The Fight to Survive

It all started in August of 1992 when I started dating my daughters’ father when I was nineteen years old. I fell madly in love. I loved his big kind heart, the love and attention he gave me. We did almost everything together. He spoiled me and always made me feel like a million dollars. Unfortunately, the alcohol and drug use would change that loving, kind-hearted man that I loved so much into a monster. During the wonderful times, there was abuse. I stayed for many years because I knew he wasn't always this person. I loved him so much that I was blinded by it. I seriously thought that he would change, and I could help him do that. Through the next six years and five months, I was physically, sexually, emotionally, and mentally abused. I can recall several incidences in detail, however, I am sure there are plenty that I have unconsciously blocked out.

March 19, 1993, was the first time. It was my and my two-year-old sons’ birthday. My boyfriend wasn't the father of my son and his biological father and I threw him a party at Pizza Hut. My boyfriend didn't attend. My son's father needed a ride home from the party, so I took him. I didn't think it was a big deal at the time. I had no feelings for my son's father. We stopped at a local gas station for gas and my boyfriend shows up. This was the first day of many abusive days to come. In the parking lot of the gas station, he started to beat me until my son's father jumps out of the car after him. By the time the police showed up, I had to hide my bruises so the police wouldn't arrest him. You see, I loved him, he was drunk and promised it would never happen again.

May 8, 1994, we had our first daughter and moved to Greensboro, NC where our best friends had moved. Away from my family the abuse got worse along with his use of drugs. There were many nights between 1994 and 1996 that I thought I would go to sleep, and I would wake up because I couldn't breathe. His hands were choking me as I slept. I tried going to a local organization for help and getting a restraining order, but in those days without physical marks or verbal threats to kill me, there was nothing they would do. So now I am too scared to just leave.

June 1996, I got pregnant with our second daughter. The day of the abuse that sticks out in my head was the time I was pregnant with her and he beat me all over the kitchen. Slamming me into the stove and refrigerator until his baby sister jumped in and fought him. My daughter is a miracle to have made it through the abuse to being born.

Early 1998, I am now praying for removal from this situation safely and have either of us look back. Suddenly, the lights got cut off and the rent was past due causing us to have to find somewhere to live. He went to his mothers and I went to stay at a friend’s house.

Ten months later my best friend in Greensboro calls me and wants me to move in with her. Three months later I got my own place. I would take the kids to see him in our hometown on the weekends.

May 1998 against my doubts, his oldest sister convinced me to take him to Greensboro so that He could get his life together. She told me I was the only one who could save him. She said he would be dead or in jail if he stayed. At this point out of the goodness of my heart I was trying to help him. He understood I had moved on with my life and we were just friends, or so I thought. On June 14, 1998, on a Tuesday evening and his birthday, it was the last straw for me. He came in from hanging out with a few friends and he lost it on me. He threw me around, hit me, and kicked the fan down the hallway, etc. I finally ran outside, and he locked me out keeping the kids inside. After he calmed down he let me back in.

The next morning, I left like I normally did to go to work and take the kids to daycare, but instead I dropped the kids off and went to the courthouse to sign a 50B (restraining order). All the judges were in a conference till Thursday. I went back to the daycare and picked up the kids and left to head to Whiteville to my friend’s house till Thursday with just the clothes on our backs. On Thursday I headed back to Greensboro to sign the 50B and the police evicted him from the house. I was able to go get some clothes. Still scared I went back to my friend’s house till Friday and then home to my parents for the night.

From my house I went into a shelter in Greensboro until we went to court for a permanent restraining order. The judge said we should seek marriage counseling. I couldn't believe it, not only were we not together anymore, but we were also never married. At the end of the hearing, he told me he would kill me and whoever I was with. This time his threats didn't work. I decided then and there that I would not let him control me and the rest of my life. I requested that the shelter in Greensboro move me to a shelter in Fayetteville, NC, where they helped me in 24 hours get my own apartment and within 3 days a job. I spent 14 months in this program going through counseling for me and my kids. I met my first husband in Fayetteville and in mid 2000 we moved to Greensboro, NC so he could attend NCA&T University.

When we got to Greensboro, I found a psychiatrist, why I was never diagnosed with PTSD then I don't know. It could have saved a lot of grieve in my marriage. They were no help at all.

With no self-confidence or self-esteem and very insecure in whom I was, the restoration process starts to build a confidant woman. A woman damaged but not broken. Because of no self-confidence or self-esteem, I was hard on myself and very negative about everything including myself. I was always thinking that other people were putting me down, when really, they were trying to help me. You see even through all the therapy; I was still damaged. I had no idea who I was. I had a lot of built-up pain and hurt that I had covered with a bandage in order to move forward with life. Telling myself I was a survivor and now that I was out of that relationship everything was great. But I had to realize that not only did I need to be healed from the hurt and pain, but I needed to find out who Tanya really was.

The restoration and healing did not come over night or in a few days or even in a few months. I had to speak out loud every day, “I forgive _________”.

You never imagine that you will have to go through the same thing over again. I thought that once I had learned to move on from my abuse there would never come a time when it would happen again. How could I let myself fall for that again? I mean, I own a foundation for women of domestic violence. But in 2013 I started down that same path after a divorce from my first husband that left me so lost and once again broken.

In 2013 I thought I had met the right man. He was ten years older than me, that meant he was mature right? He had a good job; he was stable and seemed like he just had it all together. When we moved in together, I should have known it was a disaster waiting to happen. But after my divorce I was looking for someone to love me.

In the beginning, it was him just drinking too much. Those nights he would come in and he would call me every name in the book and even talked about guns and shooting up people that weren't even in the house. I just ignored it and would talk to him when he was sober about his drinking and about how the enemy uses those moments in time where he has no control over himself to come into his mind.

This time I never let it get as bad as before. But there were a few times that it could have been worse. The physical abuse started in 2016 when he came in drunk and pushed me. I went to the hospital the next morning because my chest was hurting so bad, I couldn't breathe, my left arm was going numb, my neck and shoulder were hurting. The ER said they couldn't find anything. They released me. A few days later I was back. Both times I was sent in an ambulance from my job. They still couldn't find anything. I ended up at my primary care's office and spent three months trying to find out what was wrong. I had an ultrasound to check for ulcers, a heart doctor to make sure I hadn't had a stroke or heart attack or any other heart related problems, a endoscopy and colonoscopy, and a diagnostic breast examine, until I finally asked for a full body CAT Scan. Finally, the CAT Scan showed that my C3 and C5 discs in my neck were bulging and herniated. I spent twelve weeks in physical therapy and six months of taking three steroid injections in the top of my back and a total of eight months taking medication that had steroids in them and gave me some short-term memory loss issues. Fast-forward to 2018, then it was throwing bags of clothes at me, and full water bottles. Still, a lot of name calling and pushing. Till the night he came in and grab me by my throat and slammed me down. That was the last straw. This happened in October 2018 and I spent the next four months getting myself ready to move out. I moved out January 30, 2019. It was not an easy process, especially financially getting on my feet by myself. July 29, 2019, I realized I couldn't continue to try and handle the emotion and mental issues that I was having. I really thought I could handle it on my own. I went out of work on short term disability. I started counseling and therapy August 2019. It has been rougher this time I think because it also brought up a lot of what happened to me in my past. My fears are back, can't sleep, anxiety off the charts and finally someone diagnosed me with PTSD. I read up on it after the diagnoses and realized that I should have been diagnosed in the early 2000s because I was suffering from all the signs.

It took the second abuse for me to be diagnosed with PTSD. However, when I look at all the symptoms, I had all of these in the early 2000s. If my husband (at the time) and I would have known this, it may have made the first several years of our relationship and marriage easier. I remember a specific event while we were standing in the bathroom at my apartment when we were dating, and he had just affectionately put his around my shoulder and neck. In a split-second reaction I elbowed him as hard as I could in the ribs. You see that touch brought back the flashback and feelings of being choked. I also remember the fears of going to sleep at night where I would have to literally rock myself to sleep. Nightmares are common for survivors. I know for me I have memories and then I have nightmares. I think even some of my memories are played out in my dreams as nightmares.

Now I am restored. I stand before women today knowing that there is restoration your self-esteem, self-respect, love, outlook on life, and bring healing and full restoration to you. I know that what I went through was not for Tanya, but all my bad was made it good. I have started Rejuvenated Women’s Foundation. I am an advocate and speaker who brings awareness to help survivors.

My story is written in more detail in my book, “Damaged But Not Broken: ….Restoration After Domestic Violence”. I took the above from inserts of my book.