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Julia Philips, a writer, shares what she learnt as a rape crisis counsellor. She explains entering the first training session and feeling completely overwhelmed as she was surrounded by a family therapist, nurses, sex educators and public defenders who were also volunteering to be counsellors. Philips remembers thinking how underqualified she felt for the roleRead more

Jude Miller Burke completed a research study in 2017 with 300 successful men and women that revealed that “40% of them reported experiencing childhood abuse, witnessing family violence, or having an alcoholic parent while growing up.” Burke documents that even more of them “reported growing up in poverty, having a parent with a mental illness,Read more

Healing after abuse is a long, arduous process. Thomas Fiffer shares a list of the challenges that survivors don’t share or rarely share. Fiffer’s article paints a clear picture of the daily struggles that survivors face after leaving an abusive relationship. Below is a short summary of the article. Leaving and staying away from someoneRead more

VersAnnette Blackman-Bosia writes about the journey of healing after experiencing domestic violence. The article is targeted at single mothers who face additional challenges to leave an abusive relationship. Caring for their children and carrying that financial burden alone is a big deterrent for women to leave an abusive relationship. Although the hardest part of theRead more

In an article by Sherri Gordon, she explains how victims stay in abusive relationships because they fear not being able to provide “financially for themselves and their children.” Financial security is also recorded as one of the main reasons that women return to the abuser. Therefore, it is important to identify signs of financial abuseRead more

Bonnie Koehn, in her article, Early Signs of an Unhealthy Relationship, writes about how abusers can be very charming in the early stages of a relationship and for this reason women are usually drawn to them.  Therefore, it can be difficult to identify signs of abuse, and often it is only identified when the partnerRead more

It can be difficult to differentiate between someone with a bad attitude and someone who is abusive. In an article by Maria Miguel, the issue of emotional abuse is tackled in a lot of detail.  In the article, You’re Not Crazy, But Emotional Abuse Can Make You Think You Are, Miguel explains some of theRead more

Heidi Davoren shares the story of Jerry Retford, a man who used to abuse his wife in front of his children, and how he changed his life. Retford explains some of the things he needed to do before he sought help; Accept responsibility Stop blaming his partner or everyone else for what’s going wrong inRead more

Elizabeth Brico, who is a writer from the Pacific Northwest who covers stories about life after trauma, writes in this article about her experience of fighting for custody of her child from her abuser.  Here’s a summary of her experience with the custody proceeding and how it affected her: The abuser had an attorney, andRead more

People always say that survivors must speak about abuse and there are hundreds of campaigns that encourage survivors to speak. Rarely, do you ever hear anyone ask what happens to a survivor when they come out and share their story. An insightful article on domesticshelters.org sheds light on the insults, humiliation and abuse that survivorsRead more