this part of my life like I do other parts of my life. But for me my goal in life is to help others by sharing information, experiences etc. So here it goes! This is a blog that is not easy for me to write but I know it may help someone and that makes it worth it.
One of the things I have learned is first Domestic Violence against women can happen to anybody. I say this because sometimes in regards to others people may think that only happens to weak , uneducated, lower class, a certain race. etc women. I can say I know this not to be true because I am a very spoken, out going, educated woman myself and it happened to me! And even for me at first I was in denial.

There was the fussing and arguing that as a very young 20 year old woman I had no clue that was verbal abuse at the time. Then there was the throwing and breaking stuff by the other party that who knew would one day lead to being head butted, hit, pushed by your spouse that so called loves you. Now on the flip please note that as the strong woman I am I was not a back down type of woman so I too would physically and verbally fight back at times to protect and defend myself. This made things even worse!! Now I was too becoming an abuser somewhat. Moreover, also know that even though I knew some of the signs of abuse I really did not think I would become a victim of domestic violence. But I had. 
On the outside of my life things looked pretty good I was married, with two kids, a house, several cars, self employed, a community leader and more. On the inside of my life there was some true uncertainty and turmoil about all of the domestic violence. Now it was not like there was physical fighting everyday, week, or month. This too made it easier for me to be in denial. However there was alot of verbal abuse,  and put downs ( meaning demeaning comments). Yet still the strong lady I am I kept on in being in denial and defending myself and trying to fix things... via all the fussing and fighting.

I reached out to family and friends that some almost refused to see past the outside picture that they saw. Others told me that I / we needed God and prayer. At one point I reached out to a church leader that said they did not deal with this sort of thing and would call me back and never did. And then other people in my life were to the point and were like get out of there. So there were the calls to hot lines, the counseling appointments, marriage ministry, many I am sorries, police calls and separation. And still I stayed or went back. Why did I stay and then go back after leaving? Like many women I did not want to leave my life style, my house, the kids to be in the home with out their father and the list goes on and on. But one night it all changed when the other party held me down and told me they were going to kill me and tried to lock me in the house!

And for me that was it the beginning of the ending of that whole relationship.  Once I ran out of that house via the garage door which the other party forgot about... I was now a true believer of how real all of this was and I was a true domestic violence victim. That night I decided to be a victim no more. I accepted that I would have to down grade my life  some due to being a single mom. I went from a nice size home to a small apartment, to having cars to riding public transportation. But what I gained was PEACE. For me I have also moved on to a new relationship and marriage where we practice not being disrespectful,  never calling each other out of our names.. we practice respecting each other! Ladies please do not over look some things like I did. Anybody can have more than one side!  If you are in domestic violence situation ...PLEASE SEEK HELP..... SEE THE LINKS BELOW!!!!

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