Hello G.R.O.W. family! Meet Kayla, today’s #SurvivorSunday feature. As tough as she is beautiful, Kayla shares with us a story of young love gone wrong and finding the courage to fight for herself and for the person who needed her most.

Kayla’s Story:

Hello, my name is Kayla and I am a 29 year old survivor of domestic violence.

My story starts when I was just 17 years old. I met this guy and I thought I was in love. He was funny and also a bad boy. I don’t know what attracts girls to bad boys but it happened to me. Only a few months later I found out I was pregnant with his child. I thought life was perfect at that moment, even though I was young and scared to have a baby. When I graduated from high school, I moved in with him. Within a week his true colors came out. He began wanting sex and even when I didn’t want to he would force himself on me and hold me down. If I did anything without telling him, he would scream at me or hit me. I kept telling myself that it was going to be okay and if I did everything better that he would quit. It began to escalate and he would tell me I was a whore and that he didn’t think the baby was his. One night he got so mad at me for talking to a friend that he started beating me. I had to cover my stomach so that he couldn’t hurt our child. We had good weeks and he always said he was sorry.

When our child was born, I had complications and was told to choose one person to come to the operating room for my c-section. I wanted so bad to have my mom there but he just looked at me and put fear in my eyes. I had moment after that when I wanted to give my son my last name, but he would have beat me if he knew. Things were fine for a little while and I generally never left our son with him even though he hated that. One day, I asked him to help me with our son and he got mad at me because he wanted to relax. So I got a little upset and told him that he needed to help if he wanted dinner. He came after me and threw me to the ground. He had me on the ground after that and took a knuckle to my sternum and just kept pounding it (this happened quite often). I tried to get away so he grabbed my hair and slammed my head to the ground. Once he let me go, I grabbed our son and went to his room. He followed and threw me down again. I was so scared for our son’s life at that moment that I froze. He finally walked away. I even had a time when I had my friend move in. I guess in hopes that it would stop him but it never helped. He even grabbed her and threw her against the wall when she tried to save me.

The final straw for me though was when I was driving him to work and he decided he didn’t want to go. I told him we needed the money and he got mad and began yelling at me. I turned the car around and started to take him to his parent’s house because that’s where we lived at the time. As I went to turn into the driveway (which attached to a highway) he grabbed the wheel and turned me towards traffic. Our 11 month old son was on my side and a car nearly hit us. I yelled at him and he punched me in the face. This was the first time that he ever left a visible mark, he always knew to hit me where no one would see it before. I vowed that day that my son and I could live without him. I quit worrying that he said I would never find anyone to love me because I have a kid and I quit letting him bully me.

I now am happily married 9 years to an amazing man. I have no contact with my ex. He still tries to harass me when I go home and his family does too. He has no rights to our son. It took 2 years for me to get away but every day I am thankful to be a survivor. It has been 10 ½ years now since I left.