5 Years Free

Yesterday marked 1,825 days. 60 months. 5 years.

Five years of freedom from domestic violence. I call this day my “freedom day” and honestly, it hit me differently this year. There is something strange about putting a number to it. Five years sounds big. 1,825 days somehow feels even bigger, because I lived every single one of those days.

Some of those days were filled with peace and joy. Some with laughter. Some with heartache. Some held huge strides of restoration, and others held incredibly hard healing moments. Freedom didn't make every day easy, but it made every day a gift that was mine, and through every single one of them, there has been God who has never left me and has taught me so much along the way.

Five Years Ago

Five years ago, I couldn't have fully understood what freedom would look like. I remember being terrified of the future, unsure how I would make it as a single momma, broken and feeling so unworthy. I think sometimes we imagine leaving abuse as this finish line. You leave abuse, you flee and then rainbows, sunshines and smooth sailing.

I learned pretty quickly that leaving was only the beginning. The battles that come along with leaving and starting over are treacherous and daunting. I remember asking myself, “Will I survive this next part?”.

After leaving abuse, there are so many different aspects of life that must be rebuilt and restructured.

Safety.

Trust.

Identity.

Motherhood.

Peace.

The ability to trust myself enough to believe my own thoughts again.

The ability to make decisions without fear of “getting in trouble”.

The understanding that I didn't have to live constantly waiting for what might happen next or when the next blow up would be.

There have been beautiful moments of restoration over these five years. There have also been moments when healing hurt— really bad. Times when I felt like I was drowning with no life boat in sight. There have been days when I felt like I had come so far and days when I realized there were still places inside of me that needed healing.

That's the part of freedom we don't always talk about.

You can be free and still be healing.

You can be grateful and still grieve.

You can know you're safe yet still feel unsafe.

You can praise God for where you are while still carrying scars from where you've been.

So many feelings and emotions can exist together. And the answer to the question that I had asked myself was answered daily by God who said, “My daughter, I pulled you from the bondage you were in and gave you new life. I have been with you as you survived the hardest battle and I promise I will remain with you as you walk through this next season of life”.

1,825 days. So many lessons.

He Makes Me Lie Down in Green Pastures

Psalm 23 has been a source of comfort for me for all five years since I was rescued from abuse.

"He makes me lie down in green pastures, He leads me beside still waters, He restores my soul."

Those promises mean something different when you have been so far from peace for so long. Still waters mean something different when you've spent years bracing for the next storm.

Peace means something different when you lived in fear in your own home. Watching my children experience a house of peace has been one of the greatest gifts of these five years.

Our home isn't perfect. Our lives aren't perfect. Healing definitely hasn’t been perfect. BUT GOD has provided peace here. There is laughter here. There is safety here. There is room to breathe here.

There are green pastures and still waters here.

Five years ago, I couldn't see them yet BUT GOD could. He was preparing them all along.

Through the Valley

Psalm 23 doesn't say there won't be a valley. That's important to me. We were never promised lives without suffering. We were promised a God—a Father and a Friend—who walks alongside us through it.

"Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for You are with me. Your rod and your staff, they comfort me."

I have walked through valleys during these five years, deep valleys that seemed so far from the mountaintops I longed to reach. Freedom didn't suddenly erase everything that happened. It highlighted it and made me more aware so that changes could be made to lead a life worth living, a life free from the bondage of abuse.

There were so many leftovers from abuse that followed us out the door. There were wounds that took longer to understand than I expected. There were hard days, painful memories, flashbacks, nightmares, fear, grief, anger, questions and moments when healing felt exhausting.

But I wasn't walking through them alone. When I look back now, I don't just see what I survived.

I see Who walked with me.

I see a God who pulled me from bondage.

A God who gave my children a house of peace.

A God who stayed close through the painful parts of healing.

A God who kept His promises and continues to do so.

A God who gave us hope for a future when I couldn't see very far beyond the day in front of me.

The Woman Five Years Later

I've been thinking a lot about the woman I have become. Five years ago, she didn't know me yet.

She didn't know how many difficult things she would do.

She didn't know how many times she would have to choose courage while still feeling afraid.

She didn't know how much she would heal.

She didn't know how fiercely she would learn to protect peace.

She didn't know that one day her story would allow her to sit beside other survivors in some of the hardest moments of their lives and say:

There is life after this.

Not because someone told her so, but because she lived it. I wish I could go back and let that woman see just a glimpse of today. She probably wouldn’t believe it. Not because everything turned out perfectly. It absolutely didn't…but because I think she needed to know that one day she would breathe differently.

Her children would know peace.

Her voice would come back.

She would laugh again.

She would dream again.

She would build again.

And one day, she would look at the calendar and realize:

It has been five years.

1,825 Days

Yesterday wasn't just an anniversary of the day abuse ended. It was an anniversary of everything that began again.

1,825 mornings of waking up free and unharmed.

1,825 days of becoming.

60 months of learning what peace feels like and striving for it.

60 months of seeing my children grow and thrive.

Five years of watching God take us by the hands and lead us toward still waters.

There has been joy.

There has been sadness.

There has been laughter.

There has been heartache.

There have been incredible strides of restoration.

And there have been really hard healing moments.

But through all of it, there has been freedom.

And through all of it, there has been God.

So today, just like I did yesterday, I will say:

Thank you, God, for 1,825 days, 60 months, 5 years.

If you are reading this and are experiencing domestic violence, I hope you know this: You do not deserve the abuse you are enduring. You are worth so much more than what your abuser tells you that you are. You are a gem and deserve a life of peace and hope. It’s possible and we want to help you every step of the way. Call our hotline- 888-341-9568. You will get my best friend who gets it and walked alongside me out of the dark pit and into the light again. You are not alone.

Signed: Breann Griffin, Co-Founder and Co-Executive Director of The Hiding Place

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