End The Silence, Stop The Violence

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...

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...