Personal Stories of Hope
![[get_informed.jpg]](http://beckysfund.org/cms/uploads/images/get_informed.jpg "[get_informed.jpg]")
An anonymous survivor would like to share her story with you...
"I'm so sorry daughter, I'm so sorry. Don't cry, umma is here. I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry..." says my Korean mother crouching before my trembling and sobbing five year old self. A trembling and sobbing five year old with a red handprint quickly swelling and covering almost half my little face. The screaming continues into the night. My plastic chair is thrown and makes a purple streak against the wall. My mother is struck and repeatedly told how she would be killed, along with me, and no one in this world would know it was him... read on here
I am telling my story in hope that someone else can find strength from it to pull herself from the overpowering mess in which I found myself…..
I got married young, 20 to be exact, but I was truly in love with my husband. I agonized over the fact that he was deploying overseas to partake in Operation Iraqi Freedom. I had known him almost my entire life, but when he deployed, we had only been married for a short period of time. For 14 months I waited. The television was on CNN 24/7 and my home phone was forwarded to my cell phone, in case he called when I wasn’t home. I carried on my life, but it wasn’t easy. I missed this man, the man I loved so much. He was my personal hero and a hero to our nation. I anxiously counted down the days until his return, had brief phone conversations with him, and wrote letters daily... read on hereI have all the reasons why I stayed in the relationship as long as I did on the tip of my tongue.
Several years of denial and self-imposed indifference has kept me from truly reflecting on my past abusive relationship. What's harder than self reflection? I kept telling myself that lack of time and other priorities were the reasons I couldn't get this article done. I now acknowledge that I put it off because it is just plain hard and uncomfortable! I have countless accounts of public embarrassment and violence at the workplace. I have several memories of the disappointment and hurt I felt when my so called friends witnessed the abuse, excused it, and decidedly erased it in their minds... read on here