How I Survived Domestic Violence

"I Will Survive" was beautifully sung just for me by a male survivor friend at my “Celebrate With Me” Book Signing Party. Writing my book, “Listen to the Cry of the Child,” took courage and strength but just hearing those powerful words of Gloria Gaynor’s song, “I was petrified & afraid” made me think over the many things that had transpired in my life when I was a victim. I suddenly realized that I had survived so many severe very dark traumas! As my friend continued to play the piano he looked at me and sang, “Spending so many nights feeling sorry for myself and “thinking about my broken heart” helped me realize that because of my God-given gifts with deep faith and empathy towards those with broken wings, I was a prime target for domestic violence!

I began to think about why I had gone down the path of co-dependancy rescuing people who were just like me. Wow, I heard him sing, “I’ll stay alive ”because “I’ve got my whole life to live” and give back to others who are domestic violence survivors. I questioned, perhaps those strengths can become my purpose in helping others who are broken? Gloria’s words cut deep into my soul and I began to have hope for the first time in my life. I honestly didn’t think that I was a survivor but I wept when I heard “I Will Survive” because I knew that he was singing not just for me but for survivors everywhere.

As a child of a violent crime, I lived with a silent scream for thirty eight years. Growing up as the daughter of a pastor, the sexual abuse began when I was a little child. The "secret" of my grandfather's incest while treating me to ice cream was unthinkable! He was a Deacon in his church and hid who he really was from everybody.

He entered my bath time, exposed himself to me and took me alone with him in his car where he asked for sexual favors. He molested me while treating me to ice cream. I found out later that he had also violated my cousins and my mother. She could not protect me & I was unable to tell. He told me not to. I was too little to understand anyway. I wanted nothing to do with him. At age eight, I decided never to get near him again. That stopped his abuse. I was thankful when he died at 101 years of age but sorry that I never got the courage to confront him with what he did to me.

Years later, I discovered the truth when I faced the minister who sexually assaulted me as a preteen at a Bible camp. He was twenty seven years old, preaching by night and molesting the pastor’s daughters by day at various places at the camp. He singled me out as if picking the sweetest, ripest, freshest, undefiled oranges at the supermarket, fondling me underneath my bathing suit while he laughed and joked at the swimming hole. Those secrets shut me down with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder much like amnesia.

Because of the memory blocks, school became difficult. I was introverted, shy, had few close friends, panic attacks & nightmares. Like a deaf mute, I became silence about it for decades, desperately wanting to tell someone what was happening in my silent world of memories but unable to do so. Like the silent falling of the snowflakes, no words about it came out and no voice was heard. I screamed but no sound came out of my mouth. There were only tears late at night when no one but God was listening.

The pain of keeping these dirty secrets buried took a tremendous toll on my body. As I grew into pre-adolescence, I looked undernourished, suffered with anorexia and thought I was ugly. The signs are all there in my pictures I don’t like seeing. I didn’t go through puberty when my friends did. I was mortified when at age sixteen, I hadn’t started my monthly cycle. Not knowing why, my mother took me to the doctors for hormone shots to make my body begin doing something that should have normally happened by then. Who would have suspected it was because of the sexual abuse, least of all me?

As I grew into young adulthood, I felt as if a wrecking ball had come down on my head and shattered my life like a mirror into a million pieces all over the road of life. I have been trying to pick up the pieces of my life ever since. Just like all the king’s men in "Humpty Dumpty," I had no idea how to put myself together again. Even though I knew I was created in the image of God, in my shattered state it was impossible to realize that image.

Unable to trust and afraid of men, I didn’t date much but at a small college where I worked I met the love of my life. Looking into my husband's eyes at age nineteen, saying our marriage vows on our wedding day I meant them forever. He was my lover, my protector and my best friend. I trusted him fully. I never dreamed in a million years that I would personally be faced with an affair by my husband after only nine years of marriage. I walked in on him and his lover. I was devastated! Within a year it happened again with someone in our small church. Any form of infidelity requires us to be dishonest with ourselves, with others and with God.

He tragically lost his father to suicide two years into our marriage. I also believe pornography played a part in his betrayals. I never thought I could trust him again because my trust in people, particularly in men who abused me had shattered me personally as well as my marriage. I now realize that he comforted himself with women as a result of his tragic loss of his father to suicide. It devastated him & everyone in our family. He shut down!

Years of emptiness and infertility led to adopting our first born son. I wept when I welcomed another mother’s baby into my arms and home. Five months later I found out I was pregnant with our second son. God answered our prayers, but neither of us knew how to deal with our losses. Seven years later I discovered that I was pregnant with our third son. He was a sweet, gentle baby but because I hadn’t grieved my losses, Postpartum Depression robbed me of the ability to cope. An abuse victim suffers in silence. By remaining silent, and with the fear of anyone discovering my "secret," the effects of the abuse on my adult life were something far more devastating than the actual abuse!

Freedom came as I was willing to slowly come clean with my secrets. With the support of pastor’s & psychologist from my childhood denomination, I courageously faced and confronted the clergy who long ago had violated me. He was in complete denial but I chose to forgive him. Seven weeks later I learned that he fell down the stairs and broke his back and died! Writing my memoir from the depths of my soul I was finally able to grieve all my many losses. Reading the chapter with my husband about our marriage betrayal in my book, "Listen to the Cry of the Child" brought closure and healing.

I chose to take the step of forgiveness on my journey to freedom as I went through the grieving process. My husband has too. The best years of our marriage was after writing my book when he acknowledged and owned his part in his marriage betrayals that devastated me! Because he was willing to look at what he did to me, himself and to God, we have finally come to fullness in a love for one another once again. We are very much still in love with one another and celebrated 54 years together.

Forgiveness does not mean forgetting because the pain is so deep and the scars remain. Fear chokes the soul just as weeds choke the most beautiful flowers in the garden. As this fear was beginning to be released, I realized that this the garden of my life could now bloom in the mission I am now on. We can't change our past but as we begin to heal the wounded child within, the pain will lessen and can become 'gifts in disguise' and a purpose in my life. When fear comes uninvited, it needs to become an offering to God and to ourselves to work through that fear in order to free our souls to live!

I am giving back to other’s with broken wings who have not yet found their voices. I teach battered domestic violence survivors, speak in prisons to sex offenders in chapel and facilitate a trauma support group called Beauty Out of Ashes. I would never have fulfilled my purpose had I not been able to forgive! I have learned that to forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner is you.

Now, when I hear Gloria Gaynor’s song, “I Will Survive”, I am reminded that I not only am a survivor but have moved from victim to victorious survivor & overcomer. Yes, “it took all the strength I had not to fall apart and mend the pieces of my broken heart” but because “I grew strong and learned how to get along, I will survive!”

Barbara & her husband, Wayne are humanitarian aid workers speaking all over the world including two months with her violence prevention work in the Philippines. Barbara's inspiring amazing story on CBN Asia The 700 Club in the Philippines with Filipino actors in a 4 minute YouTube movie of abuse as a preteen. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ToE1Hor0sVw&feature=youtu.be

Please help us in our ongoing violence prevention ministry & order a personally signed copy of my inspirational memoir published book from us at [email protected]