EVERYTHING I NEVER DREAMED

The president and CEO of the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence tells the story of how she became a champion for domestic abuse survivors.

Early on in her life, Glenn learned what it meant to live with interpersonal violence. When she was a child, she writes, her father mistreated the entire family and sexually abused her. “When you’re abused within your own home,” she writes, “you are always kept off-kilter; you never know what the day will bring, or what your abuser will do from one minute to the next.” When the author was 16, she met Cedric, another domestic abuse victim who became the father of her child. Cedric went to jail for armed robbery; when he was released, they got married, and “the physical abuse began…just weeks after the wedding.” Glenn attempted to leave only to return to Cedric, whose violence and maniacal possessiveness escalated even after she moved out. In 1992, Cedric “abducted me at gunpoint” and later shot her in the head. Yet Glenn could not make use of the resources available to her because she lived in fear that her husband was “watching my every move.” Though distressing, Cedric's suicide not long after the shooting freed her, and though it took years to recover from the trauma, Glenn found some peace in volunteering for domestic violence organizations. That work gave her insight into the way victims needed support to heal and speak out, and she began her journey on the national level with NCADV. Interwoven with stories and statics of the thousands of other women who have suffered and sometimes died at the hands of their abusers, the book sheds light on a profoundly tragic issue while also offering hope that “we can change cultural attitudes and behaviors around domestic violence. We need education, collaboration, and infinite persistence. Domestic violence is a solvable problem, but we have to want to solve it.”

Inspiring and courageous.