I was born in California and had I grown up there, I'm certain my life would have turned out quite different. For one thing, I'd be a surfer. A water baby at heart, you couldn't keep me away from the Pacific Ocean if I had grown up in the Bay Area where I was born.

Of course, I didn't grow up on the West Coast. I grew up in Appalachia, spending most of my years far away from the ocean, in wild and wonderful Preston County, West Virginia. I spent another portion of those years in Berkeley County, over in the Eastern Panhandle. These three places: San Jose, Independence and Martinsburg, are as different as night and day. And yet they share some similarities, such as domestic violence, child abuse, alcoholism and drug addiction.

These deadly problems are not isolated to these areas; they are social ills that happen the world over. Which means that whatever works for one one problem in one geographical area, should work in another. The presentation of the solution might be different, but the underlying rationale stays the same.

Here's my rationale for wanting to hold workshops to empower women, to help them regain their sense of self-esteem, reclaim their self-confidence and revel in their God-given talents: If women can do this, and I believe they can, because I did, then nothing is beyond their limit. Be it landing a job, learning a foreign language, obtaining a master's degree or running for President.

But before they can do those things, they must first escape the abuse. Whether it's abuse they no longer endure, but which follows them around like their shadow, and which stems from childhood molestation or parental neglect; or whether it's abuse they're still subjected to, that they must face every day when they wake up, and fear every night when they fall asleep.

The men who killed Shannon Stafford, Lori Dodson and Leslie Layman have their own demons to deal with. (At least in the case of Stafford and Layman, since Dodson's killer committed suicide.) And I have some ideas about what can work for them, to help them change. At their very core, you see, they're not that much different from the women they batter: they're dying from emotional starvation and insufficient self-worth, because their own childhoods were marred. Abused boys become abused men; abused girls choose these very men, who then abuse the women as they were themselves abused. It's a vicious cycle.

I was invited to join the ABIP board in March, after speaking about escaping my past abuse at their annual conference. If you listen to these people talk about how they work with batterers, you learn two things pretty quick: 1) The facilitators (composed of a man and a woman, who model a healthy relationship for the men in their group) truly believe these men can change and, 2) They believe that what's needed for an abusive man to change is for him to be shown compassion and empathy—not disdain and disrespect that then fuels his rage.

Another vicious cycle, for how can a woman respect a man who beats her, verbally, emotionally, sexually, or physically? I have some ideas about that, but that's a topic for another day. For now, I want to focus on the women, because there will be cases where her abuser won't get help, won't see the need to change, and who may ultimately kill her. So she has to be prepared, in case this happens and she wants, or needs, to leave.

For the past year, I've been traveling all over the place, as much as I can, to give away books to battered women's shelters, to social service agencies, to hospitals, to schools and to women themselves. (Anyone who believes this is self-serving please think again; there is no way I can possibly recoup all of the time, energy and money I've spent on these excursions. That will take many, many years, and thousands of sales.) Using every spare penny from my unemployment, and then some, I did this because of what readers were telling me.

"I feel like you read my mind . . . like you know what I went through . . . like we could be sisters, our stories are so similar."

"I think this book belongs in every school in the country, and every counselor's office and every shelter."

"This should be mandatory reading for every girl and she should have to read it twice—once when she enters high school and again when she leaves."

That's just a few of the thoughts readers have shared with me. There are many more. But they convinced me that my story of survival and empowerment carries enough weight that other people somehow see themselves in it. They see what is possible, in their own lives, and the lives of their daughters, and sisters, and girlfriends.

That's why I went beyond just writing a book, a story about my journey, and why I created an organization that can help educate people in such a way they can either not become victims in the first place, or they can escape abuse, if they're stuck in such an environment. The Silent No More Foundation will allow me to continue educating people about abuse, and there's no better place to start than at home. In Preston County.

It's exhilarating to see so many people who want to stand up and speak out for the three women whose own voices have been silenced. I invite you to break your own silence by helping me make these workshops a reality. Together, we can make not just a dent in the problem, but a real difference.

Please join me next Thursday, May 24, at 6 p.m. at the Preston County Hospice building, (located on the hill in the old Arthurdale Inn), where Eleanor Roosevelt lived during her own efforts to empower Prestonians. We can limit our discussion to your ideas for the workshops, or we can expand to other ideas about how to do what tomorrow's Charleston Gazette will say is necessary, if we really want to get serious about changing our own little piece of the world.

* * * *
Daleen can be reached at daleen.berry@gmail.com.

Editor's note: Berry has expertise in overcoming abuse through awareness, empowerment and goal attainment, and wrote about Postmaster Engle in her book. She's an award-winning author, editor and journalist who speaks at conferences around the country. Berry was one of two keynote speakers addressing a national audience at “The Many Faces of Domestic Violence,” the 18th Annual Conference of the Association of Batterers’ Intervention Programs on March 1, 2012, in Anaheim, Calif. She recently spoke to social workers from all over the country at the “Hope for the Future: Ending Domestic Violence in Families” conference at the University of California, Berkeley.

Her memoir (paperback and as an e-book) can be found at bookstores everywhere, or ordered online. To read the first chapter free, please go to Goodreads. Check out the five-star review from ForeWord Reviews. Or find out why Kirkus Reviews called Berry "an engaging writer, her style fluid and easy to read, with welcome touches of humor and sustained tension throughout."

If you want to read 30 other five-star reviews, check out this title on Amazon. To view the Sister of Silence book trailer, go to her VintageBerryWine Youtube channel. For a mock up of the SOS t-shirt readers are demanding, check out Berry's Facebook page.

But Will She Be His Last?
The years have been hard on Dennis Ervin. But they’ve been even harder on the women who have loved him.

Denny and I are the same age, we attended three years together at our alma mater, West Preston High School, and he once dated one of my closest friends. If you look at his picture in the 1980 Panther Tracks yearbook, you’ll see a smallish looking guy with big, dark eyes and a shag haircut like the one worn by teen heartthrob Keith Cassidy. Back then Ervin was goofy but seemed a nice enough guy. Not a tough guy. Then again, I never dated him.

His police mug shot looks much different: older, harder and with a complexion that appears ravaged from booze and drugs. Ervin was arrested and charged with killing Leslie (Engle) Layman, who died from gunshot wounds near Independence, W.Va., last Tuesday, May 8. She was the third Preston County woman to die from a bullet during the last three weeks, thanks to another type of war that is carried on silently in homes all over the world. It's a domestic war, and far more deadly than many other battles have been.

I knew Leslie when she was a child. She was 10 years younger than me. I know her parents, but haven’t seen them for years. I probably knew her grandparents best (since Jim Engle was the postmaster in our tiny town, and once rendered us great aid) and even her great-grandfather. (He was the storekeeper whose store I skipped into each day after school, while still a child myself.)

When you lose touch with people you once knew, it can be hard to understand how their lives can come so unraveled. Yet this is what I’ve pieced together, after talking to three women who knew Ervin far better than I did.

He liked to drink, so heavily the state took his driver’s license after several DUI’s and placed him on home confinement for possession of marijuana. There’s a rumor, which is all I’ve heard it to be thus far—although his mug shot seems to confirm it—that he was into far more potent drugs, maybe even bath salts.

Local media reports indicate Ervin and Layman were exes. Being anyone’s ex doesn’t seem to be something Ervin handles very well. Take Nancy, for instance, who was friends with Layman. Her name has been changed at her request, but he mishandled her repeatedly during their time together.

“Four or five years ago, before (the) bath salts, he had pulled guns on her, dumped gas on her and threatened to light a match,” her friend, Donna Livengood, said.

Nancy often called Livengood when Ervin battered her, but one night her friend was too far away to help. She did the only thing she could think to do.

“I called her parents and told them what was going on and that she needed out of there,” Livengood said. “She stayed mad at me for awhile until she got the common sense to get out of there. Thank God she did.”

Nancy told me she moved in with Ervin after meeting him in a bar one night. Everything was fine for the first six months. Then he changed.

“He got very jealous. Very controlling. He was even jealous of my mom, dad and son,” Nancy said.

“The first time he punched me because we ran into an old friend of mine at the bar. We were all playing pool (and) he was acting fine. Then when we left, we went to Bamco were he used to work. We went there around midnight so he could work on a car,” Nancy said. “He ended up chasing me around the garage and threw a very big wrench and hit me in the back of the head. I had a huge bump (there).”

Nancy said she told Ervin, “I can’t believe you did that.”

He then ordered her not to call the police, since he was wearing a leg bracelet for home confinement. “Why did you hit me with that? Why did you do that?” she asked, trying to talk him down from his anger, and buy herself some time to think.

Nancy left Ervin, but went back repeatedly. She never called the police, never sought medical treatment for her injuries, and never filed paperwork for a protective order to keep Ervin away. “I’ve not done that much in my life,” Nancy said.

Now she wishes she would have.

Nancy misses her friend Leslie, and says “it’s been hard the last few days. I have a lot of guilt.” She also has “unbelievable stories (to tell). I think Leslie would be happy for me to tell you about what an ass he is.”

Another woman, another friend of Leslie’s, feels the same way. Helen, whose name has also been changed, was in college pursuing a law degree when she moved in with Ervin during her divorce proceedings. They had been friends for years, and Ervin—who was 15 years her senior—was no more to her than “a big brother who protected me and took care of me.”

Helen just needed a place to stay until her divorce was final. She got much more.

“I’d always heard about his violent past but never believed it because I’d never seen it,” Helen said. “Anytime him and I would go out anywhere, anybody who knew him would say “Oh my God, watch him. He’s beat up every girlfriend he’s ever had.”

But she wasn’t his girlfriend, and Helen didn’t believe the rumors could be true.

Ervin, however, didn’t see it that way. Maybe that’s because even though she was just staying there temporarily, they did have sex once. It was something that occasionally had happened in the past, but she never felt like they were a couple.

So one night after he had too much to drink, Ervin began hitting her with accusations, saying she was “(having sex) with other men and coming back and sleeping in his house,” Helen said.

It wasn’t true, and she didn’t know where the false charges had come from. But by then, she knew something was wrong. “He would get this look in his face like you could see the devil. You knew that you were in trouble,” Helen said.

She described how Ervin picked up the steel baseball bat he always kept at his side, and began threatening to hit her with it.

“If you’re going to do it, you’re going to look me in the face and do it. I’m not afraid of you but I’m not gonna’ turn my back and let you do it to me then,” Helen said she told him.

That’s when Ervin made good on his threat. He struck Helen “several times across the back. Then he kicked me while I was on the ground.”

Like Nancy, Helen didn’t seek medical treatment or call the police. Since she worked in the law enforcement field herself, she felt like it would have been too embarrassing. “I felt like it was dumb on my part,” Helen said.

Instead, she simply left.

“I managed to crawl out of the house and called my soon-to-be ex-husband,” she said. “I honestly can’t remember how many times he hit me.”

Ervin hit her so many times she couldn’t take off her own shirt later that night, and today has a herniated disc in that same area of her back, which causes her so much pain it interferes with her daily duties at home. At the time, she merely told friends she fell down the steps while carrying an armful of firewood.

The morning after the assault, Ervin, who begged her to return, kept apologizing via text messages. She refused to go back.

But then she realized all her belongings—her clothing, laptop, college textbooks, even kitchen appliances—were still there. So she decided to return for her things. “He told me before about changing the locks on people . . . I knew how he was. Knew if I didn’t go back, I’d never get (them),” she said. Helen believed he would destroy the belongings if she left them there.

And she “fully intended to leave” Ervin, after grabbing her belongings that day. She even had a plan of escape.

But she didn’t want to go stay with family members who lived nearby, for fear of endangering them. So she decided to stick around, play it cool, and during the evenings while Ervin was away at work, she would slowly cart off her belongings, a few at a time, so he wouldn’t notice. All “without causing any problems.” She hoped.

Before she could sneak all her things out, though, Ervin was drinking heavily and blaring the stereo late one night. She had to be up early for work the next morning, and knew not to make a fuss. So Helen offered to go sleep on her mom’s couch. She began gathering up her laptop and other items she needed and told him she would see him the next day. But Ervin refused to let her leave with anything.

“He would not let me have it so I left without it, and crashed on my mom’s couch,” Helen said. Her sister woke her up later that night, which is when Helen learned that Ervin had stolen her car.

That did prompt a call to the police. Helen said that local law enforcement was very familiar with Ervin, so a state trooper met her at Ervin’s house. Since Ervin had disabled the vehicle, a towing company was called. While Helen and the trooper stood outside in the road, waiting for the car to be loaded, Ervin was “standing in his doorway yelling profanities and threats.”

Finally, the trooper told her, "‘You leave, we’ll tow your car. Call us in the morning. You need to get a protective order,’” Helen said.

She almost didn’t get the chance. Before morning arrived, Ervin called a mutual friend of theirs, telling the friend to send police out to get him, because he was going to hunt Helen down and kill her.

Authorities were notified and police picked up Helen and took her to file for the protective order—which was granted. It ordered Ervin to stay away for 18 months.

But even after all of that, Helen didn’t press criminal charges. Neither did anyone in law enforcement who was familiar with Ervin’s repeat criminal behavior.

“I kicked myself every day afterwards for not (pressing charges),” Helen said. When asked why she didn’t, Helen gives the same answer that many abused woman have given in the past.

“I just wanted to be done with him. I wanted to go about my life. I thought, I’m walking away and it’s a domestic assault charge,” Helen said. “He’ll get six months probation and a slap on the wrist and then (I’ll have to) worry about him being ticked off at me and coming after me again.”

Now, she would do things differently. Which is what she wants to tell other women. “Report it. It doesn’t matter what it is. Get out. Stay away. There’s shelters . . . there are people to help you. You don’t have to stay in that situation,” she said.

Many women who end up being battered or even killed say they never saw the warning signs that experts say is a good predictor of abusive behavior.

“I could tell almost immediately after staying with him that he was very controlling. My family was never allowed around. If the phone would ring he’d get angry. Just little things like that,” Helen said, telling a story almost identical to that of Nancy.

Many other women see the signs, but ignore them. That’s what Helen did. “Still, I never saw anything major to throw too much of a reg flag,” she said.

And Ervin did destroy Helen’s laptop and a cell phone she had bought him. “I never was able to go back and get my stuff. He was told to pack it up and take to his attorney’s office and I would get it. He brought my clothes but that was it. I never got anything else,” she said.

Now, five days after Layman’s death, Helen couldn't care less about that.

“It’s just stuff. I’m alive, thank God. Other people suffered way worse than I did,” she said.

* * * *
Daleen can be reached at daleen.berry@gmail.com.

Editor's note: Berry has expertise in overcoming abuse through awareness, empowerment and goal attainment, and wrote about Postmaster Engle in her book. She's an award-winning author, editor and journalist who speaks at conferences around the country. Berry was one of two keynote speakers addressing a national audience at “The Many Faces of Domestic Violence,” the 18th Annual Conference of the Association of Batterers’ Intervention Programs on March 1, 2012, in Anaheim, Calif. She recently spoke to social workers from all over the country at the “Hope for the Future: Ending Domestic Violence in Families” conference at the University of California, Berkeley.

Her memoir (paperback and as an e-book) can be found at bookstores everywhere, or ordered online. To read the first chapter free, please go to Goodreads. Check out the five-star review from ForeWord Reviews. Or find out why Kirkus Reviews called Berry "an engaging writer, her style fluid and easy to read, with welcome touches of humor and sustained tension throughout."

If you want to read 30 other five-star reviews, check out this title on Amazon. To view the Sister of Silence book trailer, go to her VintageBerryWine Youtube channel. For a mock up of the SOS t-shirt readers are demanding, check out Berry's Facebook page.

It takes a lot to make a grown man cry. Especially in Preston County, where they just don’t. Centuries of struggle and tribulation have rendered these macho Mountaineers strong and stoic, when it comes to showing such emotion.

But on Friday, April 27, as the lid on Shannon Stafford’s white casket closed with a permanence no one in the funeral home was prepared for, grown men in Preston County wiped tears from their eyes and wept like little old ladies.

It seems particularly poignant that as a foster child who was removed from her biological home, Shannon never fell through the figurative cracks in what many people in this country call a broken system, one that often does more harm than good.

Shannon was different than so many other foster children who do fall through, often ending up crippled for life. So just how is it, after successfully reaching adulthood and becoming a mother herself, she died fighting for her own daughter, Faith?

Because that’s what happened: Shannon died trying to stop her only child from suffering the same abuse that led Shannon and five of her siblings to be removed from their biological home.

Fortunately, Shannon didn’t just survive in foster care with George and Gladys Adkins in Kingwood. She thrived. Ask anyone who knew her. Like, Gwenda Adkins. Gwen met Shannon when she was seven. Shannon, like their other foster children, called them “Papaw,” and “Mamaw,” and would later introduce them to people as her parents.

“Shannon was easy-going and sweet and unassuming,” Gwen said. Even after leaving her foster family and going to college, she would always call and check on them, or return home to visit and help them.

Shannon was blessed to have been placed with the Adkins family, who said they had more than 30 children come through their doors during the 23 years they were foster parents. She was blessed because the Adkins are no normal foster parents: each child was special to the couple.

“But there was something extra special about Shannon,” her foster brother, Barry Adkins, said during Shannon’s funeral service. While there, Shannon became a leader of sort in his parents’ home, because she loved people, and people wanted to be near her.

“And how she loved children. There was something special about this girl, how . . . children were drawn to her. She just seemed like a magnet to children and you could tell how much she loved children, how much she loved Faith,” Adkins said.

Relating how, following her death, someone asked him to describe Shannon’s qualities, Adkins said he couldn’t.

“There’s not enough good words in the dictionary to describe Shannon . . . how caring she was, how compassionate, how kind, how tender, how forgiving,” Adkins told the group who had gathered to tell Shannon goodbye.

Crystal Martin is Shannon’s biological sister, and four years her senior. Martin tried to convey a sense of who Shannon was, as a person. After acknowledging that she herself isn’t a morning person, she said Shannon would often call and wake her up, only to find Martin in a bad mood.

Sounding very upbeat and happy, Shannon would ask, “‘What’re you doing?’ She’s giddy at all times,” Martin said. Or she would say, in a singsong voice, “Good morning Buttercup, what are you doing?”

Shan, as Martin called her, “was really shy until you got to know her.” But because she was so sweet, “you cannot be mean to her. You can’t,” Martin said.

“No matter what kind of day it was, she was cheerful,” Martin added. “I think of her every second.”

It seems like everyone who knew Shannon felt likewise, and her foster family obviously adored her. “she really was like my sister, the only sister I had,” Tyra Nester said. The two girls spent five years together in the Adkins home, so Nester got to know Shannon during her teens, from age 14 to 19.

“Shannon never fought with anybody. Not at all. She didn’t have a mean bone in her body,” Nester said. “If she was upset with somebody, the most she would ever do was grunt.”

Perhaps that unwillingness to argue with loved ones was what caused Adkins to say that “loving” is the best word to describe Shannon.

Mary Newton agrees. “She taught us how to love. How to forgive people. She just was full of love. She taught me more about love in eight months than I knew in 55 years,” Newton said.

Newton is Nick Helms’ mother, and the last person Shannon spoke to before she died. The two women were on their cell phones talking when Shannon was shot.

“She taught us how to forgive . . . she just taught me that life’s too short. Life’s too short,” Newton said. “Not that you can’t get mad. You can get mad, but God wants you to forgive.”

Newton also spoke about Shannon’s magnetic personality. “She was so great with kids. She loved kids, loved them. She was so good with my granddaughter. (Lakin) just loves her.”

Tabitha Jeffries said Shannon was better with her own children than she is herself. Jeffries was Shannon’s best friend during their childhood years after Shannon moved into the Adkins’ home, next door to Jeffries.

“She just had a way with kids. She was good with them. She has more patience than me,” Jeffries said, slipping into present tense as though the shock of Shannon’s death still hasn’t sunk in.

Whenever Martin would tease her own children, Shannon would always come to their rescue. “She would say, ‘Don’t do that,’ and then add, ‘Aunt Shannon will save you,’” Martin said.

“She was so good with my kids and they would rather go to her than to me,” Martin added.

During her early years in foster care, Jeffries said Shannon was “fun, full of energy, hyper.” They went to church, played basketball together and went roller skating at the civic center or swimming in the city pool.

“If she wasn’t at my house, I was at her house and if we weren’t at each other’s houses, that means one of us was grounded,” Jeffries said.

When asked if she ever saw Shannon be mean to anyone, Jeffries almost takes affront to the question—and then says the same thing so many other people have said about Shannon.

“She didn’t have a mean bone in her body,” Jeffries said. “She liked to watch horror movies, and the worst thing she ever did to me was stand in the laundry room and scare me . . . after we watched a scary movie.”

During high school, Shannon was the type of person who would have been nice to you no matter who you were. “Shannon was never that type of person, that would hurt somebody else,” Courtney Austin, a former classmate, said.

It seems hard to believe someone so good could die so young, without realizing her dream of becoming an early childhood teacher. That’s because Shannon was very close to obtaining her undergraduate degree, where “her love would be bestowed on others deeply and often,” Gwen said.

Describing the beautiful blonde mother of one as “a sweet soul (who) chose to see the good in everyone she met,” Gwen wrote a tribute that was read at the funeral. In it, she said “Shannon was like a flawless diamond, sparking with a million lights in a dark world. We are the fortunate ones to have loved her and to have had her love in return.”

During the past several months, Shannon faced a particularly challenging divorce and custody battle. But even that couldn’t make her be mean to Faith’s father.

“She didn’t have a mean bone in her body . . . Even after all the terrible things they did to her and said about her, she wouldn’t say one negative thing,” Helms, who was Shannon’s boyfriend, said. “I told her I just couldn’t believe that she would let stuff roll off her back and just keep on going. She would say it was her faith, ‘it’s not me.’”

Helms said it was heartwarming to see Shannon interact with his young niece, Lakin. “She would see Shannon come in and run and give her a hug,” he added.

Adkins agreed Shannon’s faith was her stronghold. “Hers was a life of understanding . . . of tenderness. I don’t know that I’ve ever met . . . someone more forgiving than Shannon Stafford. She didn’t have a vengeful bone in her body. If somebody did her wrong, she’d just smile and come back again,” Adkins said.

Gwen, who accompanied Shannon every week during supervised visits with Faith, took that a step further. “She bent over backward being civil to people who don’t know the meaning of the word,” Gwen said.

“Faith was her life,” Adkins said.

“She loved that little girl more than her own life,” Helms said.

* * * *
Daleen can be reached at daleen.berry@gmail.com.

Editor's note: Berry has expertise in overcoming abuse through awareness, empowerment and goal attainment, and can be pretty funny when she wants. She's an award-winning author, editor and journalist who speaks at conferences around the country. Berry was one of two keynote speakers addressing a national audience at “The Many Faces of Domestic Violence,” the 18th Annual Conference of the Association of Batterers’ Intervention Programs on March 1, 2012, in Anaheim, Calif. She recently spoke to social workers from all over the country at the “Hope for the Future: Ending Domestic Violence in Families” conference at the University of California, Berkeley.

Her memoir (paperback and as an e-book) can be found at bookstores everywhere, or ordered online. To read the first chapter free, please go to Goodreads. Check out the five-star review from ForeWord Reviews. Or find out why Kirkus Reviews called Berry "an engaging writer, her style fluid and easy to read, with welcome touches of humor and sustained tension throughout."

If you want to read 30 other five-star reviews, check out this title on Amazon. To view the Sister of Silence book trailer, go to her VintageBerryWine Youtube channel. For a mock up of the SOS t-shirt readers are demanding, check out Berry's Facebook page.

Court documents prove Nathan Mitchell has history of abuse;
Facebook posts raise other questions

Five years of fear forced 25-year-old Kristin Thompson to keep mum about her own abuse. While she remains terrified of her former abuser, she says she must speak up, because she's afraid that silence may have cost Shannon Stafford her life.

After her good friend was brutally gunned down in public during a domestic-related shooting April 21, Kristin broke her silence. She formed a Facebook group called "Justice For Shannon Stafford" that now has more than 2,000 members.

At the center of the group's concern is Stafford's two-year-old daughter, Faith Mitchell. The child was at the Wal-Mart parking lot crime scene in Morgantown, W.Va. Nathan Mitchell took his daughter there to meet her mother, where she was shot and killed by her father-in-law before the custodial exchange could occur.

Police say Larry Mitchell, 54, opened fire on Stafford, 29, as she sat waiting for word of Faith's arrival. The Mitchell men took separate cars to the Wal-Mart, something the police are looking into. While the investigation continues, Faith remains in her father's custody.

Kristin, who lives just five miles from the Mitchell's Harrison County home, spoke about Nathan's abuse when she attended Stafford's funeral viewing last week. "I want her to get justice. And I want that baby—" Kristin breaks off. "I don't know how he treats that baby but I'm afraid," she said, crying. "I don't want them to raise her, because look how Nathan turned out."

Several witnesses have come forward, breaking their own silence to say that how Nathan turned out is abusive. One of those men is Kristin's father, Todd Thompson, who said his daughter barely escaped alive in 2007 from a three-year relationship with Nathan. Thompson also said the Mitchell family—or rather, Nathan and his mother, Sandra—made his daughter's life “a living hell."

"She told us horror stories about it. He'd be driving down the road and she'd changed the radio station and he would start choking her," Kristin's father said.

Thompson related an incident that occurred after Kristin invited friends to go swimming. "He drug her by the hair of the head and tried to stick her head in the toilet (because he didn’t want the friends at his home)," Thompson said Kristin told him.

That's something Shannon could relate to. "She sent me a message on MySpace . . . asking me if he had ever been abusive . . . because she was in the pool with him and was joking around splashing him and he got mad and grabbed her by the neck."

At the time, Kristin believed it was a trap set by Nathan, who continued to harass and stalk her after they broke up. He did this even after the courts ordered him to stop.

"I didn't message her back because they (Sandra and Nathan) were constantly trying to slander me and get me in trouble," Kristin said. "Now I feel like if I would have told her 'yes,' then she would have left and she could still be here. I was just scared."

As she talks about Stafford, the tears start falling. "I hate myself for this now," Kristin said.

The Thompsons aren't the only ones talking. Two former friends who insisted on anonymity, citing fear of retaliation, related other frightening occasions spent in Nathan's company. The first friend said he interceded once after Nathan threw a girl on the ground and began choking her. "I had to forcefully remove him from her and make him leave," he said.

The second friend called Nathan "very unstable," and shared a sobering story involving one of Nathan's earlier girlfriends. "He was drunk . . . and said, 'I want to find that bitch and I'm going to kill her,'" the friend said.

Thompson believes his daughter has repressed the memories of much of Nathan’s abuse. But what she can't remember, her father does and together, their words paint a very dangerous picture for anyone of the opposite sex living with the younger Mitchell.

According to Harrison County court documents, Kristin ended their relationship after Nathan climbed through her bedroom window and began choking her about 1:30 a.m. Sept. 1, 2007. "I couldn't breathe while he was choking me but he would let go before (I passed out) . . . then he would stop and ask me why I had to be this way . . . like I was making him do it," she said.

Pictures taken the following morning show a ring of bruises around her neck. And while she was initially terrified of filing a police report, her father helped her do so the next day. Those photos and Kristin's testimony led Harrison County Magistrate Keith Marple to grant her a six-month protective order.

"I knew if I pressed charges, it would make him mad. I didn't want (that). I just wanted him to leave me alone," Kristin said.

But Mitchell didn't leave her alone: after Marple granted the final protective order, Mitchell publicly posted his wrath on his MySpace page.

"You think it is over but it's NOT!!!!!!!" The Sept. 17, 2007 page also reads: "I just got out of a long relationship . . . I would like to meet a girl that (doesn't) lie, cheat and make me feel like shit . . ."

Again taking to social media after Stafford's death, Nathan posted something that appears ominously connected to this case. On April 23, according to his Facebook page, he was listening to the song "You Deserve It," by an artist called Future, which has outraged many people. The lyrics include these lines: "Ain't asked for this, I worked for this. I was in the dungeon, that place's a sin . . . I'm better than you and I know it. I will show it."

Nathan appealed the 2007 Harrison County decision, Thompson said, taking the case to circuit court. Official documents show he lost the appeal.

Nor did the protective order keep Nathan from harassing or stalking Kristin. Once, she had her parents come and get her, after she discovered Nathan, Sandra, and a Mitchell family friend were outside a restaurant taking photos of her. Kristin says that was just another attempt by Sandra to control her.

"She was scared to death," her father said.

He also remembers how Kristin's personality changed when she was dating Nathan.

"She was drawing away from us. Our relationship was deteriorating. They wanted her away from us. They wanted her to themselves," Thompson said, adding that Sandra tried to convince Kristin she could live with them.

That control is what has Kristin frightened for Faith. "If you loved your baby, you wouldn't take her mother from her. Everybody needs their mom," she said.

Because of Faith, she's fighting to overcome her fear, as a growing group of West Virginia residents rally behind her. "I've lived in fear of that family for five years but this has gone too far. I'm not going to sit back and watch them get away with this," Kristin said.

No one responded to phone calls about this story made to the Mitchell home, to Nathan's cell phone, or to an email sent to Nathan at his Facebook page. A supervisor at the Harrison County CPS did not return a call about the story. All attorneys involved in the case declined to comment.

Editor's note: Daleen can be reached at daleen.berry@gmail.com.

Berry has expertise in overcoming abuse through awareness, empowerment and goal attainment, and can be pretty funny when she wants. She's an award-winning author, editor and journalist who speaks at conferences around the country. Berry was one of two keynote speakers addressing a national audience at “The Many Faces of Domestic Violence,” the 18th Annual Conference of the Association of Batterers’ Intervention Programs on March 1, 2012, in Anaheim, Calif. She recently spoke to social workers from all over the country at the “Hope for the Future: Ending Domestic Violence in Families” conference at the University of California, Berkeley.

Her memoir (paperback and as an e-book) can be found at bookstores everywhere, or ordered online. To read the first chapter free, please go to Goodreads. Check out the five-star review from ForeWord Reviews. Or find out why Kirkus Reviews called Berry "an engaging writer, her style fluid and easy to read, with welcome touches of humor and sustained tension throughout."

If you want to read 30 other five-star reviews, check out this title on Amazon. To view the Sister of Silence book trailer, go to her VintageBerryWine Youtube channel. For a mock up of the SOS t-shirt readers are demanding, check out Berry's Facebook page.

Shannon Stafford was holding a cherished love letter from her would-be fiancé when she was buried inside a white casket last Friday. Stafford was executed just six days earlier outside a Morgantown, W.Va., Wal-Mart, while her two-year-old daughter Faith was several yards away at the time. Police later allowed the child to go home with the man who threatened to kill Stafford, and that's where Faith remains today, as a quickly growing group of vocal Facebook supporters claim she's in danger.

Saturdays were undoubtedly Stafford's favorite day of the week, since the 29-year-old mother was permitted to visit Faith then. Last Saturday was the first time in almost a year that she would have had Faith for more than four hours once a week. Harrison County Family Judge Cornelia Reep had just granted Stafford an overnight visit with the toddler. Friends and family say Stafford was ecstatic but anxious, as she sat in a parked truck awaiting word about Faith's arrival. Stafford was supposed to get Faith from her estranged husband Nathan Mitchell, who was meeting her there.

Stafford's would-be-fiancé said he became worried when Nathan told Stafford to come alone and park in a specific location in the parking lot, but she insisted she had to do what Nathan asked.

"He was adamant about her being alone and walking over to his vehicle to get Faith . . . but she did it anyways, because she didn't want to do anything that would cause her problems," Nick Helms said. So he went inside Wal-Mart, while Stafford waited alone.

In preparation for the toddler's first visit to their Bruceton Mills home, Helms helped Stafford with the nursery. Pictures posted on Stafford's Facebook page show the bright, cheery room was decorated by people who lovingly paid attention to every detail, down to the ties that held back the bedroom window curtains.

But instead of having a joyous reunion after a year apart, 29-year-old Stafford was gunned down at the giant retailer. Police have charged her estranged father-in-law, 54-year-old Larry Mitchell, with the murder. Eyewitnesses say he began walking toward Helms' truck, firing rounds as he did so and stopping only to reload his weapon. Even as Stafford tried to get out of the vehicle, they said, he continued shooting until she laid there, unmoving, on the ground.

Family members say she was dead within 10 seconds.

Mitchell has since been arrested, is facing a murder charge, and sits in the Doddridge Regional Jail. Monongalia County Circuit Judge Phillip Gaujot denied Mitchell bail earlier today.

Although an older Mitchell fired the fatal shots, Stafford warned Helms it was the younger Mitchell—Larry's son, Nathan—who might kill her. (The two men took separate vehicles to the parking lot. After interviewing Nathan, police initially said they believed Larry acted alone.)

"He told her once he would kill her and put her out back and nobody would ever know she was there, or care," Helms said. Helms planned to propose to Stafford once her divorce was final.

"She told me about mental, verbal abuse," Helms said. "She said he threw her down on the bed (but) never got too much into that. She just didn't want to talk about it."

According to Helms' mother, Mary Newton, who worked with Stafford, Nathan was so controlling the young mother had to sneak calls to her friends while at work and wasn't allowed to visit her family while under his thumb. Other than one visit just after the toddler's birth, Stafford's relatives say they never saw Faith, because Stafford was not allowed to take the child for family visits.

It was that controlling environment that finally caused Stafford to flee the Shinnston home she and Nathan shared with his parents last year, after Nathan refused to go for marital counseling with her. She also begged him to move out, so they could have a place of their own for Faith, friends said.

So she left sometime in late spring 2010, and tried to take Faith with her. But the family refused to let the baby go. Instead, Nathan and his mother physically removed Stafford from the home, Helms said. Stafford did the only thing she could: she called the local police.

Shinnston Police Chief Michael Secreto said an officer went to the Mitchell home and he vaguely remembers hearing about the incident. "But there was nothing we could do. If there's no (custodial court order) we refer the parent to go get an order from the magistrate," Secreto said.

So Stafford did what she was told. She went to court, and then she tried to negotiate the challenging legal system without an attorney. Helms said she couldn't afford one, not even when the Mitchell family claimed she was a drug user who abused her baby—an allegation Stafford's family and almost everyone who knew her flatly disputes, in dozens of Facebook posts.

Nonetheless, Stafford found herself facing a family judge who based her decision on testimony given by the Mitchells and erred on the side of caution, in initially only permitting supervised visitation between mother and daughter. Child Protective Services (CPS) also got involved.

Then Stafford got a break. That's because just two months ago, Helms, whose father Terry died in the Jan. 1, 2006 Sago mine explosion, sold his father's house. Helms used the money to hire Stafford an attorney.

She had been cleared of all child abuse allegations brought up by the Mitchells.

“There never was an open case, because CPS never found anything,” Tabitha Jeffries said. Jeffries and Stafford were best friends throughout childhood. They grew up next door to each other in Kingwood.

Jeffries, a nurse, said she spoke to Stafford after an April 18 court hearing, when Reep ruled Stafford could have overnight visits with Faith, as well as shared custody with Nathan Mitchell. But three days later, Stafford was murdered.

Reep was to issue her final custody decree on April 27, the day Stafford was buried. According to The Dominion Post, the case has since been dismissed.

Everyone close to the case says the Mitchell family—who have had custody of Faith all this time—feared they were losing control of Stafford and her daughter. That's what friends of the slain mother are posting on Facebook.

"If you would have asked me on April 20, I would have said (Larry) was a good guy, but he was controlled by Sandra (his wife) and Nathan," Kristen Thompson, a friend of Staffords, said during an interview at the funeral home. "(Larry) was in the background . . . he'd come home, eat dinner, and go into his bedroom. He was already in prison, pretty much, living there."

Kristen said her gut tells her "Larry didn't act alone." That wouldn't surprise Helms' mother, Mary Newton, who was worried about Stafford's safety.

Newton said the Mitchells couldn't be trusted. "Shannon said, 'Well Nathan won't do anything to me when he has the baby around.'"

But Newton persisted. "I asked about his dad and Shannon said, 'Larry wouldn't do anything like that. He's not that kind of person.'"

Stafford's estranged mother-in-law was another matter, however. "She knew Sandra was. She was afraid of Sandra," Newton said.

No one responded to phone calls about this story made to the Mitchell home, to Nathan's cell phone, or to an email sent to Nathan at his Facebook page. Stafford's attorney, John Danford, said he couldn't comment on the case. Judy Sawyer, who has been appointed Faith's guardian ad litem, said likewise. A call to the Harrison County CPS office was not returned.

Morgantown Police Chief Ed Preston said every detective in his department is working on the case, and all evidence will be handed over to Monongalia County Prosecutor Marcia Ashdown once the investigation is complete.

Editor's note: You can reach Daleen at daleen.berry@gmail.com.

Daleen Berry has expertise in overcoming abuse through awareness, empowerment and goal attainment. She's an award-winning author, editor and journalist who speaks at conferences around the country. Berry was one of two keynote speakers addressing a national audience at “The Many Faces of Domestic Violence,” the 18th Annual Conference of the Association of Batterers’ Intervention Programs on March 1, 2012, in Anaheim, Calif. She recently spoke to social workers from all over the country at the “Hope for the Future: Ending Domestic Violence in Families” conference at the University of California, Berkeley.

Her memoir (paperback and as an e-book) can be found at bookstores everywhere, or ordered online. To read the first chapter free, please go to Goodreads. Check out the five-star review from ForeWord Reviews. Or find out why Kirkus Reviews called Berry "an engaging writer, her style fluid and easy to read, with welcome touches of humor and sustained tension throughout."

If you want to read 30 other five-star reviews, check out this title on Amazon. To view the Sister of Silence book trailer, go to her VintageBerryWine Youtube channel. For a mock up of the SOS t-shirt readers are demanding, check out Berry's Facebook page.

Just three miles from where Shannon Stafford rested in her white casket Friday morning, there’s a huge billboard you can’t miss, just as you leave Masontown, W.Va. It urges Prestonians to help prevent child abuse, saying: “It’s your turn to make a difference.” Everyone who drives by is encouraged to “reach out” and “speak up.”

That’s what the people of Preston County (along with a handful of others in Harrison, Marion and Mon counties) are trying to do: stop a child from being abused. The problem is, though, the wheels of justice move ever so slowly. And it has only been a week since Shannon was gunned down in a Walmart parking lot.

But that’s yet one more week Faith—the two-year-old child at the center of the custody battle that ensued between Shannon and her estranged husband, Nathan Mitchell—spent in a home many people are calling toxic.

Given that Shannon’s boyfriend, Nick Helms, has been telling anyone who will listen that Faith was not far from Shannon’s body after she was killed, people are justifiably upset. "He was parading her back and forth, not right up beside her but probably 10-15 yards away," Helms said.

Authorities have said they have no proof the toddler was abused, when the proof has been staring them in the face for the last seven days: Shannon’s estranged father-in-law, Larry Mitchell, murdered Shannon in front of her daughter.

By “in front of,” I mean she was—we hope and pray and, at the very least—in her father’s truck, a few spaces away from where Shannon was parked. (And at the very worst, it’s possible 28-year-old Nathan Mitchell intentionally took the little girl out of his truck for the purpose of showing her the scene, making the abuse even greater.)

When I say abuse, I’m speaking about the abuse the elder Mitchell perpetuated against Shannon—because experts know that any violence directed at a parent also damages the child. In fact, it’s been said that one of the most important things you can do for your child, is to love your spouse.

Experts aren’t the only ones who know this, which is why laws based on this premise are now in place all over the country.

We don’t know that Faith actually saw her grandfather kill her mother, but eyewitnesses say Nathan stood nearby laughing afterward, his toddler in tow. Nor do we know she even saw her mother’s body or, at age two, whether she could comprehend what she was seeing.

But the study of child development has come a very long way, and considering that they now know an unborn fetus is dramatically affected by everything that happens to and around the mother, why would a two-year-old not be affected by the stress level of such a crime scene, at the very least?

If, though, Nathan did place his daughter in a position so she would see her mother, or hear comments about her in the ensuing chaos of the shooting, he is guilty of intentionally abusing Faith. I’m not a mind reader, so I certainly don’t know. And I wasn’t at the scene. But I’ve interviewed enough people in the last week that it sounds in keeping with his abusive character.

Helms said he doesn’t know, either. But in his mind—and many other people’s—the child should not have been near the crime scene. That she was, constitutes abuse—in their minds, and in my own.

Friday at Shannon’s funeral, one woman who spoke on condition of anonymity said, “If she was shown her mother’s dead body by her laughing father, that’s abuse.”

Which is why, regardless of what the police did or did not do at the crime scene—by covering Shannon’s body with a plastic tarp and during their own interrogation of Nathan—I believe the authorities should have erred on the side of caution, and taken Faith from him immediately.

I say this because that’s what the state law demands. There, under the procedural rules for abuse and neglect hearings (W.Va. Code § 49-1-3), an abused child is defined as one “whose health or welfare is harmed or threatened by . . . domestic violence.” While child abuse and neglect is defined as “physical injury, mental or emotional injury,” among other things.

After attending Shannon’s funeral Friday, I sat down with Morgantown Police Chief Ed Preston. Quite a stickler for rules, Preston said his department follows those laid out by the Governor’s Committee on Crime, Delinquency and Correction, when it comes to handling domestic violence incidents such as this one. I haven’t had time to do more than briefly review this updated version, but it’s quite comprehensive and Chief Preston says his department follows it to the letter. Check it out for yourself and let me know.

That being said, from professional and personal experience, I do know any family member who believes a child’s health and welfare are in danger can file a motion with family court, requesting an emergency hearing be held about the perceived dangers. Free templates can be found online, if a family member wants to go “pro se,” instead of hiring an attorney.

Other than addressing general procedural issues involved in criminal cases like this one, the MPD is not talking.

But that hasn't stopped the public from doing so. And in the court of public opinion, something is very wrong with this picture. Nearly 1,500 people have joined Harrison County resident Kristin Thompson’s "Justice for Shannon Stafford" Facebook page. Kristin, who became good friends with Shannon after she left Nathan, set up the page for the murdered mother, as a way of not having been able to do more for her friend before she died.

Many of the posts indicate more is involved than an ugly custody battle. The more I'm speaking of is Faith, the toddler who Shannon lived, breathed and, ultimately, died for.

When asked if Faith saw her mother laying there, Helms said there was no way the child could have done otherwise.

Helms and Shannon shared a home, after she was forced her in-laws’ home, which she shared with her estranged husband. Helms was inside the store when he saw people scrambling, and heard news of a shooting. He knew instantly Shannon was the victim. That's because she had forewarned him.

"Shannon made me promise if anything ever happened to her that I would fight for her and Faith," Helms told WDTV, a local television station.

****

In spite of everything she endured, Shannon Stafford never lost faith. And yet she did. She lost custody of her daughter, Faith, as a battle waged within the family court system became as contentious and deadly as the one Shannon had been fighting outside the courthouse steps, with her estranged husband and his parents.

For the last few months, Shannon had chronic stomach pain, brought on from the stress of having her daughter taken from her, she underwent a thyroidectomy, and she suffered a miscarriage.

These are things you haven’t seen in any newspaper article, but they are just as important as all of the other facts about this case, because they speak to what her psyche was facing, as she quietly waged her own war against the Mitchell family.

My daughter Courtney went to school with Shannon, and she sent me screenshots of Shannon's Facebook page, which showed the young mother's concern over the then-pending surgery, her happiness over becoming a mother again (prior to the miscarriage), and posts in which Shannon referred to life being harder than usual.

Shannon’s FB posts were not adversarial toward the Mitchell family, Courtney said, but “she was always writing how she needed to be strong.”

Shannon’s family and closest friends knew the details of her ordeal, but other people might not have. For instance, Courtney said Shannon posted once that Mitchell “wouldn’t let her take Faith when she left.”

Shannon never spoke about the abuse in public—and rarely discussed it in private. “She didn’t post that he was abusive. But there were some issues there, you could read between the lines and know there were problems there. She didn’t badmouth him,” Courtney told me.

Nor did Shannon speak badly about her estranged mother-in-law, Sandra, with whom she worked at Madonna Day Care in Shinnston—before she lost her job there when she left Nathan. And yet, parents who take their children to the daycare center have said they and their children were all told Shannon ran off.

Posts on the 'Justice for Shannon Stafford' FB page during the last week include those from parents who say they simply didn't believe that when Sandra told them, and their children, that. Over and over—online and in person—people keep saying that Shannon loved children, that she was someone children were drawn to, like a magnet, and that she would not abandon any child in her care.

None of these things, though, caused Shannon to utter a single complaint. That’s because, according to the people who have known both Shannon and the Mitchell family for years, Shannon was like a quiet little lamb.

“Shannon was very kind-hearted and careful not to speak ill of people,” one family member told me recently. Looking back, people close to her said they can now see that “Shannon avoided confrontation with (the Mitchells) at every step, which makes us think that she knew they were capable of generating distress.”

****

The Mitchell family allegedly set out to destroy Shannon’s good name and take her child. Using the court system as a weapon, it appears they were successful for nearly a year, as they kept Shannon from all but a few hours of weekly access to Faith.

But the tables appeared to be turning when the elder Mitchell gunned down the 29-year-old mother the very day she was going to be allowed to spend more than four hours of supervised time with the little girl.

People close to the case said the Mitchells manufactured evidence against Shannon, and believed they had every right to do so. Among their claims: Shannon did drugs and partied. But hundreds of people who knew her far longer than the Mitchells say that’s bogus. Totally untrue. These are people I know personally, who are good people, and I’m inclined to believe them.

Shannon’s family says the Mitchells wanted total control—no matter the cost—and that’s why they even tried to undermine the partial custody Shannon received, as she gained ground in the legal battle and the court recognized she was a good parent.

This isn't the first time I've made phone calls and asked questions about a murdered woman who was being abused. And that is what this case is really about: domestic violence and a controlling, manipulative Mitchell family who literally put the young mother "through hell," as several people have told me.

But this case mirrors one I covered when I reported on Wanda Toppins’ murder. She was killed in September 1990 by her ex-husband, Jerry Toppins Sr., in front of their three-year-old son, David.

Jerry Toppins Jr., said that memory haunts his younger brother. “He is 25 now and still remembers that day vividly,” Toppins posted on FB.

Another similarity between the two cases: Helms was on the verge of proposing to Shannon, since her divorce was just days from being final. While Wanda and her fiancé were to have been married the day she was murdered.

Just like the elder Mitchell, Toppins also continued firing at his victim long after she fell, leaving her body riddled with bullet holes. Right in front of his son. Then he, again like Mitchell, callously turned his back on Shannon and coldly walked away.

Editor's note: Daleen Berry has expertise in overcoming abuse through awareness, empowerment and goal attainment, and can be pretty funny when she wants. She's an award-winning author, editor and journalist who speaks at conferences around the country. Berry was one of two keynote speakers addressing a national audience at “The Many Faces of Domestic Violence,” the 18th Annual Conference of the Association of Batterers’ Intervention Programs on March 1, 2012, in Anaheim, Calif. She recently spoke to social workers from all over the country at the “Hope for the Future: Ending Domestic Violence in Families” conference at the University of California, Berkeley.

Her memoir (paperback and as an e-book) can be found at bookstores everywhere, or ordered online. To read the first chapter free, please go to Goodreads. Check out the five-star review from ForeWord Reviews. Or find out why Kirkus Reviews called Berry "an engaging writer, her style fluid and easy to read, with welcome touches of humor and sustained tension throughout."

If you want to read 30 other five-star reviews, check out this title on Amazon. To view the Sister of Silence book trailer, go to her VintageBerryWine Youtube channel. For a mock up of the SOS t-shirt, check out Berry's Facebook page.

It seems like everyone wants to be the next Howard Stern, saying things simply for shock value. I don't do that. I don't make shock statements. But sometimes I'm saying more than meets the eye.

Like last week, when I said Jordan Powers should apologize to James Hooker's family. Several people took exception to that comment, or perhaps it was something else in my Huffington Post piece that upset them. I said it for several reasons, including the fact that as a reporter, I'm often privy to more information than the general public. (I'm guessing that maybe 50-percent of what we know as reporters makes its way into the collective public eye.)

So my readers couldn't possibly know about a certain email I got not long after this case broke, and prior to my first piece about Powers and Hooker, that indicated there was more to the story than most people realize. The email was from someone quite close to the case, who knew far more of the facts involved in this story than your average bear. Present company included.

So while I didn't let that information affect the first piece I wrote, by the time the new information came to light, i.e., Powers up and left Hooker for what she believed was his infidelity to her (by, I'm assuming, learning that—unlike he probably told her—she was not the only teenage girl he'd "fallen for") I did allow it to color my perspective.

Maybe that's due to the ongoing discussions Ken Lanning and I have, about victims and predators and their culpability, or lack thereof, and last but not least, about the difference between a child under the age of say, eight, who is molested, and a girl like Powers, who claims nothing sexual happened between her and Hooker prior to her turning 18.

Legally, before that day, Powers isn't responsible for anything she did, as it pertains to this case. That's simply what the law states. The law also says she's a victim. And she most certainly is. Her victimization is going to be more difficult to overcome, given the grooming that she's gone through at Hooker's hands.

Yet this is what I've noticed about victimization: some victims are still stuck years after their initial abuse, and they remain stranded in the status quo. They cannot figure out how to get out, and so they might not be able to have healthy relationships, or hold down a job, or even leave their own homes. This is understandable, given the severe abuse that many, many victims have endured during their lifetime. Especially if that abuse began when they were still very young and were powerless to defend themselves.

Please don't get me wrong: all abuse is bad and evil and should never ever happen. But does that mean that all abuse is the same? No, for the very fact that so many victims do manage to turn their lives around and get past the abuse, becoming not just survivors, but people who thrive in their homes, their families and their communities, shows that it isn't the same at all.

So just as all abuse is not the same, neither are all victims. I'm really not sure what to make of Powers, and perhaps that's because she had no compunction about going on national TV with Hooker. (Again, though, one could argue, as I do myself, that he was to her what Patty Hearst's captors were, and she was so thoroughly under his power and control that she would do whatever he said.)

That might be the case. But it might not. It's irrelevant, anyway. That's because the primary reason I suggested Powers should apologize to Hooker's family is because they deserve an apology from someone. And they won't get it from Hooker. But what if this young woman could somehow extend an olive branch, that would not only help the healing begin for them, but for herself as well?

Who cares if she doesn't owe them one. Who cares if she shouldn't have to give it. How many times have we apologized to people because, at the time, it just seemed like the right thing to do?

Beyond that, though, I strongly encouraged Powers to analyze how she came to be chosen by Hooker: what led her to accept his attention and affection, when another girl her age might have steered clear of him? And I still think that's great advice, since she has to understand the underlying reasons for her own actions—if and only if, she wants to avoid them the next time. (Or run back to Hooker, as her mother said she fears Powers might do, if he keeps hounding her.)

Avoidance is key to becoming someone else's victim down the road. It's also key to becoming mentally healthy again. And a healthy survivor who refuses to be victimized a second or even a third time stands a much greater chance of forming healthy attachments, of being able to leave home, and of holding down a good job.

That's my wish for Powers.

Editor's note: Daleen Berry has expertise in overcoming abuse through awareness, empowerment and goal attainment, and can be pretty funny when she wants. She's an award-winning author, editor and journalist who speaks at conferences around the country. Berry was one of two keynote speakers addressing a national audience at “The Many Faces of Domestic Violence,” the 18th Annual Conference of the Association of Batterers’ Intervention Programs on March 1, 2012, in Anaheim, Calif. She recently spoke to social workers from all over the country at the “Hope for the Future: Ending Domestic Violence in Families” conference at the University of California, Berkeley.

Her memoir (paperback and as an e-book) can be found at bookstores everywhere, or ordered online. To read the first chapter free, please go to Goodreads. Check out the five-star review from ForeWord Reviews. Or find out why Kirkus Reviews called Berry "an engaging writer, her style fluid and easy to read, with welcome touches of humor and sustained tension throughout."

If you want to read 30 other five-star reviews, check out this title on Amazon. To see a mock up of the SOS t-shirt, check out Berry's Facebook page.

A 12:06 a.m. phone call this morning reminded me that today is, indeed a special day. For more reasons than the obvious one, that being the release of the "Sister of Silence: Silent No More" book trailer.

The phone call was from my son, whose name is "Slade" in my book. (My children got to chose their own pseudonyms. Enough said?)

He began by saying that "27 years ago today you gave birth to me," and then ended the call by telling me he couldn't thank me enough. If I could, I'd frame it, because it's singularly the best message anyone has ever left me. Bar none.

So "Slade" was born on April 1, 1985, effectively making him an April Fool's baby, and, at 21, making me a mom for the fourth time in five years. Six weeks later and I would never be a mom again.

Let's talk about reality for a minute: the Centers for Disease Control says that approximately 32,000 pregnancies occur each year in the United States, due to rape. That's why I took permanent steps to stop becoming pregnant; rape, you see, doesn't only happen outside of own's home.

The "SOS: Silent No More" video project, which is actually a six-minute long book trailer, took four months to complete. Most of that work was done by Nick Adkins, a Marshall University college student. The rest of us just played our parts here and there, as we were needed. I was the only person older than 30 who participated.

Other than the compelling story line in Sister of Silence, I think these young people—Nick, Sarah Lemanski, who plays me, and Max Gould, who plays Eddie—recognize that sexual misconduct and even sex crimes are a huge problem in our society. Our conversations led me to that conclusion.

My own understanding of sex crimes is based on personal experience, my journalism work and tons of research. I also see that children and young people aren't being prepared to fend off predators or attackers. Parents are more than a little squeamish when it comes to talking about sexuality. So I'm giving them some tools to work with.

The first one is my book, Sister of Silence; the second one is the video that goes live tonight at 9 p.m.; the third is a non-profit I created, the Silent No More Foundation, that will help parents educate their children easier and in a more comfortable setting. Please join our educational efforts at VintageBerryWine, my YouTube channel.

Stay tuned for more details, because this is not an April Fool's joke. My son reminded me of that less than 24 hours ago.

Editor's note: Daleen Berry has expertise in overcoming abuse through awareness, empowerment and goal attainment, and can be pretty funny when she wants. She's an award-winning author, editor and journalist who speaks at conferences around the country. Berry was one of two keynote speakers addressing a national audience at “The Many Faces of Domestic Violence,” the 18th Annual Conference of the Association of Batterers’ Intervention Programs on March 1, 2012, in Anaheim, Calif. She recently spoke to social workers from all over the country at the “Hope for the Future: Ending Domestic Violence in Families” conference at the University of California, Berkeley.

Her memoir (paperback and as an e-book) can be found at bookstores everywhere, or ordered online. To read the first chapter free, please go to Goodreads. To see why Foreword Reviews gave it five stars, click here. If you want to read 30 other five-star reviews, check out this title on Amazon. To see a mock up of the SOS t-shirt, check out Berry's Facebook page.

It was midmorning, the sun was hot and the day promising, when I spotted a Baskin-Robbins on the street corner. Happy memories of Jamoca Almond Fudge and Mint Chocolate Chip ice cream came flooding back from childhood. It had been years since I'd been there. No time like the present, I thought, pulling into the parking lot.

My iPad and other electronic equipment was inside and I was in Burbank, Calif., so I carefully locked the car and went inside. The next school district I was to visit—where I was dropping off copies of Sister of Silence—could surely wait another ten minutes, I decided.

Making my way to the women's room, I took care of business and then went to flush. At that very same second, the car keys came tumbling from my purse, which was by then back on my shoulder. I didn't even realize they had fallen into the water—until I saw something dark disappear down the drain. My heart stopped beating for a split second, because I knew it wasn't from me.

Now normally when I'm at home and do this kind of thing, I just call my friendly American Automobile Association (AAA) and they save the day. Not that I've ever flushed my keys—or anything else that I shouldn't have, that I can remember—down the commode before. But I've locked myself out or locked them in so many times I was once legendary as a result.

However, when I'm in traveling to promote awareness about abuse or market my book, as often happens, I drive a rental car. (Not from Enterprise, though.) This one was a rather nice model, and not flashy at all. But it did come complete with an electronic key fob. (I didn't choose to have the extra bells and whistles; that was simply the only car they had that did not have a nasty fragrance lingering inside—which would have made me ill, for sure.)

Now for anyone who hasn't experienced this particular scenario, let me tell you quite bluntly: you don't want to! Not unless you have a spare amount of cash on hand that isn't needed to buy such luxuries as, say, food, or return airfare home.

That's because when you flush your own key, you can choose to get an inexpensive one made, that simply unlocks the doors when you put it into the slot. You can kiss the key fob goodbye and resign yourself to living without it, or you can simply delay getting another one until you have the money to pay for it. But when you're driving a rental car, from a big chain company, they have a policy. It goes something like this: "Lose the keys—pay us $350."

They don't tell you this when you rent the vehicle, of course—or else you would treat them like gold, never letting them hang out of any pocket and perhaps not even leaving your hand. You might even decide to wear them around a body part, like a bracelet or a necklace. (That's what I'm doing next time. It wouldn't be as stylish as those worn by actors walking across the Red Carpet at the Oscars, but it would be the most expensive necklace I've ever worn, so hey, if it saves me $350, then I'm going for it.)

Because that is at least what it cost me, in the long run, to fix this problem, which I created by opting to use the loo before getting my ice cream. I was stranded in the parking lot for the entire day while trying to figure out the logistics, or see if there might be an alternative. There was, in fact. A nearby car dealer made the new keys and gave me a new fob for just $290. Leaving me enough money to eat for the next few days—I'm not a big eater, especially when I do something stupid like that—but airfare home was a little less certain. So I called in a huge favor and a white knight driving a four-dour sedan came to my rescue, depositing funds into my nearly empty bank account.

By the time I got back on the road, it was after 6 p.m. I know this because the dealership had closed and I was one of the last to leave. Not only had I missed visiting that particular school district (as well as several others, given they were then closed and I was on a tight schedule), I still had about 200 miles to drive—the last 50 of those not being interstate miles. By the time I made it to my friend's home, it was almost 11 p.m. and I was exhausted.

I fell asleep with the car keys clutched tightly inside my hand.

Books Here, Books There, They Need My Book Everywhere!

Since I was starting my journey in Los Angeles with one speaking engagement and ending it in San Francisco with another, I decided in advance to stop at every agency I could along the way to tell them about my book, which is becoming a useful tool in helping people understand various "touchy" topics that they often don't like to talk about.

Take grooming, for instance, and I don't mean the kind you (hopefully) do each and every day in front of the mirror. By the time I finished speaking at the annual Association of Batterers Intervention Programs (ABIP) that Friday, March 1, the headlines were full of stories about this topic. (In fact, some people in the audience said my speech caused them to look differently at the story when they read it that day.) That's because a 41-year-old Modesto, Calif., teacher had quit his job, left his family and moved in with his former student, who is now 18. (Ironically, my last speaking engagement occurred just an hour or so west of Modesto.)

Upon hearing this, I modified my plan, so I could focus on every school district I could possibly reach between LA and San Fran. Given that recent case, as well as others like it in many other California schools, they obviously needed my book, right? (California is not alone; sadly, this kind of thing goes on all around us.) So that's what I did, and the response was very gratifying. Sometimes I didn't get to talk to anyone in the curriculum department, as I wanted, but most of the time, I did. In every instance, everyone was either enthusiastic about being able to read something about a topic they believe is important—such as preventing child abuse—or they were distressed at the fact that teachers aren't able to teach about this problem in the schools.

As an example, how many students have been taught that it's natural to have feelings of affection for an authority figure, such as a teacher? How many parents tell their teens before they reach this point that it probably will happen, and then give them the sage advice needed, to not act on it? Equally important, how many classes have you been to where students learned that a teacher "coming on to them," doing such things as texting them several hours a night, is inappropriate? Where there is actually discussion about what such behavior means, when the teen is quite young and the adult much older? Or what this imbalance of power represents and how it will have lasting repercussions on the teen's life?

Since many of the administrators I spoke to said quite candidly they are now actively trying to change this, they were most appreciative to receive a copy of Sister of Silence, which breaks down this problem piece by piece while telling my story. It also provides thought-provoking questions in the back for use in a group setting, that are designed to help readers reason on why these things happen and how we can respond differently.

And the response in Modesto was wonderful! The women there I spoke with were so happy to get my book that I left two copies for them. (And wished I had had more time to stay and chat, since they were quite nice.) But I had more books to pass out, more people to see, more places to go.

A Blogging I Will Go, A Blogging I Will Go

Along the way, I also managed to get a piece published in The Huffington Post, thanks to Arianna Huffington herself. (I sent her an email and she said they would "love to have your voice on our site.") So now I'm blogging for the online publication—when I can find the time, between handing out books and working on other related ventures, one of which involves starting a non-profit to help educate parents and children about these essential topics.

Coming Soon To a YouTube Near You!

Yes, the "Sister of Silence: Silent No More!" video is going to happen. In spite of not meeting our $5,000 goal, as we hoped to do using Peerbackers, we only raised $415 toward the book trailer—all of which went to the actors and videographer. (If you donated or contributed in some other way, thank you very much!) Because everyone involved so generously gave of their time and talent, though, without worrying about what they might get in return, we can still make it available for you.

The month of April focuses on such problems as sexual assault, domestic violence and child abuse, and advocates give them even more attention than usual. So April 1 seemed like the best time to unveil the video. But because the video length has almost doubled, going from its original three minutes to almost six, we're most likely going to miss that deadline. (Good thing I'm in charge, huh? Kind of hard to fire yourself—especially when you're working for free.)

But rest assured, the video will be live within a few more days. Thank you so much for your patience! Now please pass the popcorn.

Editor's note: As of March 29, the video is nearly finished. It will be uploaded and can be viewed on the "Vintage Berry Wine" channel on YouTube Sunday, April 1.

Daleen Berry has expertise in overcoming abuse through awareness, empowerment and goal attainment, and can be pretty funny when she wants. She's an award-winning author, editor and journalist who speaks at conferences around the country. Berry was one of two keynote speakers addressing a national audience at “The Many Faces of Domestic Violence,” the 18th Annual Conference of the Association of Batterers’ Intervention Programs on March 1, 2012, in Anaheim, Calif. She recently spoke to social workers from all over the country at the “Hope for the Future: Ending Domestic Violence in Families” conference at the University of California, Berkeley.

Her memoir (paperback and as an e-book) can be found at bookstores everywhere, or ordered online. To read the first chapter free, please go to Goodreads. To see why Foreword Reviews gave it five stars, click here. If you want to read 30 other five-star reviews, check out this title on Amazon. To see a mock up of the SOS t-shirt, check out Berry's Facebook page.

In two days, I'll be speaking at Las Positas College in Livermore, Calif. My presentation ties into the current news headlines about a story in the rural area of Modesto: that's where former Enochs High School teacher James Hooker is being investigated for moving in with one of his students, Jordan Powers, who is just 18. (And who has not graduated yet, I might add, which is significant.)

Someone said recently that since they're both adults, society should just leave them alone and let them have their chance at happiness. I'm not sure about anyone else, but I was hardly an adult at 18—even though I had given birth to one child and was pregnant for a second. I sure thought I was but by the time I turned 28, and in hindsight, I saw how really immature I had been then.

And yet, I made the very same decision as Powers, for the very same reason: I thought I loved him, and I thought I was an adult with the maturity needed to make that decision. I was wrong. Is Powers? Well, if she's been under the influence of this 41-year-old man for the last few years, yes, she is. That's a differential in power in the relationship, and it's based more on wanting and needing affection from an adult male role model, a teacher who wields an incredible amount of power over his students.

It's happening all over this country and elsewhere, and it's not the same type of relationship that occurs in two consenting adults who are truly mature individuals—and who have not had an imbalance of power where grooming occurred that led the younger of the two to come to believe that the dynamic is love, and not something much darker.

I'm in California because I just spoke about this topic at a conference. And next week, I'll speak at Las Positas. In between, I'm dropping off copies of my memoir at schools all over California. I'm told they're beginning to look at this problem in a new light, to see what they can do differently to help students with this very real, very insidious problem. I'm hopeful my book will become one of the tools they use to do that. If it's good enough for students at Johns Hopkins University, it should be good enough for high school educators here in the Golden State.

Editor's note: Daleen Berry has expertise in overcoming abuse through awareness, empowerment and goal attainment, and is an award-winning author, editor and journalist who speaks at conferences around the country. Berry will one of two keynote speakers addressing a national audience at “The Many Faces of Domestic Violence,” the 18th Annual Conference of the Association of Batterers’ Intervention Programs on March 1, 2012, in Anaheim, Calif. She recently spoke to social workers from all over the country at the “Hope for the Future: Ending Domestic Violence in Families” conference at the University of California, Berkeley.

Her memoir (paperback and as an e-book) can be found at bookstores everywhere, or ordered online. To read the first chapter free, please go to Goodreads. To read 30 five-star reviews, check out this title on Amazon. To see a mock up of the SOS t-shirt, check out Berry's Facebook page.

I loved The Artist, and am happy it won Best Picture (and just about everything else) at the Oscars last night. I’ve wanted to write about the movie since I saw it during a matinee last week. I’m not a movie critic, nor do I write about movies, but it was just that good.

But after I began thinking about the movie’s five wins, I found myself wondering if it was just another case of a bunch of white men in suits (and with a lot more money) winning out over a group of less well-financed women, for the only category my other favorite movie—The Help—won, was Best Supporting Actress. (Octavia Spencer played the courageous Minnie Jackson, and if she hadn’t won, I’m sure I wouldn’t be the only person crying foul.)

That part about the money and men in suits was my second thought, and it could be true. I haven’t researched it to find out.

But this morning, I decided what it comes down to is this: While they're both about the underdog overcoming, the two movies really shouldn’t have been made to compete against each other. For they were totally different genres. How can a modern day story (Yes, it was set in the 1960’s South, but the racial discrimination and social inequality issues remain.) possibly compete against a 1920’s world that knew no sound? We have sound today, so it’s hard to imagine what it was like then, unless we sit down to watch an old Charlie Chaplin or Buster Keaton film on Netflix.

I loved both movies, but in very different ways, for starkly different reasons.

When I first saw The Help, it was in a theatre full of both black and white women, who cheered when it ended. (And it made me feel that if these same women read my book, they would cheer for it, too.) So we movie-goers obviously shared a bond: we root for strong women who overcome the odds, and will suffer—if necessary—to do so. The lines going in were long, and more than one woman coming out afterward saw someone she knew waiting in line, and said she would go right back in and see it again, if she could. There probably wasn’t a dry eye in the house, including mine.

The Artist was by its very nature, well, artistic. French actor Jean Dujardin didn’t utter a single word throughout—until the very end—yet I heard every word he didn’t speak, loud and clear. And that’s a feat few actors today can pull off. That’s because they rely instead on obvious good looks, nudity and sex, profanity and violence, or rapid-fire action that makes one’s head spin just watching it.

Whereas in The Artist, the facial expressions and gestures alone tell you exactly what the characters are thinking, feeling and trying to tell you, that their silent words can’t or don’t. And the story line was pretty incredible, too. That there was no sex and no adultery (since George Valentin, Dujardin's character, was married when the young starlet Peppy Miller—played by French actor Bérénice Béjo—fell for him) is almost unheard of, for a film of today. (Speaking of gestures that speak louder than words, the scene where Miller puts her arm into Valentin's suit jacket is wonderfully done.)

Further, the ending of The Artist has something especially appealing to me: the heroine saves the hero! That in and of itself is quite profound, in today’s world of movies where the guy saves the damsel, and usually everyone else.

Finally, even though I knew Minnie and her friends were on their way to carving out a well-deserved place in this world, my heart sank at knowing how long and hard their continued battle would be.

Not so with The Artist, which simply left me feeling happy that I'd been taken away from the struggles that still comprise daily life for so many of us.

Bravo!

Editor's note: Daleen Berry is a national expert in overcoming abuse through awareness, empowerment and goal attainment, as well as an award-winning author and an accomplished journalist who speaks at conferences around the country. Berry will one of two keynote speakers addressing a national audience at “The Many Faces of Domestic Violence,” the 18th Annual Conference of the Association of Batterers’ Intervention Programs on March 1, 2012, in Anaheim, Calif. She recently spoke to social workers from all over the country at the “Hope for the Future: Ending Domestic Violence in Families” conference at the University of California, Berkeley.

Her memoir (paperback and as an e-book) can be found at bookstores everywhere, or ordered online. To read the first chapter free, please go to Goodreads. To read 30 five-star reviews, check out this title on Amazon. To see a mock up of the SOS t-shirt, check out Berry's Facebook page.

I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be here if only a man had been involved in my conception. On the contrary, there would have been no conception.

So why is it that women are being pushed back into the kitchen, when it comes to making decisions on matters that involve: 1) basic biology, 2) their own health and well-being, 3) their future and 4) the future of their children?

If you've read my memoir, you know why this particular headline "'Where are the women?' Outrage after birth control hearing is led by panel of five MEN" has me more than a little concerned. As I wrote in Sister of Silence, having been forced to give up my procreative powers was something that tore me up inside. It's something that has always haunted me. And yet I had no choice, as I told the doctor who informed me he would never perform a tubal ligation on anyone as young as me—just 21—if not for the circumstances that forced me to beg him to do so, back in 1985:

I shook my head, forcing myself to find the right words. “You don’t understand. I have no choice. My husband refuses to accept responsibility for birth control, and he won’t let me use any, either. You’re right, four kids in five years is a lot—especially for someone my age, and if there had been anything at all I could have done to prevent that, I would have. That’s why I’m here now—because if I get pregnant again, I’ll lose my sanity!” I expelled everything in one long breath.

I was tired of protecting Eddie, of keeping “our secret,” of taking the blame for being pregnant so many times. I had to be honest. Hating that I had to give up my right to ever have children again gave me the courage I needed. It was plain and simple. Black and white.

It feels like I just traveled back 27 years, because that's how long it's been since I wasn't permitted to use birth control during my marriage. That decision dramatically affected the rest of my life, for the good and the bad.

Now imagine being me: you're 21, with four children under the age of five. You know the only sure way you can keep from going crazy is to make a conscious choice to undergo a surgery that leaves you questioning your own moral values—but it will prevent you from ever having another child. That's no choice at all.

Then flash forward to age 30, when you meet a man you'd love to have children with—only it isn't possible. And imagine the years in between, when you wonder how your life would have turned out, if you'd been able to exercise the rights that you were denied.

Here's the thing about this debate: it's ridiculous that women are being pushed to the side of a conversation that has to do everything with them, and with their bodies. That's about as antiquated as the notion that the earth is flat. It's especially ludicrous when you stop and think about how many women make the decision about what kind of birth control to use, and then take steps to obtain it. For my married friends who use birth control, it's almost always a method that relies on her—the pill, a diaphragm, or another device that and requires her involvement. Rarely, it seems, is the contraception of choice a condom—because most men don't like them.

So to hold a hearing and refuse to allow women to speak about a serious life choice that affects their minds and bodies, as well as their future and that of their offspring, harkens back to the dark ages. Or to 1981, when my husband refused to let me use the diaphragm I got to keep from getting pregnant.

Turns out, there's a lot of this kind of thing going on: a 2011 The New York Times article cited what experts now call "reproductive coercion," which involve men who deliberately sabotage their partner's birth control efforts, trying to get a woman, or keep her, pregnant. These women—of which I was one—have had absolutely no say whatsoever in that decision.

Is it going to continue to be this way for the foreseeable future? When will men who have the power to make decisions realize women have a right to be heard, to speak up about their own wants and needs? Or that society will be stronger for it?

I can't imagine—and don't want to believe—that in 2012 there are more men out there like my ex, men who truly expect women to just smooth out their aprons and keep their pretty little faces hidden in the kitchen, while they decide what happens to our bodies when we aren't allowed to use contraception.

While the powers that be are making this matter a political football, it's really much more simple than that. Allowing women to have a say over their own bodies and what happens to them—when, how or if they conceive—boils down to Basic Human Rights 101.

Nothing more, and nothing less.

Editor's note: Daleen Berry is a national expert in overcoming abuse through awareness, empowerment and goal attainment, as well as an award-winning author and an accomplished journalist who speaks at conferences around the country. Berry will one of two keynote speakers addressing a national audience at “The Many Faces of Domestic Violence,” the 18th Annual Conference of the Association of Batterers’ Intervention Programs on March 1, 2012, in Anaheim, Calif. She recently spoke to social workers from all over the country at the “Hope for the Future: Ending Domestic Violence in Families” conference at the University of California, Berkeley.

Her memoir (paperback and as an e-book) can be found at bookstores everywhere, or ordered online. To read the first chapter free, please go to Goodreads. To read 30 five-star reviews, check out this title on Amazon. To see a mock up of the SOS t-shirt, check out Berry's Facebook page.

Our $5,000 project request has received four-percent of its backing, and we’re at the halfway mark: tomorrow will leave us just 15 days to fund the Sister of Silence book video. It may seem an overly ambitious goal, but I think it’s entirely possible we will reach it by the March first deadline. Which probably sounds crazy to you—so why do I say that?

Well, the start has been slow, thanks in large part to my unexpected illness. But hopefully I’m on the mend now, and the monetary pendulum will begin swinging faster and higher. Had I not been ill at the outset of this project, I would have introduced our group and given you a better look into what we’re doing.

We're a small group of five, including two students at opposite ends of West Virginia who attend rival universities. There’s West Virginia University Senior Sarah Lemanski, a budding-but-brilliant actor; Marshall University Sophomore Nick Adkins, a computer genius; Max Gould, a Morgantown High School senior on his way to a serial killer career in theatre, Zachary Martin, an adorable baby boy with no previous acting experience who outshines us all, and me, a new author with 20 years of journalism experience.

Lemanski and Gould gave up holiday time with family because they believe in this project, and Adkins has already spent more than 40 hours editing it. Your money goes to pay the actors and videographer a fair wage, and will hopefully offset production costs. (I won’t receive a wage, as my involvement is totally voluntary.)

A sidebar about the actual costs for such a product: If Amazon produced this video, it would cost at least $10,000 and would only use still photographs—not live actors, like this project does. This estimate is realistically based on the following: CreateSpace (Amazon’s self-publishing arm) charges $2,199 for a 60-second video that only uses still shots. Our video will be 180-seconds and features live actors who perform! That’s why we call it a book video, rather than a book slideshow.

Your donation for this project comes with a free SOS e-book, SOS t-shirt (the book cover on front, the words “Silent No More” on the back) and/or your name in the end credits. Thank you for helping us make this a reality—and in helping save other children from becoming victims like those at Penn State and elsewhere!!!

Here’s the top 10 reasons you should want to help us fund this project:

1) To help save other women like Whitney Houston;

2) Because some women apparently just don’t get it (like those who tweeted it's okay if Chris Brown punched them like he did Rihanna;

3) You’ve been assaulted or abused (or know someone who has);

4) You realize it wasn’t the Grammys that got a black eye: it was Rihanna;

5) You were or are a pregnant teen or are now a single parent;

6) Your money will go not just to help fund a great cause, but great art—and student art, at that;

7) Giving always feels better than receiving. But by giving, you also get something: a free ebook, t-shirt and/or your name on the end credits, making this a win-win;

8) I won't be featured at all in the video at all—for which you can breathe a sigh of relief—since the fundraising pitch shows my acting days are long behind me;

9) Any money I had put aside for this project is now paying for my considerable medical bills, since I’ve been uninsured since 2008, and;

10) You’ve received one of the hundreds of free copies of SOS I’ve given away (including shipping and handling), which has a $30 value.

And besides, if Stanford, Harvard and Yale folks have so much to give to their students, surely you can spare $10 for our little video project. Right?

Just a few words about Rihanna, Houston and cash cow/woman beater Brown. Houston had the greatest voice—and it frustrates me beyond belief that so many unbelievably gifted women like her continue to abuse themselves, along after their abuser stops. This video project seeks to teach them how to stop doing that.

Second, people are fed up with the status quo when it comes to violence against women. Our video project doesn’t seek to sweep anything under the rug, as Yashar accused Brown of doing: “In fact, he has done what millions of men and women do every day in our country, he has demanded to have the issue of domestic violence swept under the rug . . . That is why he doesn’t deserve our attention or business.”

In this piece, blogger Yashar offers a powerful argument against our ongoing support of such violence, and a compelling reason for you to donate toward this video project.

As an author and an advocate, I’ve committed myself to helping other victims through my written works—even speaking for free at conferences and colleges—around the country. My work as a police reporter has given me a clear understanding of how widespread sexual abuse really is.

For instance, did you know that one in three women will be a victim of serious violence during their lifetime?

I also understand how the associated stigma often prevents most victims from seeking help, and how current laws do not adequately protect victims from perpetrators. Writing helped pave the way for my own recovery, since my greatest therapy came as I reflected on dozens of diaries while writing my memoir.

Sister of Silence has been endorsed by national experts at Johns Hopkins University, the FBI, the University of Berkeley, and by many other authors. It’s being used in colleges and at least one high school, and by a California therapist.

Health care professionals say this groundbreaking work should be in every classroom and therapy office in the country—but because this award-winning book does not have the backing of a major publishing house, we need your help to make that happen. Producing this video as a form of mass media is the quickest way to do that.

So thank you for helping us make this a reality—and in helping save other children from becoming victims like those at Penn State and elsewhere. Please share this link, and you can also select your thank-you gift while you're there.

And after you donate (or even if you can’t donate) can you please share this on your page, and/or in an email with your friends? For whatever you can or are willing to do, thank you!

Editor's note: Daleen Berry is a national expert in the area of child sex abuse and interpersonal violence, as well as an award-winning author and an accomplished journalist who speaks about these important social topics at conferences around the country. Berry will one of two keynote speakers addressing a national audience at “The Many Faces of Domestic Violence,” the 18th Annual Conference of the Association of Batterers’ Intervention Programs on March 1, 2012, in Anaheim, Calif. She recently spoke to social workers from all over the country at the “Hope for the Future: Ending Domestic Violence in Families” conference at the University of California, Berkeley.

Her memoir (paperback and as an e-book) can be found at bookstores everywhere, or ordered online. To read the first chapter free, please go to Goodreads. To read 30 five-star reviews, check out this title on Amazon. To see a mock up of the SOS t-shirt, check out Berry's Facebook page.

If I had a dollar for every woman I've met who never healed from the abuse heaped upon her at the hands of a man, I daresay I'd be pretty wealthy by now. As the hour draws near for tonight's Grammy Awards, I keep asking myself: was Whitney Houston one of those women? Did she never heal from her abusive marriage?

I don't know, but it rather looks that way. Given what authorities are saying could have been a fatal combination of Xanax and alcohol for the six-time Grammy winner, it's highly possible Whitney never could quite overcome the damage she sustained as an abused wife.

I know what that feels like, to want to hide behind the pain of abuse with a bottle in your hand. This is how I described it in my memoir: "It was at night, when he came to me, that I needed the alcohol to drown out what happened whenever he touched me."

Fortunately, helped by divine faith that allowed me to wield an incredible amount of self-discipline, I stopped drinking before I ruined my body, drowned my spirit, or killed myself.

My sister, however, was not so fortunate. She remains a drug user and an alcoholic today, long after the abuse she suffered at the hands of a man. She is, so far as my family knows, living on the street, seeking handouts from anyone who will give her one.

Whitney Houston's death has made me angry: angry at the Chris and Bobby Browns who think women are punching bags; angry at a society that allows these Browns and other men to get away with it, and angry at the women who fail to help themselves.

In this day and age, there is so very much help out there—family violence centers, battered women shelters, and excellent resources that literally walk you through the process of escaping a violent environment—that there is no reason for women not to try to help themselves.

Beyond that there is therapy (even free, or income-based therapy) that can help you to begin the hard work of pulling yourself up from the lowest place of negativity, oppression and shattered self-esteem. There are support groups in the real world and the online one, filled with women who have done it—who have escaped their past lives, and gone on to build bigger and better ones for themselves and their offspring.

Many people believe addicts should simply get their act together. Until you've lived with one or been one yourself, it's hard to understand that it simply isn't that easy. People who battle addiction—be it drugs, alcohol, food, sex or work—are running away from the incredible pain they've become mired in. They don't want to face whatever it is that's hurting them, so they block it out by making themselves so numb they feel nothing at all.

Many other women, years after the actual physical, emotional or sexual abuse has stopped, engage in equally damaging behaviors: cutting themselves, becoming anorexic or bulimic, or living lives that teeter on the edge of disaster in other ways.

I'm not a psychologist, although I've seen plenty of them, so I don't know what the single biggest factor is that separates women like me from women like my sister or, possibly, Whitney. Why did I make it out and why am I still alive, fighting and thriving and trying to make a difference? In the case of me and my sister, I seriously doubt it has to do with genetics.

What I think might be a major component to this difference is the ability to tell yourself that you have value, and believe it—long after an abuser has beaten you down and convinced you that you are absolutely worthless. I put it like this in the workbook I developed to help teach women how to regain their self-esteem:

"I believe each and every one of us was born with an intrinsic feeling of being valuable. Even if our parents mistreated, ignored or molested us (or allowed someone else to do so), that abuse and neglect could not wipe out what each one of us received from our Creator.

That old poster, with the little boy saying, 'I know I’m valuable, ‘cause God don’t create no junk,' is really true.

Before our birth, each of us was instilled with something much more powerful, much more concrete and long-lasting than anything that harmed us after we were born. It’s true that this gift sometimes gets lost or misplaced—but it’s always there, waiting like the water in a well, to be drawn up and used to quench our incredible thirst.

It’s a resource that may be buried under so much garbage, though, that you have to really dig to find it. But it is there. I know it is. I found it, and you can, too!"

For every Whitney, there are 1,000 other women who also can't see their own true value. That's why it's up to us to remind them—at every opportunity—how valuable they are. In the meantime, we as women have to realize that it isn't the words of a man, or the bruises from his fists, that define us: it is we ourselves.

It is the little girl we once were, when we made up stories or wrote poems, tossed a basketball through a hoop or beat a teammate to the finish line, won a coveted role in a community play or were chosen to represent our school at a state championship.

That child is still in there, buried deep within you, waiting for you to find her again. If you can put down the bottle or the pills long enough, I know you can do it. She deserves to be nurtured and cherished, because she has value. And no matter what your age today, so do you.

My sister might not yet believe that. And Whitney might not have, either. But Whitney did know it, at least on some level, when she said that "learning to love yourself, it is the greatest love of all."

Editor's note: Daleen Berry is a national expert in the area of child sex abuse and interpersonal violence, as well as an award-winning author and an accomplished journalist who speaks about these important social topics at conferences around the country. Berry will one of two keynote speakers addressing a national audience at “The Many Faces of Domestic Violence,” the 18th Annual Conference of the Association of Batterers’ Intervention Programs on March 1, 2012, in Anaheim, Calif. She recently spoke to social workers from all over the country at the “Hope for the Future: Ending Domestic Violence in Families” conference at the University of California, Berkeley.

Her memoir (paperback and as an e-book) can be found at bookstores everywhere, or ordered online. To read a free preview, please go to Amazon.

I've been seen in an emergency room twice since I left for my last book signing Saturday morning. The first time was when I coughed so hard I felt like I was going to pass out from lack of oxygen. I was four hours from home, driving solo, so the ER was my only option.

The second time was about the same, yesterday. My primary care physician didn't get back to me soon enough after I contacted her Monday, with the nebulizer and albuterol the first ER doc told me to get pronto, for asthma, once I returned home. And the pulmonary doc I'm scheduled to see on Feb. 23 couldn't get me in yesterday when I was so breathless my chest felt like it was in a vise, so I had no recourse but to go to the ER. Fun, fun, especially when one is without medical insurance. Can't wait to get the bills!

Anyway, until my health is stabilized, I've no choice but to postpone my southern book tour. Driving from here to Florida by myself doesn't really seem like the course of wisdom. But on the upside, since I'm limited in what I can do, I should be able to catch up on a lot of writing. That means I can get Lethal Silence out to you even sooner, I hope!

In the meantime, I can't count the number of SOS readers who have said: 1) "I could not put your book down!" or, 2) "This is going to make a great Lifetime movie!" or 3) "I can just see this book on Oprah!" (Bob Edwards wasn't the first to say that about my book after his March 8, 2011 show aired, but he was probably the biggest name to say it. Did I tell you how much I love Bob?!)

Given that, I cannot stress how much you can do to help make that happen. It's very easy—please click on this link and help us pay the fabulous actors and the videographer who have helped us bring YOU, the reader, the SOS book trailer. This book trailer is the first step in this process. We have 22 days left so please donate today, and give these talented, hard-working youths some compensation for their efforts, which will help them continue on their chosen career path.

If you can help us, even just a little, we have some great gifts to give you—including a FREE copy of my ebook, a SOS t-shirt and even having your name added to the video credits! Check them out here.

Oh yes, and about Saturday's book signing at Empire Books in Huntington. I sold one book—to the lovely store clerk who booked me there in the first place. I made less than $12, for a 8-hour round-trip drive that cost me four times that much. In today's tight economy, authors need to find ways to cut their costs. In so doing, they have to decide what is worth their time—and how much their time is worth. Authors know that book signings don't bring many sales, unless your name is Jodi Picoult or John Grisham, but it does give you great exposure.

In fact, for every person who passed the table where I was sitting without a second glance, 10 others looked back at the table, at my books, for more than a few seconds—and I have no doubt that they were memorizing the title, Sister of Silence, so they could go home and look it up online. (Probably because they didn't want to pay the $18.99 retail price at the bookstore, and hoped they could find it at Amazon, or Barnes and Noble or iTunes for much less—which they can!)

In the meantime, I read from Sister of Silence and had three teeny-boppers listening in rapt attention. They wanted my book, but didn't have the money, and since they were just 13 or 14, I suggested they ask their parents for permission before reading it, anyway. But they were a wealth of information: they gave me the names of book bloggers who review books, and that's something I've done virtually nothing with! (Because I've been too busy chasing traditional book review avenues.) So yes, I lost money by going to this particular book signing event—but in the long run, maybe I'll be able to offset that loss.

Plus, and this is more important: I connected with other people, albeit young people, who often feel frustrated because they don't have many (or any) adults who take the time to listen to them. And that, dear readers, was very rewarding. Even though, when we were done talking, I could barely breathe.

A final word to the wise: Empire Books only allows you to sell your books the day of your signing, and they don't tell customers this in advance. So if you are interested in selling books, this may or may not be the place for you. If you're interested in exposure, well you'll probably accomplish that, so long as you realize it's money out of your pocket to get it.

Many of my readers have written to wish me well, and I want to thank you for your kind wishes! Please keep them coming, since there's nothing as beneficial when it comes to health care as knowing other people care enough to let you know it.

I'm off to take a breathing treatment now, and then a nap—for coughing so much just takes the punch right out of you. I'll be back later, with more information. About books, writing and just staying alive!

Editor's note: If you're looking for a book you can't put down, one that's averaging between 4.4 and 5 stars on Goodreads, Amazon and Barnes and Noble, and which could just double as a self-help handbook, this book may be it. If so, please go to Amazon and read the Sister of Silence foreword, which will help you understand the current Penn State tragedy and any other number of major news headlines around the country. Written by renowned (and now retired) FBI special agent Ken Lanning, it's well worth your time.