Abuse and Worthy Causes

Today I will be joining several of my friends to raise money for an organization called, Southwest Women Working Together. Barbara Keaton, of Cupid and Nights over Egypt coming out in Dec from Genesis Press is on the board. She asked me to....I'll have to take that back. She told me that I was going to be there as well as Lisa G, Riley of At last and her newest, part of an erotica anthology, Wicked Delights, Deatri King-Bey of Caught Up and, her newest, Beauty and the Beast coming out from Parker in Dec, that we were all to come to this event and being the good little friends that we are we said sure.

I almost forgot. She strong armed Nikki Woods of Easier Said than done into being the M.C. Then she got Angie Daniels and Earl Seawell to be our guest. She managed to get great prizes one including a dinner with Earl for whoever brings in the most guests.

Okay, I know you're wondering where the heck I'm going with all of the above but you know how friends are mention one's name and not the other and well....things can get pretty ugly. LOL. OOPS. Sorry. Kelle Z. Riley author of Dangerous Affairs is also a participant.

Anyway back to what the reason was for me writing this. Barb gave all of us jobs to do and kept adding to them I might add. The latest thing was to go to the dollar store and buy ten red bags. She had earlier asked us to post all of the information on all of our sites which I will admit here in public that I didn't do. I try to walk the line between spamming people and telling them things that they might not want to hear so I only posted it one place.

Well yesterday I was in the dollar store and besides the red bags I found tons of things that I will use later when I'm making up gift bags for my readers. So the cashier finally asks me when she's ringing up the bag what they were for so I told her about the event today.

She proceeded to tell me with a full line of customers behind me that she was a survivor of spousal abuse, that her throat had been slashed, both legs broken, ear drum shattered and numerous other things. Then she told me that her fourteen year old daughter was being abused by her fifteen year old boyfriend and that her daughter ended up in the hospital because she had begun cutting into her flesh. The boy was telling this child where she could go, whom she could see, and what time she had to be home. I was in stunned disbelief even as I stood there looking on the woman's battle scars.

It was then that I knew that spamming or not this subject is important enough that I said it. If anyone out there needs helps getting away from an abusive partner and that include men who are abused by women please contact me if you can't find any of the many places that offer help on your own. For the people living in the Chicago area I will post the information on my website.

If you're an abuser please get help, if you're a victim of abuse, you're not alone there are people willing to show you a safe way out of your situation. Please call someone. No one knows you have a need unless you tell them.

Dyanne