Overcoming Abuse with Courage and Faith

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LaShondra Barnes is a domestic abuse survivor, a mom of three and a podcaster on fire for Jesus.

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On her podcast, she shares the gospel with women who are looking to be empowered and encouraged that God is all they need.

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Her testimony is full of some difficult stories to hear, but she has overcome through the pain and trauma with the help of Jesus and a great support system.

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You will be encouraged by her story of bravery in the face of abuse.

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Be sure to share this episode with family and friends so they too can be blessed by the contents of this episode.

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Hey, lashondra, thank you so much for coming on the episode today.

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I really appreciate it, thank you.

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Thank you so much for having me.

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Let's start off with you telling us a little bit about your backstory, your history and your testimony.

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Sure?

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Well, my name is LaShondra Barnes.

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I'm, first and foremost, a woman of God.

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I'm a faithful follower of Jesus Christ.

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I'm also a single mother currently raising neurodiverse children.

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I'm as well a podcast host and producer.

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My podcast is called Her Desired Heap and Podcast and I am a domestic violence survivor.

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Just growing up I was very reserved.

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I was always kind of like quiet and to myself.

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I remember my childhood.

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My parents would argue a lot and fight a lot.

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My dad would drink a lot and just have early memories of them fighting, sometimes the family fighting.

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And I remember they got divorced when I was around middle school, like around sixth or seventh grade, I would say, and honestly, all I remember is when they got divorced I was happy because it was like the fighting stopped and just as a kid, that's so traumatic to constantly have to experience things like that.

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So no, it sounds bad, but I was happy when they got divorced because the fighting stopped and he moved out and it seemed like it was over.

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At a very young age I would say that I had a relationship with God because I was always praying.

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I wouldn't say that my family, like, constantly went to church every week, you know, multiple times a week.

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It wasn't like that, like we would go every now and then I would go a lot with my mom and I don't know went from me being confused, like as a kid, to what they were talking about me actually going to church and listening to what the pastor was saying and trying to understand it.

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And this was at a very young age.

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Over the years I guess I just, you know, from middle school just continue to have that prayer life and continue to just pray God, and I wouldn't necessarily hear him talk back to me or listen or anything, but I just knew that that component was necessary and from then on I just continued to have that relationship with him.

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That's great.

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It's always important in your youth, especially when you're going through a tough situation, to have something that you can believe in, and there's nothing better than believing in God.

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I grew up in a Christian home so I also had parents who constantly were arguing and fighting.

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My parents didn't drink, but they had their other issues.

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But, yeah, it was really hard to deal with as a child to be around that kind of environment and I also my parents divorced when I was 12.

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I remember not really having the greatest relationship with my dad, so I was more than willing to go with my mom, but I can't imagine being in a situation to the point where you are glad to see them split up.

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So that must have been hard on you and I'm sorry that you had to deal with that.

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Especially in childhood, we should feel safe at home and it's very sad that there's a lot of children nowadays who don't have that comfort, don't have that ability to feel safe in their homes, and I'm sorry that you had to go through that too.

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Yeah, thank you.

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And now that I look back, I was probably happy that it happened, because me and my father we weren't like really that close.

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He really worked a lot Like both of my parents worked a lot, but my father he worked so much and he was in the house.

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He was present but he didn't have a presence.

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All the way up until middle school he lived in the house but I didn't have a relationship with him.

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We didn't have a bond, we didn't really spend time together, and so that's probably why it was easier for me to be like okay, yes, it's over, he's gone, because I didn't have any connection, even though he was living in the house.

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And I feel like that happens a lot.

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And I always thought, oh, I have a good dad, he's there.

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But as I got older, I realized like, wow, I didn't notice all the things like the alcoholism and things that were going through the family.

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And even as I got older and went through depression and stuff like that, and I was talking to my parents, I found out that they went through depression and anxiety and they never said anything.

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And I was talking to my parents, I found out that they went through depression and anxiety and they never said anything and I'm like, wow, like I could have got talked to you about this.

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So there's so much stuff that happened, but just looking back, I honestly think it's because we didn't have a relationship like at all, even though we were living in the same home.

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Yeah, I can relate with that because my dad worked really hard too and I didn't see him much and we just never really clicked.

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We didn't start having a relationship until I was an adult, actually, and not because of lack of trying on his part.

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There were other circumstances that happened and my hardness of heart towards him and everything that kept us apart.

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But I mean we have a great relationship now.

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He calls me all the time, I call him, we visit each other when we can.

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It's amazing what God can do even in a middle of a broken situation.

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Which brings me to my next question, which is how did you get involved in a domestic violence lifestyle as an adult?

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So as a child I witnessed the arguing and the fighting and stuff like that.

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I didn't know how much that would have affected me in my adulthood later on.

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So I met my first boyfriend when I was about a junior in high school.

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This guy also ended up being the father of all three of my kids later on and my abuser later on.

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He was the guy I met in high school.

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He was like high school we are, I guess you would call it, and so we met at the beginning of the school year.

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We get together and then he moves away out of state and I was devastated, being my first boyfriend.

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We lost contact and I never had closure from that and I also found myself because he was so kind, he was such a gentleman.

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He was a year younger than me but he was so much more mature than the other guys that were in my grade and he was so respectful, he would open doors, just all those things right, and so when he left, I was so devastated and I found myself trying to recreate that relationship I had with him with other people after he left, because I just never had closure and we kind of lost contact and he was just it's like he disappeared off the face of the earth.

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That was really hard for me to deal with.

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So we ended up reconnecting around my junior senior year of college and we decided to be in a long distance relationship.

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I remember when I was in college I live in Illinois, he was in a different state at the time I went to go visit him and that's the first time and I didn't realize when I met him in high school how much stuff he had went through.

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He had experienced neglect and abuse and different things like that in his childhood.

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But I had no idea.

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I had no idea he was struggling greatly with mental health as well.

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When I went to go visit him it was the first time that I actually witnessed him having a psychotic break.

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It wasn't like violent or aggressive or anything, but he was just like so weak he couldn't eat, he couldn't really talk and he was like just pacing back and forth For some reason.

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You would think that that would have scared me away, right Like what is going on.

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But me it was weird.

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I was like man, I could really take care of him.

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I really want to be there for him.

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I really want to take care of him.

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I guess he thought that it would scare me away, but when I returned back home I was like no, I'm here for you, I'm loyal, I'm going to be there for you, I'm going to take care of you.

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All this we continued in a long distance relationship.

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Soon thereafter I was pregnant with my first child.

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I think the first red flag that I noticed was I was always the one to pursue and to pay for things, and I guess the first red flag as well was me having to literally beg him to move to where I was at during the pregnancy so I wouldn't have to go through that whole thing by myself.

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He didn't actually move to Illinois where I was at until, I want to say, a month or two before my son was born.

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I had to go through the majority of the pregnancy alone, and he finally came.

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He comes, flies in, he proposes to me at the airport, and we were in that relationship for a total of five years, but out of three of those five years we were engaged.

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Never got married though, but we were engaged, and so he moves here kind of struggle a little bit, living from, you know, family members house to family members house until we're able to get our own place and get established and then kind of build.

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And in that relationship I experienced a lot of mental and emotional abuse, some verbal abuse, a little bit of financial abuse.

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At the very end mostly it got very toxic and physical.

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Yeah, so majority of the relationship it was mental and emotional abuse, which would be like the manipulation, control, feeling like I had to walk on eggshells in my own house trying not to set him off.

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He would destroy property, withhold my phone, car keys, bank cards, things like that.

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He would destroy the things that I valued and cared about, things like that.

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So and then sometimes like name calling, belittling, making me feel small or criticizing me, without not constructive criticism but just doing it to make me feel bad about myself, not offering a solution, just talking down to me, things like that.

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So I experienced that majority of the relationship and then at the very end it got extremely physical and that's right.

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Before I left.

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Wow, that's heartbreaking to hear.

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It's amazing how much people think they can get away with talking to other people, but if someone were to do it to them, they're quick to say, oh no, you don't, I don't think they understand.

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It's like you literally just did that to me.

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How is it that you're able to do that but I can't do it to you?

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My first husband was about the same not to the same level, but he was a narcissist.

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So he had a lot of those tendencies too, and I was only with him for three years.

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That's all he could stand.

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But I kind of knew he had anger issues and all these other issues before I married him, but I had such low self-esteem that I didn't care and thought that was as good as it was going to get.

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That that's the guy God probably wanted me to be with, because when I tried to break up with him he wouldn't leave me alone.

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I don't know where I got off, thinking that that's what God wanted rather than that's just him not leaving me alone.

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But I mean I can definitely relate to why you didn't see the red flags or you just kind of swept them under.

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I mean, coming from the lifestyle you came from it would be not surprising to see that that's what you felt most, I guess, comfortable with Not really comfortable, but you know what I mean and, yeah, it's really sad that you had to go through that and I'm very sorry to hear it.

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I wanted to know what it took to get you out of that.

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What was your final straw?

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Okay, Can I share a couple of stories, because there's like a few incidents that happened kind of leading up to that.

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One day we were going on a drive and my kids were very young they had to be like two, three and four at the time we were in our van and we were looking for a place to live.

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So we were driving around kind of looking for a new apartment.

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I want to say we were about an hour, hour and a half away from the area that I was familiar with.

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So I didn't really know where we were at and it was getting dark, my phone was about to die and I didn't have my charger.

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So I'm like okay, we need to get back towards the house because I don't know where I'm at.

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I was driving and he was in the passenger seat, so for some reason, the whole ride he kind of had like a little bit of an attitude or whatever.

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I don't know what was wrong with him.

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Eventually he's like okay, let's just go home.

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So I'm like, okay, cool, I look for a street to kind of turn around and make a right turn and out of nowhere he explodes and starts screaming and yelling and he's like where are you going?

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What are you doing?

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And he just starts to panic and I'm like are you okay?

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What's the problem?

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I'm going, I'm turning around so we can go home.

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I believe I pulled over the car to the side of the road and we were like going back and forth arguing, he slaps me across the face in front of the kids.

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That's like the first time he really hit me.

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Well, I asked him why did you do that?

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Why did you slap me?

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And he said because you wouldn't shut up.

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And just remember.

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In that moment I kind of lost.

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It was like the emotional and mental abuse was one thing, but when he finally hit me, it was like I lost all respect for him.

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That was like the last straw for me.

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I lost all respect for him.

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In that moment he's like just let me drive, just let me drive.

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And I'm like, okay, I shouldn't have done that.

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But I'm like, okay, let me just try to get home.

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I get in the passenger seat and he's in the driver's seat and then we begin to drive home.

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We're arguing because at this point I'm just so upset that he did that and I'm just tired of him at this point, and so I want to say like, maybe once or twice he pulls over the car and tells me to get out of the car, I'm going to fight you like a man.

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He pulls over the car and says that to me and I'm like I'm not getting out this car, so you can pull off with the kids in the car and leave me in the middle of nowhere.

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No, either that or try to fight.

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No, I'm not getting out.

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He does that like once or twice, but I never get out the car.

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He proceeds to go home and then we're still arguing back and forth because I've lost all respect for him.

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At this point.

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I just didn't care and it was hard for me to bite my tongue and be quiet because he was wrong and I just couldn't deal with it anymore.

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He begins to accelerate the car.

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I look ahead and there's like cars stopped at a red light ahead of us and he begins to speed and go faster towards the cars and drive faster and faster and faster.

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And I remember one of my kids were screaming in the back of the van and I just broke down crying.

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In that moment I felt so helpless.

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I didn't know if we were going to get in an accident.

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He was like speeding and saying you're making me crazy, you're making me crazy and just I thought we were going to die.

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I didn't know what was going to happen.

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But I just was sobbing and I just broke down crying.

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In that moment I felt helpless.

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But what made me feel worse was my kids were in the back of the car and I couldn't do anything to protect them in that moment.

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Thank God he slows the car down in time we don't get in an accident, he doesn't hit anyone, and then we continue to go home.

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He's lurking the car in and out of lanes and just driving crazy pretty much.

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But thank God we made it home safely.

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That night I was like look, you need to get anger management, counseling, therapy, you need something.

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I'm not staying here, you need help, because at that point I'm like this is getting just ridiculous.

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He agrees to and I did try to leave that night, but he had a habit of like locking the kids in the room and like barricading them in the room and saying are you doing this in front of the kids, as if I'm the one that was wrong, trying to leave with them.

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After that happened, I tried to leave that night, but he convinced me hey, I'll get mental health services.

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So the next day we go to a clinic and at the time there was a wait list, so he couldn't really get services immediately anyway.

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So all he did was put his name on the waiting list and then he never really got the help.

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But I ended up staying at night and that's just one of the situations that kind of led up to me, me leaving him at one point.

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And if you do have any questions, please feel free to stop me.

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Your story is compelling.

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I'm just listening.

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I can't.

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I'm like this is crazy.

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I don't know how I would have reacted.

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It gets worse.

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Keeping calm too, Wow yeah.

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Kudos to you for keeping calm.

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I don't think it's god.

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Oh my goodness, he saved my life.

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Truly don't like the stuff that I went through and the fact that I didn't lose my sanity through all of the things that I went through.

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It's amazing to me like he spared my life in my children's life for sure.

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Um to was a point where he left right.

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He left our apartment, just.

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I don't know why.

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He just packed his bags and left.

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I don't know where he went.

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I think he went to a shelter, I don't know, but he left right.

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After that I had got an order of protection.

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It's like a restraining order.

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Yeah, I had one on my first husband at one point, so yeah, very familiar with that.

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I got one of those in Illinois, I believe.

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It was good for two years initially, I think, and so I get a restraining order.

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And I remember when he left it was like around the holidays Christmas, because my birthday is a week before Christmas.

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I just remember my birthday.

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I was sitting in the living room and I was staring out the window and I was so depressed, I was so numb.

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All I could do was look out the window and stare On my birthday.

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I just remember being so depressed.

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Then one day the doorbell rings and I'm like who's that?

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So I go over to the door and it's him.

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He says are you going to let me in?

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It's cold out here.

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I sit there and I don't do anything.

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Then he rings it again and I ring the little buzzer to listen to him speak and says are you going to let me in?

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He had just walked through four cities in the middle of the winter.

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It was snow outside to get to the house.

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It's like it's cold.

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Are you going to let me up?

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I don't know why I pressed the buzzer for him to get in the house, but I did.

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He ends up moving back in and we both end up going to the courthouse to lift the order of protection and he comes and moves back into the house.

00:17:07.073 --> 00:17:11.121
I think it was just guilt, you know, being made to feel bad.

00:17:11.121 --> 00:17:15.997
It was the holidays, you know, him wanting to be around, the kids, you know, for Christmas, stuff like that.

00:17:15.997 --> 00:17:16.578
So it was like.

00:17:16.578 --> 00:17:23.406
And then me being so numb and depressed I thought the only answer to that being, you know, going away, was him, I guess, being there at the time.

00:17:23.487 --> 00:17:33.537
I just wasn't thinking in that moment you know I was so numb, but he ends up moving back into the house after that and that was a bad decision because it just got worse after that.

00:17:33.537 --> 00:17:43.290
So I want to mention that when you're in an abusive relationship there are so many barriers that keep you in there or keep you allowing that person to come back.

00:17:43.290 --> 00:17:52.868
Statistics say, like what you leave five to seven times before you know leave for good, even if even you know.

00:17:52.868 --> 00:17:56.076
Looking into a situation, some people might say, well, why did you do that?

00:17:56.076 --> 00:17:57.431
Why did you let them come back?

00:17:57.545 --> 00:18:01.435
But we don't realize what, psychologically, is going on in a person's mind.

00:18:01.435 --> 00:18:04.355
They are not practically thinking in that moment.

00:18:04.355 --> 00:18:07.030
They might be in the state of like fight, flight or free.

00:18:07.030 --> 00:18:08.133
You never know.

00:18:08.133 --> 00:18:10.357
You know or be in survival mode.

00:18:10.357 --> 00:18:17.050
You don't know what they're going through and what their barriers are that might be keeping them in that situation.

00:18:17.050 --> 00:18:25.016
So I just want not to say that it's okay, but we have to consider the full dynamics of a person's situation to understand like, okay, that made sense.

00:18:25.016 --> 00:18:27.771
If I were in that situation I might've done the same, you know.

00:18:28.272 --> 00:18:29.275
Yeah, I makes sense.

00:18:29.275 --> 00:18:32.162
If I were in that situation I might've done the same, you know.

00:18:32.162 --> 00:18:32.864
Yeah, I completely agree.

00:18:32.864 --> 00:18:37.013
I mean hindsight's always 20-20 with anything, no matter what situation it is.

00:18:37.034 --> 00:18:39.565
So of course someone can be on the outside and be like why didn't you just leave?

00:18:39.565 --> 00:18:47.574
It's a lot more complicated than that when you've had your mental stability messed with too, not to mention you have children.

00:18:47.574 --> 00:18:58.953
These are all factors, and if you don't have a support system away from that, you know, a lot of times when you're in an abusive situation they try to alienate you so that they're all you have.

00:18:58.953 --> 00:19:03.854
Where are you going to go at that point if you don't have a support system outside of that?

00:19:03.854 --> 00:19:08.130
So I completely understand why it was difficult for you to let it go.

00:19:08.130 --> 00:19:13.046
And you know, sometimes you've, you get blessed and you can leave pretty quick.

00:19:13.046 --> 00:19:19.630
Sometimes you can't, and nobody should be judging anyone in that situation, especially if they haven't been in that situation.

00:19:19.630 --> 00:19:24.644
It's something you have to go through and then you'll really be able to understand.

00:19:24.944 --> 00:19:35.201
So I'm glad you mentioned that because it is true there's a lot of people out there who will just, you know, criticize the person who's in the abuse, without really understanding their side of the story.

00:19:35.201 --> 00:19:37.285
Of course the situation's terrible.

00:19:37.285 --> 00:19:40.609
They want to get out, but maybe there's a reason they can't.

00:19:40.609 --> 00:19:48.025
You have to take a step back sometimes and look at it from their perspective and figure out why they aren't leaving.

00:19:48.025 --> 00:19:49.791
Not because they want to stay, but maybe they just can't.

00:19:49.791 --> 00:19:51.356
So thank you for bringing that up.

00:19:51.356 --> 00:19:52.539
That's absolutely right.

00:19:52.539 --> 00:19:58.234
When did you surrender your life to God and just let him take over?

00:19:58.234 --> 00:20:05.000
Was it after you guys finally split up, or was it during all of this, before you guys actually split up?

00:20:07.297 --> 00:20:10.759
I would say it was after I already had a relationship.

00:20:10.759 --> 00:20:14.528
But, like I said, I was just praying and I wasn't really listening to God.

00:20:14.528 --> 00:20:15.457
I wasn't ignoring the red flags.

00:20:15.457 --> 00:20:16.759
I wasn't, I was ignoring the red flags.

00:20:16.759 --> 00:20:18.865
I wasn't, you know, fully surrendered.

00:20:18.865 --> 00:20:26.277
So I definitely would say, after he left is when I chose to fully, like, go all in and surrender my life completely to Christ.

00:20:26.277 --> 00:20:29.846
But leading up to that, call this part of my story like the grocery store.

00:20:29.846 --> 00:20:32.759
Okay.

00:20:32.759 --> 00:20:36.448
So this part of my story I was actually afraid to tell.

00:20:36.448 --> 00:20:42.387
I didn't share it until just last year and this relationship and all the stuff happened.

00:20:42.387 --> 00:20:46.163
The abuse happened back in 2016, 2017.

00:20:46.163 --> 00:20:48.248
I had held onto that for almost seven years.

00:20:48.248 --> 00:20:49.779
This part of my story I'm about to share.

00:20:50.181 --> 00:20:55.622
One day we go to the grocery store and for some reason I was very anxious that day.

00:20:55.622 --> 00:20:57.261
I didn't really want to be around people.

00:20:57.261 --> 00:21:13.480
I kind of wanted to quickly get in with the kids and get out, but for some reason he was in the store running up and down the aisle with the kids screaming, yelling, being loud and drawing so much attention to us, and I'm like, hey, can you guys just relax, calm down, because I didn't want attention.

00:21:13.480 --> 00:21:14.217
I felt super anxious.

00:21:14.217 --> 00:21:14.698
I didn't want attention.

00:21:14.698 --> 00:21:15.118
I felt super anxious.

00:21:15.118 --> 00:21:17.385
I didn't want to be around people, I just wanted to get in and get out.

00:21:17.385 --> 00:21:22.671
For some reason, when I was walking in the store, I felt like everybody was looking at me like I was crazy.

00:21:22.671 --> 00:21:23.311
For some reason.

00:21:23.311 --> 00:21:27.795
I was like why is everybody looking at me literally like I'm crazy?

00:21:27.795 --> 00:21:30.825
I never told him this or said anything to him.

00:21:30.825 --> 00:21:37.461
So we get home and he's on the couch in the living room.

00:21:37.461 --> 00:21:38.848
I'm confronting him about his behavior in the store.

00:21:38.848 --> 00:21:42.021
I'm like why were you yelling and screaming and acting like crazy in the store with the kids?

00:21:42.021 --> 00:21:44.230
I didn't feel like myself.

00:21:44.230 --> 00:21:45.273
I needed you to calm down.

00:21:45.273 --> 00:21:48.125
Why don't you just respect my wishes and just relax so we can go?

00:21:48.468 --> 00:21:51.778
Remember, he had a headache and he wanted me to give him some ibuprofen.

00:21:51.778 --> 00:21:58.771
So I went to the kitchen, grabbed it, I gave him the pills and then he said to me me and the kids were having fun in the store.

00:21:58.771 --> 00:22:02.179
He said everyone was looking at you like you were crazy.

00:22:02.179 --> 00:22:03.903
In that moment I kind of just snapped.

00:22:03.903 --> 00:22:05.527
I felt like I blacked out.

00:22:05.527 --> 00:22:09.574
I lost all sense of reality because I thought what he was saying like he was right.

00:22:09.574 --> 00:22:21.141
Maybe there was something wrong with me Because, remember, I had said when I was in the store I had said when I was in the store I had that thought and I never said anything to him.

00:22:21.141 --> 00:22:22.244
So when he verbalized it I'm like, wow, what is going on?

00:22:22.244 --> 00:22:23.148
I don't know if I thought he was right.

00:22:23.169 --> 00:22:24.513
And so I took those pills, that they were open on the floor.

00:22:24.513 --> 00:22:33.787
I grabbed them, I threw them all over the kitchen and in this point I still can't even fully remember if I was either imagining myself put the pills in my mouth or if I was actually doing it.

00:22:33.787 --> 00:22:36.130
But I know that I was just like hysterically crying.

00:22:36.130 --> 00:22:40.237
I was hysterically crying and attempting about or about to attempt suicide.

00:22:40.237 --> 00:22:43.064
That moment, because he made me feel like I was so crazy.

00:22:43.064 --> 00:22:45.480
The ambulance was called and they came and checked me out.

00:22:45.480 --> 00:22:54.086
I picked up all the pills, put them back in the bottle and I remember sitting on the front stairs in front of the apartment building Come and check me out and I agreed to go with them to the emergency room.

00:22:54.086 --> 00:22:58.653
So you know, of course they called it a suicidal gesture, suicidal attempt or whatever.

00:22:58.653 --> 00:23:01.771
No, like I didn't swallow anything, like they didn't have to like pump my stomach or anything.

00:23:01.771 --> 00:23:06.025
So no, I didn't swallow anything, but like I literally in that moment lost sense of reality.

00:23:06.025 --> 00:23:08.857
It's even hard to this day to remember, like what was happening.

00:23:08.857 --> 00:23:14.146
But I know that I was crying and I was either imagining putting a bunch of pills in my mouth or I was about to do it.

00:23:14.146 --> 00:23:17.701
I just I kind of blacked out, go to the emergency room.

00:23:17.701 --> 00:23:22.526
They checked me out About an hour I would say comes with the kids to the emergency room.

00:23:22.835 --> 00:23:26.060
He tells me this is our business, don't tell your family about this.

00:23:26.060 --> 00:23:29.537
He said this is us, this is us, don't tell them about this.

00:23:29.537 --> 00:23:36.730
And I did it Like I never really told anyone until last year, including my family, that that had happened.

00:23:36.730 --> 00:23:40.566
I don't know why, but he convinced me, you know, not to.

00:23:40.566 --> 00:23:45.487
So I leave the emergency room with a referral for intensive therapy.

00:23:45.487 --> 00:23:50.383
They sent me to a six-week program and the program was four days a week.

00:23:50.383 --> 00:23:54.503
You stay there four hours a day, you eat lunch there and you just go to groups all day.

00:23:54.503 --> 00:23:55.636
That really helped me.

00:23:55.636 --> 00:24:04.310
But the interesting thing was the whole time I was in that program I never once mentioned him because he was still living in the house with me.

00:24:04.310 --> 00:24:17.058
I never mentioned him or anything that I was going through with the domestic violence until the very last day, because that day I had to go and get another order of protection against him because he physically attacked me.

00:24:17.358 --> 00:24:22.262
Before he physically attacked me, I remember I had wanted to go to the grocery store to get groceries for the kids.

00:24:22.262 --> 00:24:25.997
I had to walk because he totaled our car a couple of days prior.

00:24:25.997 --> 00:24:31.698
So I had to walk to the store and I wanted to go get groceries before the older two kids came home and my youngest son.

00:24:31.698 --> 00:24:33.019
I remember he was two years old.

00:24:33.019 --> 00:24:40.900
He was asleep on the living room couch so I kept on telling him hey, can you give me my card Because he would withhold my car, my phone and stuff.

00:24:40.900 --> 00:24:42.527
I said can you give me the card?

00:24:42.527 --> 00:24:46.096
I need to go to the store get foods before the kids come home so they can have something to eat.

00:24:46.096 --> 00:24:48.900
He was sitting in this chair in the kitchen just ignoring me.

00:24:48.900 --> 00:24:50.020
He wouldn't give it to me.

00:24:50.020 --> 00:24:51.201
I took it up on myself.

00:24:51.201 --> 00:24:56.867
I probably shouldn't have, but I just reached in, tried to reach into his pocket just so I can grab the car, and he slaps my hand away.

00:24:57.028 --> 00:25:01.311
We began to physically fight from the kitchen to the living room and we both fall on the floor.

00:25:01.311 --> 00:25:04.484
He ends up on top of me and I'm face down in the floor.

00:25:04.484 --> 00:25:10.257
He puts me in a headlock and then squeezing tight and making these gestures as if he wanted to snap my neck.

00:25:10.257 --> 00:25:13.403
Mind you, my two-year-old was right there, right by us, sleeping on the couch.

00:25:13.403 --> 00:25:14.184
We were on the floor.

00:25:14.184 --> 00:25:16.128
I'm trying to reach up.

00:25:16.128 --> 00:25:17.259
My face is in the floor.

00:25:17.259 --> 00:25:19.482
I'm trying to reach up to fight him off, but I can't.

00:25:19.595 --> 00:25:21.501
In that moment I feel like life was slipping away.

00:25:21.501 --> 00:25:22.345
I can't breathe.

00:25:22.345 --> 00:25:23.839
Can you just get off me?

00:25:23.839 --> 00:25:24.983
I cannot breathe.

00:25:24.983 --> 00:25:26.883
It's like are you going to leave me alone?

00:25:26.883 --> 00:25:30.320
Are you going to leave me alone?

00:25:30.320 --> 00:25:34.448
When we got up from that that, my two-year-old son was just staring at us, looking at us.

00:25:34.448 --> 00:25:36.029
He was asleep, but he was awake now.

00:25:36.029 --> 00:25:38.453
He was watching everything that his father was doing.

00:25:38.453 --> 00:25:39.517
He wasn't crying or anything.

00:25:39.517 --> 00:25:41.080
He was just looking at us and he was too.

00:25:41.080 --> 00:25:44.018
So no, psychologically that did something to him as well.

00:25:44.219 --> 00:25:45.080
Police were called.

00:25:45.080 --> 00:25:46.846
There was a male cop and a female cop.

00:25:46.846 --> 00:25:48.655
The male cop was kind of off talking to him.

00:25:48.655 --> 00:25:51.798
The female cop was like hey, you want us to take him to jail.

00:25:51.798 --> 00:25:52.619
What do you want us to do?

00:25:52.660 --> 00:25:56.723
In that moment I said no, and this is back to that barrier.

00:25:56.723 --> 00:25:58.046
He had three kids right.

00:25:58.046 --> 00:26:01.469
The oldest was not legally like, biologically my child.

00:26:01.469 --> 00:26:04.551
You know she had issues with her bio mom and that's why she came to live with us.

00:26:04.551 --> 00:26:12.119
I was overthinking in the moment and I was like man, if he goes to jail, I can't legally do anything for her.

00:26:12.119 --> 00:26:13.682
I can't protect her and did not want her to go to foster care.

00:26:13.682 --> 00:26:15.625
I told them no, don't arrest him, I just want my card.

00:26:15.625 --> 00:26:25.758
I'm going to the store with my son, so the police leave, I go to the store, come back home, and that same night the police were called again.

00:26:25.758 --> 00:26:31.545
He wouldn't allow me to get my phone to call the police, so I go to the neighbors to call and I was going to go to a shelter, but the police end up taking us to a family member's house.

00:26:31.545 --> 00:26:34.690
That's the day that I left for good and never went back.

00:26:42.315 --> 00:26:42.515
Wow, yeah.

00:26:42.515 --> 00:26:44.920
Well, I am very glad that you were finally able to break free and that you found Christ, that he's been helping you.

00:26:44.920 --> 00:26:46.382
I've listened to your podcast.

00:26:46.382 --> 00:26:52.539
I love how strong it is in the short amount of time that you do it.

00:26:52.539 --> 00:26:57.178
I mean they're short episodes but you get so much wisdom into those.

00:26:57.178 --> 00:27:03.096
I think it's because you've been through so much and I love listening to your podcast.

00:27:03.096 --> 00:27:07.106
I mean, I'm not a single woman, but I still get something out of it.

00:27:07.106 --> 00:27:09.701
Why don't you tell us a little more about your podcast?

00:27:09.701 --> 00:27:12.515
And then I have one more question for you Sure.

00:27:12.756 --> 00:27:19.103
Podcast is called Her Desire to Even Podcast and it focuses on all things Jesus, family life and faith.

00:27:19.103 --> 00:27:25.631
I tell a lot about my story, my experiences, my experience raising neurodiverse children as a single mother.

00:27:25.631 --> 00:27:33.060
Also my domestic violence story graduating as a non-traditional student.

00:27:33.060 --> 00:27:49.729
There are so many parts of my life that I share that I really want to encourage other people as well through my story, but I also use the platform so that other people can come on and share stories and testimonies of the goodness of God as well, so we can continue to uplift each other on our journeys and walk with Christ and that so others might believe as well.

00:27:51.159 --> 00:27:52.082
So that's wonderful.

00:27:52.082 --> 00:27:57.826
Last question what do you want to say to those who might be in a similar situation as you?

00:27:57.826 --> 00:28:00.865
What advice and wisdom would you give them?

00:28:01.236 --> 00:28:06.728
I would say to tell someone abuse thrives in isolation and darkness and silence.

00:28:06.728 --> 00:28:15.189
Tell someone, whether it be a trusted friend, family member, pastor, teacher, a counselor, psychiatrist, therapist.

00:28:15.189 --> 00:28:20.203
Tell someone, because you should never have to endure that pain and suffering alone.

00:28:20.284 --> 00:28:21.046
Yeah, I agree.

00:28:21.046 --> 00:28:24.721
Thank you so much, LaShondra, for coming on and sharing your story.

00:28:24.721 --> 00:28:31.625
I'm very glad that you were able to escape that lifestyle, that you and your three children are healthy and thriving.

00:28:31.625 --> 00:28:42.519
I wish success for your podcast and for everyone who listens to it, because they're going to be blessed through what you have to say, because you have so much wisdom and love for God.

00:28:42.519 --> 00:28:44.924
I'm excited to see where your podcast goes.

00:28:44.924 --> 00:28:45.968
Thank you so much.

00:28:45.968 --> 00:28:47.549
Thank you for coming on today.