Media
| Domestic abuse, violence victims tell their story | |
| Cindy Iutzi, Keokuk Daily Gate City Staff Writer | October 13, 2008 |
| Click here for original link. | |
By Cindy Iutzi/Gate City Staff WriterBright, forthright photographs of 31 clear-eyed young, middle-aged and elderly Iowa women - all survivors of domestic violence and abuse - reached out to people Friday on their way to shop or attend the Business and Professional Women's Pancake Day at the River City Mall, Keokuk. Each photo portrait was accompanied by a summary of the pictured woman's story. Once attracted, viewers had the opportunity to meet the photographer-author Katie Thompson, who was on hand to talk about her work and the impact she hopes it will make on participants and viewers. “I think it has gone really well,” Thompson said. “Our whole mission is to show a different picture of survivors. So many people have domestic violence somewhere it their life.” Thompson said one of the people who spoke with her had come to the mall shopping for a brown sweater. On the way to that sweater, she stopped by the exhibit and shared her own story of survival. “She went through all of this,” Thompson said. “I love having this in the mall. It raises awareness in populations that wouldn't come to an event like this.” “It puts a face on it (survival of domestic violence and abuse),” said Sue Prozchaska, executive director of Tri-State Coalition Against Domestic and Sexual Abuse, Keokuk. “When you see the pictures, it is really powerful. It would be a way for someone who hasn't talked about it who experienced domestic violence or saw it.” Each photo portrait, pictures of people who look like the person next door or the person in the mirror, is accompanied by a summary of the woman's story. Consider Kimberly Theisen's story. The daughter of an abusive alcholic, in first grade she had to be picked up at school by her grandfather because she was bleeding through her clothes. Her father had whipped her the night before with “a stick off a tree.” At 8 years old she was playing outside “in my fort, like a little tree fort outside,” when her older brother's 18-year-old friend came over and molested her. When she was 13 and baby sitting at her older sister's house, he showed up again. She called her folks and her mom said, ‘Kimberly, quit making up these stories.'” Theisen's older brother chased him away. She married and had children, but her first husband, who did not abuse her, died of cancer. Her second husband beat her on their wedding night and many times thereafter. When she eventually left him, he tracked her down, and using a jack handle broke both her collar bones, fractured her nose and skull, broke her leg in half beneath the knee and then drove away, leaving her there on the ground. Another time he held her hostage at knife point and then with a gun. Tanya Martin's story begins with the line, “You get tired of your kids seeing you all beat up.” She was raised with a father who repeatedly beat her mother violently to the point of hospitalization. As a child, Martin learned the unspoken rule that “you stay with your man no matter what.” She married a violent an abusive man who spread lighter fluid on her bed while she was asleep and lit it, and beat her repeatedly throughout their marriage. “I have respiratory problems from me getting hit in the face so much,” she said. Martin escaped to the local shelter eight times before she finally made the decision that she would not put up with being beaten any more. “I'm done being beaten,” she said. “No more black eyes for Miss Martin.” The Iowa Voices Project was launched last year. The stories appeared in newspapers and on Web sites throughout Iowa, reaching more than 600,000 readers. A book featuring the 31 stories will be released in October 2009. Visit www.icadv.org or go to http://booksbykt.com for more information about Thompson and the Iowa Voices Project. |
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