By Christine Murray, See the Triumph Co-Founder
When we first started See the Triumph nearly three years ago, we often were asked about the name of the campaign, and people wondered if the name would be clear enough for our audience to understand the purpose of the campaign. We knew we could have selected another name that made more clear that the focus of our work was on intimate partner violence, but we also felt strongly that the name “See the Triumph” was the best way to capture our mission of ending the stigma surrounding intimate partner violence and supporting survivors. As we’ve shared before, the name “See the Triumph” came from a quote from a participant in our earliest research study. This woman had been horrifically beaten and verbally abused by her former boyfriend and the father of her child. She told us how people have asked her if she is embarrassed by her history of having been abused, and here’s how she responded to that question:
As part of our “No Stigma/Only Triumph” series for 2015 Domestic Violence Awareness Month, I wanted to highlight this woman’s story, as it’s an example of the many stories of survivors that drive our work with See the Triumph. I had the honor of interviewing her, and her story stays with me to this day as a reminder to keep our focus on promoting the view of survivors of past abuse as strong, resilient, and, yes, triumphant. To protect her privacy, I’ve altered several potentially identifying details about this participant, including her name (i.e., Sheila is not her real name). However, the key details are presented as she described them to me. This is “Sheila’s” story, and the story behind the name, See the Triumph: When we met for our interview, Sheila was flustered and running a bit late. She was facing a number of challenges in her life at the time, including a health condition and romantic relationship transitions, as well as ongoing responsibilities to care for her children. Sheila began by sharing her reasons for wanting to be a part of our study. She said, “A lot of things have gone on in my life have to do with…trying to straighten out things from your past, when they were already kind of thrown up and messed up in the area in the first place…Sometimes it takes a lot longer than you would want it to. Sometimes you don’t realize how long things are going to be affecting you in how many different ways, too.” Before her current marriage, Sheila was in an abusive relationship with the father of one of her children. Having grown up in a family in which abuse was prevalent, “It was normal. So, getting in the relationship with him was just, it was just normal.” The abuse didn’t start right away, but rather grew gradually over time. She describes the progression of abuse as building over a time period of a couple years. The physical abuse began gradually, and sexual abuse also became part of their relationship. She said, “He would have sex with me rough. But I was sexually abused growing up. So, to me a man treating me bad like that or using me in any way, it seemed normal.” After about two years had passed, and she told me of a night when her partner got drunk and beat her badly, verbally abused her, and forced himself upon her sexually. Even after such a violent incident, Sheila stayed with her ex-boyfriend. As she said, “I excused it away. He apologized. He was so sweet…He also said it was because of how I was with him when he was drunken, and that I needed to, that something I had done or said had, you know triggered. So, all I kept thinking was, ‘OK, I’ll just try not to do that again.’” After that, the abuse continued and got progressively worse. Sheila said, “After that, it just seemed like eventually it just became a habit. It became, it just, it would happen more often. He drank more. I mean, it just progressively got worse and scarier.” Eventually, a particularly scary incident led Sheila to file a police report. She describes the beating as so bad that it led her to feel “like either I was blacking out or something, because I couldn’t even feel it even more.” Her abuser blamed her for that beating, saying, “Look at what you made me do.” The damage from this incident was extensive--Her face was so badly swollen and disfigured that she was practically unrecognizable. The incident also left Sheila with multiple concussions. After that incident, Sheila did leave the relationship and went to live with a family member. However, it wasn’t long before he pursued her again. She initially resisted the idea of reconciling with him, but even her family members encouraged her to get back together with him. So, she decided to give the relationship another chance. But, it wasn’t long before the abusive and controlling behaviors re-appeared. At this point, Sheila didn’t believe that leaving the relationship was a safe option. He had threatened that he would kill her if she left him. Eventually, though, the final straw incident finally came. It was during an especially violent incident that, fearing for her own and her child’s safety, she called the police, and she was able to leave, not even wearing shoes and carrying only her baby and the baby’s diaper bag. From there, Sheila took up residence at the local shelter and began reading to learn about abusive relationships. She took out a protective order, which he violated and was arrested as a result. Shortly after that, she decided, “No more. I was over it…And he knew I was serious.” Sheila shared that, after the relationship ended, she “went through a lot of therapy and counseling and stuff like that just to make sure I didn’t get back in another one.” She found great validation after a meeting with a mental health professional, who helped her realize that she wasn't "crazy" and who helped Sheila get on the path to recovery. Sheila shared the sentiment that she wanted to help others, and that was one of the reasons why she came in for our interview. She said, “That’s why I come here was just so important. It was just – it was just so important to do this...Because I know that I couldn’t have been the only – I’m sure I’m not the only one. It felt that way. And went through that stuff. I was in a shelter. I saw other women. But I want them to know that on the other side there is happiness, and that you can be fulfilled, and you can be – and that it doesn’t take a man.” Far from being hopeless as a result of the difficult experiences in her life, Sheila remained hopeful and excited about the future. She said, “I’m excited. I’m excited about just the new stuff. And even just thinking about new things. It used to scare me…It used to scare me so bad. I remember – I was thinking about that today on the way here. I was thinking about there was a time when I wouldn’t have done this [interview]. Because it would have been just too scary.” I don’t know if Sheila knows that her story has inspired the name of a campaign that has grown to thousands of followers across numerous social media channels. I don’t know if she knows that her important reminder about keeping our focus on the triumph in survivors’ lives has inspired and motivated so many other people to re-focus on the triumphs in their own lives. But I do know this: Sheila wanted to share her story in hopes that it would help others facing similar abuse-related challenges in their own lives. For as long as we continue to grow and build the See the Triumph campaign, we are committed to honoring Sheila and the countless other survivors who have shared their stories with us. It is in their stories that we find the keys to ending the stigma that far too many survivors face. 10/4/2015 Finding Your Inner Advocate!By Allison Crowe, See the Triumph co-founder
It’s October, so this month our focus is on “No Stigma/Only Triumph.” In order to fight the stigma that still persists about intimate partner violence, we need all the advocates we can get! So, today I encourage you to find your own inner advocate. But how do I do this? Where do I start? What do I care about? You might be wondering these sorts of questions, so I will share a little about my own process in hopes that this might help you. When Christine and I started the See the Triumph project, we knew we wanted to share the stories we’d heard from survivors in our research. We had interviewed a small number of women and were touched by the poignant experiences, messages to other survivors, horror stories of abuse, and ways the women we met had managed to overcome abusive relationships. This was about three years ago, but I remember our phone call after we’d completed the interviews as if it were yesterday! Both of us seemed to know we wanted to do something more than the traditional, scholarly writing about the research, but how exactly this would look we really didn’t know. One of our first ideas was to create a website to reach a broader audience. We had quotes from the interviews that we thought might work well displayed with pictures and images. We had to make sure that both of our institutional review boards (IRBs) would approve of sharing our research in this way. As the project grew, so did out knowledge of social media, and tools that are available for sharing information and reaching a broader audience. Honestly, when we started, Christine and I did not know much about social media tools, blogging, pledges and petitions, and how to be advocates of a project like this. Each See the Triumph milestone has been a learning experience, but along the way, one of my biggest take-away’s has been proudly adding the identity of advocate to my role as a university professor. And I have to say, it has been one of the most rewarding identities to claim. I remember learning about the role of advocacy during my master’s program in counseling and feeling intimated about how to advocate, what this would look like in practice, and finding time for this in addition to the other responsibilities of a professional counselor. Today, I want to share some of my own small lessons learned about advocacy through the See the Triumph project. My hope is that by reading some of these, you might think about them as they apply to your own passions and identities as advocates:
These are five simple reflections from my own journey with See the Triumph. My hope is that they might help those of you along the way in your paths towards advocacy. Thanks for reading, and as always, thanks for supporting our work! Best of luck with finding your inner advocate, or even beginning the process! 10/3/2015 What Triumphing Over Abuse Means To MeBy Darby Munroe, See the Triumph Guest Blogger I am a Domestic Violence survivor. Every day is an act of survival, even years later. I have PTSD from what I experienced, from what was forced on me. Even though I am relatively safe now, I have to overcome triggers and reactions that debilitate me in my daily life. Being out a few years, I look back and celebrate the courage it took to leave, to fight for my and my child’s safety, to stand up for myself, and to have a voice. The decisions and actions I make everyday increase my independence, increase the control I have over my own life, and are minute-by-minute victories. Some days, getting a full night of sleep or washing the dishes are great accomplishments. Other days, just recognizing and acknowledging my struggles, where they come from, and allowing myself to rest and process those issues are huge accomplishments. Prior to the trauma, I had grown up in what I thought was a loving family. I was adopted, but my parents never really understood me, supported me, or allowed me to be myself. They were doing their best, but expected me to meet their needs, instead of them meeting mine. It wasn’t exactly healthy, but it was all I knew. What I didn’t know was who I was, what I wanted with my life, or how to get there. I spent my 20’s bouncing from job to job, having adventures, or anything that might make me feel true to myself. I was passionate about helping at-risk youth. I was a teacher and was working toward a master’s degree. Then, my ex came along. He appealed to my passion for helping kids in need. He attacked my most valuable asset, my mind. He was so charming and persuasive and had me convinced to compromise values, my beliefs, and myself. He saw my potential and aimed to subdue it, as if it were something to be conquered. I recognize all of these unhealthy patterns, and know how to set healthy boundaries now. I am able to quickly identify what triggers me and move on. I went from survive to thrive. In the few years I have been out, I got re-certified to teach, earned two master’s degrees, got my dream teaching job, and am working toward a doctorate degree. I do have accommodations to help my performance in all of these because of my PTSD. In the near future, I am going to start a non-profit for advocacy and education. I want to help kids with high ACE scores and DV survivors, and teach high conflict parenting courses. I want to train teachers to work with kids who have experienced trauma, which is 1 in 4 kids. Domestic violence, abuse and neglect all show up in the classroom as behavior and learning problems. I have found meaning in what I went through, and I am taking that and using it to help others who are going through the same thing. Once I got out, and things calmed down, I found a great art therapist who does EMDR. For the first time in my life, I am really getting to know and understand myself. I acknowledge my history and its role in my story. I have accepted that I will never get back to the way things were before, and that I have changed. But these things help me to empathize and relate to my son, the students that I work with, and the women that I advocate for. I am embracing myself, loving others, and spreading hope. This is what triumph over abuse is to me. Darby Munroe, M.Ed. is an educator and advocate who works with at-risk youth, children with high ACE scores, and abuse victims. She teaches math during the day, and high conflict parenting classes at night. She lives with her son in a small South Florida coastal town where they love to create art, go to the beach, hike, kayak, and have adventures. By Christine Murray, See the Triumph Co-Founder
Our mission at See the Triumph is to end the stigma around intimate partner violence and to provide supportive resources for survivors of past abuse. This month, for Domestic Violence Awareness Month, we are focusing in on one goal: To raise awareness about the strength, resilience, and resourcefulness of survivors, as well as the need to end the stigma that survivors face. Our theme for the month is simple: No Stigma/Only Triumph. Why do we think it’s so important to end the stigma surrounding intimate partner violence? Through our research and outreach through See the Triumph, we’ve learned that there are many ways that this stigma poses added challenges for survivors of past abuse. Some of those ways are as follows:
If you know a survivor of abuse, or if you yourself are a survivor of abuse, then you know someone who knows how to triumph. You know all the challenges and barriers that survivors face each day--during and after an abusive relationship. You’ve seen how these challenges can be overcome in big and small ways. Triumph may occur slowly over time, but it also can be seen in leaps and bounds as survivors grow and overcome the barriers placed in their way. This month, we’re celebrating the many ways survivors triumph in their journeys to safe and healthy relationships. We look forward to celebrating these triumphs with you and to hearing your ideas about what it means to triumph over abuse throughout the month! |
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