DOMESTIC VIOLENCE AS A WHOLE

This happens to be one of my favorite quotes from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. I absolutely love quotes because sometimes they say they words that I couldn't think of myself. In the title of the post, the word "fighting" is included. I want to first explain what I mean by fighting. When I say fighting, it does not just mean physical, it could be as simple as arguing. After all an argument usually comes before a fight, but a disagreement usually comes before an argument.  I find that most times people find it hard to distinguish the words disagreement and argument. Just because you disagree with someone does not mean that you are arguing or even that you have to argue. Over the past two months, I started thinking about how different things would be if we just accepted each other for who we are. We have started to become a society where people cannot have an opinion without someone saying something negative about it (thank God for blogs right?) lol. I started to wonder...

Yesterday, I was really thinking about some things, especially when it comes to relationships.I was thinking about how some relationships that we enter really bring us down and what we thought was love was really lust. Below is a tweet that I tweeted from my organizations account yesterday. Real love will make you better not worse — F.A.C.E. I.T. (@FACEITORG) January 1, 2014 You see, sometimes we just enter relationships that we were never meant to be in, but they also teach us a lesson. If ever you get into a relationship where you are constantly losing out on who you are then that is not the relationship for me. I find most times though that there was already some sort of insecurity that we already had that opened us to wanting to be in that particular relationship. It is important that we come to learn what true love really is. It is so easy for someone to throw the love word around without putting any meaning to it. Love is a verb, not just an emotion. Love is not just som...

In Honor of Domestic Violence Awareness Month, I wanted to take the time out as a survivor to give back to those who still may be going through a domestic abuse situation or just an unhealthy relationship or situation period. While I do not have money to give, etc one thing I do have is faith, prayer, and HOPE. Because it is Domestic Violence Awareness Month, I wanted to speak to the victims of Domestic Violence. Some times this is the hardest to do, but it is time for us as survivors and advocates to really speak from our hearts to the victims hearts. We don't need to be judgmental because we need to come from that place of understanding, if fact, we do come from that place of understanding because we KNOW and UNDERSTAND what they have went through because WE went through it too. We must not forget, we have to remember how we felt when we were going through it in order to TRY to understand what they are feeling, in order to try to understand why they haven't left yet, in or...

Have you ever been going through something that you held in for a long time, but once you finally told somebody about it, they did not believe you? If you have experienced this, then you can relate to what a lot of people that have experienced domestic violence have gone through. Many times it is hard for a person that has experienced domestic violence to reach out to someone. Most times people won't believe them. The most common reason that people say they do not believe a person is because they did not speak out about it before hand. Here is a scenario: Let's say that there is a woman who is in a abusive relationship with her husband. Lets say that he emotionally, financially, and physically abuses her everyday. The woman has drifted off and does not associate with her family and friends as much as she use to because of the abuse. Her friends and family say that she is acting funny because she is married. They have no idea what she is going through and when she does br...

Some may be wondering why this particular post is under my domestic violence blog and not one of my other ones, it is because I have to stay true not only to myself but to my readers. We all know that Whitney was a SURVIVOR of domestic violence. I can remember as a child, sitting in my room listening to Whitney and trying to belt out beautiful notes like she did. I remember seeing Whitney would perform on TV, or seeing her acting in movies(the body guard, the preachers wife, waiting to exhale). I remember watching waiting to exhale with my mom and I said to myself Oh I don't need a man, that movie gave me strength to look to the future to know the difference between a good man and a not so good one. Little did I know that one day I would find myself 'needing" or "depending" on a man. Sometimes when we don't feel loved we run to other outlets that may not be the best ones. For some it may be the wrong crowd, for some it maybe experimenting with something har...

Do you know DV?  Do you see them as they lurk into people’s lives? Seeking to destroy others because they cannot deal with themselves.  Do you see DV just as charming as can be, hey how are you doing? Dv says to me.  I smile and say I'm fine not knowing that this is just the beginning of something that I will soon hope to be ending.  Oh we had such a good time, we went out a date,  we stayed out late, reminded me of love at first site.  What a good person DV is to me.  Eventually I start to noticed that things have changed,  DV doesn't look at me at the same.  Is it something that I did?  T his is starting to get frightening because he turns to anger just as quick as a flash of lightening  BUT I must be tripping because this is not how I'm living.  Me and DV we love each other, we made a pact that we would not have no other.  Just me and DV but it then it starts to get ...

You say you love me but when you get mad, you hate me. You say there is no one you would rather spend the rest of your life with BUT..when you get mad you say you wish you never met me. You say I'm the best thing that ever happened to you BUT..then you turn around and curse me, hurt me, threaten to take my life and possibly even attempt to take my life. What is this that we are going through? What has gotten a hold of you? Or what has gotten a hold of me? That i have decided to stay in-spite of all this dismay, in-spite of all this hurt and pain. You are begging me to stay as I proceed to leave and I stop for a minute as i see the tears roll down Your eyes saying you love me and you never meant for me to cry, You say you know I didn't deserve what I was getting. You put my pain at ease for a minute. I think you love me at least I hope.. because I know I love you, So I decide to stay and say ok lets make it work. BUT then later you start to turn on ...

This blog may not come off as "agreeable" to everyone and that's okay. I am an advocate that wholeheartedly believe that we not cannot fully combat/tackle Domestic Violence as a WHOLE unless we recognize, accept, and acknowledge that Domestic Violence happens to both men and women. I read so many news articles, statistics, etc that are in favor of women and leave the men hanging. I suppose that as a woman such as myself, it would be easier for me to advocate for women and relate to them because in fact I am a woman but do we always need to take the easy route? When I think about Domestic Violence Advocates, I think that God has hand picked and designed us to be just that, so its not about us, its about Him. I started to think what if a male victim of domestic violence was reading things that I wrote or listening to things I said and what IF I was only talking about women and the statistic of women, how might that discourage them for coming to speak to me or sh...

Lastnight/Early this morning, a song popped in my head that I had not heard in  a long time. This song reminded me of something that I went through and something that I know a lot of people experience. After going back and reading the lyrics to the song, I started to research the group who made the song only to find out that one of the members had been in a domestic violence relationship. The reason why I researched the group was because I know that this group was ALWAYS real with their music and if they made a song about something it was usually something that they had experienced in their life. The group happened to be TLC and the song is titled "Unpretty" which is the title of this blog. The member who had the experience with domestic violence was T-BOZ. I would first like to post the lyrics to the song so that you can read them. So you can see how it tells the story of domestic violence in the form of emotional abuse. At times, it is good to actually read the lyrics of th...

Many times when domestic violence is thought of it is not though of as being emotional abuse and this is where this blog stems from. It is important to understand and realize that verbal/emotional abuse is not okay. Most people who have experienced some from of verbal or emotional abuse do not even realize that it is in fact abuse because it is downplayed. A lot of definitions in the past use to only include physical abuse. It is almost important to realize the impact of emotional abuse because usually emotional abuse starts first and then physical abuse follows, it would be helpful for the victim to be able to realize signs quicker if the victim knew how serious verbal abuse is. Again, I wanted to personal speak out and say that it is NOT okay to be emotionally, verbally, mentally let alone physically abused. IF you are in a relationship with someone, it is NOT OK for them to call you out your name or disrespect you in ANY kind of way. You are nobody's b**ch, hoe, slut, etc, you...

This blog was inspired from a previous conversation that I had. For a couple of months now I have been slowly but surely become an advocate for domestic violence as well as other causes. There are many misconceptions of domestic violence. I believe in order to truly combat/stop domestic violence we have to be able to understand domestic violence as a whole. Now these are just my thoughts and opinions on the issue of domestic violence. For many, people have begun to wonder if domestic violence is something that can in fact be stopped, I have come to believe that there is a solution to every problem. I truly believe that ALL things are possible through Jesus Christ because He tells us that in His word. The problem that we face with the issue of domestic violence is NOT in people but with the way domestic violence is handled. As I mentioned previously, there are some misconceptions of domestic violence. One of the biggest misconceptions of domestic violence is that it is only physical the...