Im choosing to share my story to further clarify what it is like to be a victim of domestic violence, to understand myself as a survivor of domestic violence because I’ve never told my story. This is to help me move forward and reflect on the impact this journey has made on me personally. Unless you were there first hand and lived through it, with me, you don’t know the abuse my daughter and I suffered. It’s been several long years since I’ve left that relationship but I still never spoke out about the man that harmed me or his child. This story is part of my healing journey. I’m speaking out, not in harsh retaliation against him but, to help heal the demons I still face this many years later. It is also terrifying because I spent so long hiding my truth for fear of the what ifs, What if they don’t believe me? What if I loose family and friends? What if they don’t support me? Will my speaking out bring harm to myself and my daughter and loved ones? I’m no longer afraid of the what ifs. I’m no longer scared of the maybes.
My Story starts in the summer of 2009. I was young, so young, going to college. Partying a little too much. Ya know, all the things we’re supposed to do before we settle down to become responsible adults, or so I thought. Now let’s make this clear when I say party. I was not the heavy party girl, by any stretch of the imagination. I didn’t do anything crazy. Yes, I had drinks with friends but that was the extent of my party days! Through a near and dear friend named Katie, I was invited to party. So of course I went and I met a new group of friends that would later become a huge part of my life. Little did I know, they would eventually become family too. As time passed, I spent more and more time with those friends and eventually met Brandon who happened to be a cousin of one my new friends. Little did I know, that would be the beginning of a beautiful disaster for me. I say a beautiful disaster because some of the most beautiful things in my life came out of that relationship. As time passed we spent more time together and by the following spring we were inseparable.
The unfortunate truth and reality is I should have known better after my first high school relationship that left me battered and bruised, to the point that I was making up excuses to guys in my school and grade that I had been kicked by a cow on our farm, to who knows what else. He cheated lied I remember being seventeen and getting a call from him while he was in California and being told I need to go be tested that he had cheated on me with a girl we new I believe her name was Lasey and that I might have herpes. At seventeen that’s a hard reality to face especially having to go face your parents and tell them that you need to be tested. After a long mortifying visit to my doctor I was relieved to find out I didn’t have herpes after all. That relationship ended.
So I truly thought that in Brandon I had found my upgrade. I mean after all everyone told me what a great guy he was. It later comes to light he was the exact definition of a narcissist the man that’s so perfect to everyone around him but a true monster when the door closes and the world is shut outside. He was 24 and I was 19 I was still so young and let’s be serious I was innocent in the ways of the world other than drinking with friends. The reality is he was living in his parents basement no job no car no nothing. What I would later find out years into the relationship is that he had moved home because he had lost everything due to a sever Cocaine addiction. He moved home to sober up and get his life back together which was a huge step in the right direction but looking back now had I known then what I know now things may have been a lot different.
Fast forward and in August of 2010 I had gotten pregnant with Adaline. While she is the best part of me and my life I must say she was definitely unexpected as I was on birth control and it was completely unplanned. I ended up choosing to drop out of school and start working full time as Brandon was still not working and living in his parent’s basement. I was also still living at home given I was going to college. In May of 2011 we found a small two bedroom apartment and finally he was working and had a vehicle as well. I vividly remember siting in his uncles back yard one night while everyone around me was drinking and partying and I was pregnant and he rubbed my stomach he looked me dead in the face and goes “After you have the baby, are you going to lose this for me?” My heart broke and all I could do was walk away thinking that he was referring to my fat stomach that was our child. That being said I was also never a skinny girl and I never was going to be, words stung deep and the reality set in my insecurities hit hard from the past and what my future might hold. I sadly kept telling myself he didn’t mean it he was just drunk but I think deep down I knew better. By that June we welcomed our beautiful daughter into the world.
I had stopped drinking at this point and I was more of a home body. Brandon continued to drink. He basically exchanged one addiction for another but I didn’t know that at the time. The arguments started out like any other. Bickering and then tiny spats that progressed into belittling, aggression, and pure hatred. A few years into our relationship Brandon’s father became ill with cancer and it seemed the sicker his dad got the heavier Brandon’s drinking got. I slowed down on working and went from full time to part time, so I could care for Adaline while he worked full time which made me mostly financially dependent on him. I slowly watched my friends drift away until only those that remained were the ones in his circle and before I knew it I was exactly where he wanted me to be. Disconnected, isolated and financially dependent on him. Of course at this point all I began to hear from him is how lazy I was. “Why aren’t you working?” “Its my money not yours?” “Why do you spend all of my money?” “Your the reason we are always broke.” The truth was he was drinking heavily 18, 24, 30 packs of beer several nights a week smoking 2 packs of cigarettes a day and than you add his “extra curricular activity” (no I don’t mean cocaine) the money flew out the window and we kept having to move every few years because he spent so much it was hard to keep up on bills. Land lords would eventually get sick of the excuses. I let a lot slide, as I avoided confrontations that could result in emotionally abusive responses. What people don’t realize is I hardly ever bought myself anything maybe twice a year. Because the belittling of how I spent his money on myself was not worth it.
Eventually Brandon began passing out on the couch. Mainly because he would stay up drinking and I was exhausted from taking care of Addie and the house and the stress of never knowing what kind of mood he would be in. Living a life on eggshells is mentally and physically exhausting to a person.
Little things became big things: the clothes in the laundry basket that didn’t get folded. The backpacks left here or there, showers or baths that were perceived as too long. I couldn’t even play online video games without being accused of cheating on him with the random people I played with, even if they invited him to play as well. I eventually stopped gaming all together. For years, I stopped playing, and I’ve only recently picked back up a controller and started playing games again. But I still haven’t brought myself back to playing online games. So then I went to reading a lot and got accused of ignoring him for books.“You always have your head in a book.” “Why don’t you come back to reality instead of living in your fantasy world?” Drawing became an issue as well, unless I was drawing something for someone else like his family friends or our daughter or other children. NOTHING, nothing I did was ever right.
If you’re a fighter, and I don’t know a woman who isn’t, you’re going to get it worse. He won’t like your defiance and you are bound to be stuck with the consequences. The abuser will make you apologize for not giving in, tell you it’s all your fault . He won’t be held accountable.
He ruined me, the person I was, the things I loved. He dimmed my light. As time went on, I slowly became less and less of the person I once was. I became a shell of the loving, caring person I had been. I was demoralized, dehumanized. Doors slamming, things being thrown, doors being ripped off hinges, the shoving, being slammed into doors, holes being punched in walls, my cars keys being taken so I couldn’t leave, diaper bags, purses and bags being ripped off my arms and thrown across the house when I’d try to leave with our child to let the situation calm down. The fits of rage that lead to him getting up in my face screaming at me belittling me calling me names. “ fat b**ch” “ you’re just using me for money” “ you’d be nothing without me” “if you leave I’ll take Adaline because you have nothing”. Nothing was sacred. Holidays, birthdays, special occasions, all ruined by him and he didn’t care. He would make us both cry and then we were supposed to smile right before a family function.
I’ll never forget the day his young cousin walked up to me at his family reunion and told me she doesn’t like the way he talks to me that I don’t deserve that and our relationship is unhealthy and I need to leave. Of course I made up excuses like that he had just had a little to much to drink and was stressed out. But she knew better, even being younger than we were. My heart deeply sank in that moment because I knew if she were to approach him he would spin it on me. So of course I begged her not to say anything to him about it right now and to wait until he sobered up, knowing we would be gone by morning.
Then there was the sexual abuse. The part I never realized till later. When I started my journey with a beautiful organization called PAVE and met an amazing woman named Holly. I never realized your domestic partner could sexually abuse you until I walked in and Holly started asking some personal questions and the realization hit me in the face like a freight train. The comments the pushiness, the forcefulness. The accusations of “You must be cheating on me if you’re not sleeping with me.” Or “If you don’t sleep with me I’m going to go find it somewhere else.” Who wants to sleep with someone who constantly belittles them, puts them down, is drunk outta their mind and forceful? It got to a point where I would just sleep with him to stop the argument or avoid one altogether. I’d there praying once it started, that it would just be over soon. Then I’d have to hear the comments of “How come you don’t try anymore?” And “What, don’t you enjoy it?” I’d wake up to adult videos on the living room TV, and have to shut it off immediately. Just hoping and praying that Adaline hadn’t woken up yet and seen it, while he was still passed out on the couch from being drunk the night before. Oh boy, and how dare I say anything, because it was my fault. “If you’d just put out more, I wouldn’t have to watch it in the first place.” He’d say. And Holly told me “You don’t have to sleep with him just because he is your partner. That’s a form of sexual assault.”
The sad reality was no matter how many times I begged him not right now. Not unfortunately if Adaline. He didn’t care it didn’t matter if she was right there crying and screaming and terrified. I don’t know how many times I had to send her out of the house with my parents or sneak us out while he was outside smoking to get away from him. And yes you can judge me all you want about how easy it was to just leave but when you have become so emotionally demoralized to the point of feeling worthless you literally feel like you can’t do anything. They make you feel dependent on them like without them your absolutely nothing. No matter how many times my family begged me not to go back I still made the same mistake and walked back through the doors of hell. After all the sweet talking, all the “I’m sorry, it won’t happen again.” and “I miss you.” repeatedly.
The years passed and the aggression and hate he had towards me seemed to just thicken with time. I could do less and less right. Our daughter would hide in her bedroom with her dog and I fell into an even deeper depression in 2014 when I got sick with Idiopathic inter-cranial hypertension and was in and out of the hospital. His abuse at that time was amplified with my inability to work as much. In 2016 I had a massive eye surgery to save my sight. I had stopped working a company based job and started working at a hotel with my friend Dani to work around my sickness and was helping watch my friend’s kids through the summer. It didn’t matter though, I was still just a lazy pile of shit that just didn’t want to work. The house fell apart, my life was in shambles and I had no one to turn to. I had started to spiral in my depression by fall and the kids returning to school.
Around this time Brandon started acting off and in the summer of 2018 he got an OWI. He was arrested for his 3rd offense and then he lost his license. Shortly there after he started acting very odd by not coming home from work and not answering the phone. One night he never came home and I was so worried that I called every hospital, all his friends and the police department and got nothing. On December 6th 2018 I was released to go back to work but the day I found that out is the day my daughter and my life changed forever. That night I had taken his phone while he was asleep, he had started sleeping with it under his pillow, gotten an extention cord to plug it in next to the couch just odd behavior. Questioning in my mind what on earth was going on with the man who would once leave his phone just sitting around the house I went through it I found he was cheating on me with a 19 year old girl he had been working with named Brianna the saddest part of all of it was she new about Adaline and myself.
You could give a girl the benefit of the doubt had they not known about you but knowing the other person was with someone is entirely a different story. The part that truly broke me was all the horrible things he said about me. Things that were false like I controlled him, I didn’t let him do anything, I was crazy. It was late and Addie had woke up from a bad dream. I tucked her back in on the couch with a movie and I snuck into the bathroom. Locking the door behind myself, so Addie wouldn’t see me fall apart. I fell to my knees crying as I finished reading the back and forth conversation of a man I once loved and a woman I never even met bash me based off what she was told about me. Not even a woman, more so a child. In my eyes, you’re still a child at 19. Being as old as I am now, they are still just babies, but maybe that’s because my daughter is now a teen herself.
Little did I know as I read my nightmare was about to unfold before my eyes. The monster that had finally decided to find his way into bed had awoken. He came out the bedroom screaming at Addie demanding to know where I was and where his phone was. I got up off the floor knowing he was coming for me I panicked, to keep him away from her I said “I’m in the bathroom Brandon I’ll be out shortly”. It was than he exploded with rage “wheres my phone you stupid f***ing b**ch?” In a shaking and terrified voice all I could say was who’s Brianna?” He proceeded to break the bathroom door down. As he repeatedly kicked and punched and put his shoulder into the door with all his force my baby no our baby screaming in pure terror for him to stop and not hurt her mommy. It was than he said the most terrifying words that are still burnt into both or minds and that still haunts or dreams. “I’ll shoot you, I’ll shoot you right in the head if you don’t open this f***ing door and give me my phone back. They’re just in the other room.” I hear a blood curdling screech from my daughters small chest and her say, in absolute horror, “Daddy don’t shoot mommy. Daddy please, why would you hurt my mommy?” In panicked what do I do the only thing between me and him is a door my child on the other slide I can’t leave her here. And then…. He kicked it in and I went flying into the door on the opposite side of the room. I could feel the sting of the door knob in the side of my rib. I could already feel a bruise forming as I hit the floor hyperventilating and gasping for air he stood over me spitting in my face, telling me what a pile of shit I was and how much better she was than me. He than told me he should just shoot me and be done with it while our daughter tugged at her dad’s arm begging him not to shoot her mommy. “Please daddy, please don’t hurt mommy!” It was in that moment I realized if I didn’t leave I was going to die. Bbbbb…but how he’s over top of me he wants to kill me what can I possibly do now.
As panic sets in and he takes his phone ripping from my shaking hands he turns and storms out of the bathroom slamming what’s left of a door. Adaline drops to the floor over me laying her body over mine and we both start shaking and rocking praying he’s not headed for that gun cabinet. I can’t get up because I’m frozen in place in terror. I have no keys, no wallet, no shoes, they are all in the front of the house which is passed him and the back doors are both locked. I finally have the ability to push up off the floor, tucking my daughter behind me. I peer out of the bathroom door to find him gone. Idk where he is, so I scramble around and go for the kitchen.
I know, dumb, I should have ran out the back door straight to the neighbors. But please don’t judge me for being in that mind set and think what you would do is different than what happened. Especially in the dead of winter, after a blizzard. I find him on the front porch smoking and I take the house key off his key. I throw his keys out the front door and lock it. I run to the back and throw his shoes and coat out the back door I then lock those. I go up stairs with the dog and I for some reason I stair at the phone in disbelief that I can’t call 911 so I call my dad’s. Yes dads I calls my step dad and my biological dad. My step dad came and got me and my daughter and my biological dad came and removed the guns filed the police report for me and turned all the guns over to the sheriffs office in the 8 year relationship there are 14 domestic police reports in all looking back now and reading them I shake my head with a broken heart that I let myself and my child get put through that.
When I left that relationship, I left with holes in my tennis shoes. I hadn’t bought a pair of pants in idk how long. I had no job and a barely running car. So just remember, it doesn’t matter if you have nothing when you leave, you can still leave. He doesn’t own you, and you CAN do it alone. The truly sad reality of the abuse is when we left I found that not only myself but Adaline too was talking down to herself as well. Calling herself dumb, stupid, pathetic. We started affirmations seeing a psychiatrist we thought the abuse was over but we couldn’t have been more wrong.
I tried to keep there relationship as best I could for her sake she craved his love but little did I know that lead him to still be able to abuse me. After the break up he cut my break line they all went out one night after work while I was driving down a back road. At this point what do I do stop and pull over? No he could be waiting for me anywhere I had no cell service we live in the middle of nowhere so I drove miles with no breaks just praying I would make it and sobbing in pure fear for my life. When I got to my mom’s where I was staying I ran to the door and locked it I ran upstairs and went into an uncontrollable trembling fit. Of course there’s no proof who did it, and the car’s so old that I couldn’t prove anything even though I tried. I dropped Adaline off to visit him one day at his mom’s and I stayed inside my vehicle and let him take her because his mom lived in an apartment building. When I came back to get her a few hours later, he put Adaline in her booster seat and than told me “I was such a piece of sh*t bi**h for keeping his child from him and doing all this to him.” Then he looked me dead in the face and said “I hope your car blows up.” So I then started crying out of shear panic recalling immediately how my breaks had just went out and him so recently threatening to shoot me. And my daughter starts getting hysterical, trying to climb out of, the window in fear of the car blowing up. But I think that’s what he wanted. He wanted me out of the car. So I tried to calm her and I drove away just far enough he couldn’t see me and called my dad to come check my car over. Again I made a mistake because I should have filed yet another police report. He had asked to come and get his belongings and I had explained to him that we would not be home that evening, we had prior obligations with friends for dinner. He called me and told me he was at the house and he was kicking in my back door I could hear it the dog was going crazy and he told me he was taking our dog. I had finally moved past the scared stage and immediately hung up and called the police when the cops arrived they escorted him off the property. He was no longer on the lease and had no residency there do to what had all transpired the few weeks prior to this incident. I talked to the cop and we set up a time for him to come and get his belongings and yet again he tried to take the dog. I explained to the cop that Adaline was dependent on BoBo he was her best friend during the duration of the abusive relationship and Brandon would soon be going to jail anyway for his OWI she shouldn’t have to loose her dog and her dad too. He was welcome to come get BoBo after release and once he had found a home and gotten settled in as it was his family’s dog. We all agreed I even signed a formal statement. Several months had passed and I did end up giving BoBo to Brandon. My intention despite all the hate he showed me was never ill will it was only to do what was right for my child, myself and my family.
Until 2023 the abuse continued as threats in text. My daughter’s and my mental health had gotten so unstable that we ended up having panic attacks and Addie was in and out the hospital. When I had finally had enough, we ran. We packed up and went over two hours away. It’s then that he threatened to shoot me for the second time. That’s the day I called PAVE and started my true journey to healing. After filing my first restraining order and the reality he was going to loose his guns sank in, he panicked and filed charges against me for card fraud. In the county we used to live in I plead to two misdemeanors, even though he physically gave me the card to buy his child school supplies. I didn’t want to risk a felony charge and loose in a trial. Sometimes fear gets the best of us all. But I also chose that plea deal for Adaline so she didn’t have to stand up in court and testify to a jury against her dad when she still has to go see him once a month. I didn’t want those repercussions to fall on her since he can’t get to me. The unfortunate fact is that the judge back home forced me to give him my new phone number and address after a judge in my new county had eliminated that info from all court records and put in a recommendation that for our safety, Brandon not know our current location. He felt his aggression towards me made him a serious threat to me. I was then forced, in court, to give him my location anyway. My address and my phone number. A stipulation was put in place that I can’t even change my phone number, block him or move without a two weeks notice. This truly brought to light just how hard it is for women of domestic violence to get free and safe from their abusers when the court system is adamant to work against them.
It’s been a little over a year now since we have been free from him and I’m finally able to tell my story. It didn’t change over night , but now I’m actually willing to admit I kinda ran from my healing process for a long time. I deflected from it. But more recently I’ve opened up and I’ve started going to group meetings weekly with woman that have been through or are going through similar situations. I meet with Holly when we both have free time but this time of year’s been a little crazy for us both. She had me do this project called black out poetry. The page we worked on came from a Domestic Violence book. It brought out a side to my art that I didn’t know I had in me. I recently started drawing domestic violence awareness pictures more for myself. I started writing poems again, I started playing games again. In this slow healing journey, I have finally started becoming more of my old self again. Addie’s been working with an amazing advocate at PAVE named Alex, she absolutely loves him. What I can say is I never got much help back home when I came here and found pave and my new home I found freedom and a community that truly supports domestic violations survivors. As well as a police department and court system that fights with them, not against them.
Since moving here we met an amazing man and his two sons. One struggle I had to face are triggers and insecurities I had coming into this new relationship. The beautiful part in finding John was that he never waivers. He understood my past. I know that healing should have came before him but it was an unexpected happening. He lets me cry about my past he lets me heal and he walks this path of still coming through it with me and Adaline. I have two boys now and my life has changed a lot in the past year but so has Brandon’s aggression since finding out I’m in a new relationship. From accusing us of abuse which were all found to be false to neglect to court hearing after court hearing. I’m finally fighting back WE are finally fighting back.
I spent the better part of the last 15 years living in fear of what ifs and living for others and protecting someone else’s name and reputation instead of letting myself and my daughter heal. But not anymore. Today, I choose us. Today, I choose me, today I choose to move forward with my life and start a new journey, a new chapter, a new path. I still have a long path ahead and so does Adaline. I have decided that on my good days I want to start volunteering what time and effort I can give and help with spreading awareness to others.
In the end I’d like all woman to know that I truly deep down know how hard it is to leave an abusive relationship. But, just because you have past with someone doesn’t mean you have a future with someone. You are not crazy, unstable, worthless, or incapable. You’re strong smart beautiful and you can do this on your own. I’m not going to tell you this journey is easy because it’s not. It’s one of the hardest and darkest paths i have ever had to walk. From nightmares and cold sweats to hugging my pillow and crying tell my nose bled. The full body shaking, the throwing up, the survivors guilt that can eat you alive. But, despite all those battles along the way the beauty on other side when you finally reach the part where your ready to speak out and tell you’re story. To help other woman or just ready to walk into a beautiful bright new future for yourself. It’s the beautiful journey to become a better stronger you. You did not deserve to be abused, no one does.
Long story short I survived no we survived. By Survivor Stephanie
