The statehouse released the number of domestic violence related homicides on Wednesday.
Those statistics revealed there have been 112 deaths blamed on domestic violence for the year ending in June 2022, and 22 of the victims were young people, the highest since the state began tracking such data.
>> Domestic violence survivor dedicates her life to changing justice system’s response to complaints
One woman who thought she would become a statistic talked to News Center 7′s Kayla McDermott about her fight to not become a victim, but a survivor.
With her mom being a teacher, her father a pastor and being a good student in choir who grew up cultured, Christa Hullaby never thought she would one day be reaching out to the Artemis Domestic Violence Center.
Hullaby thought she had met the love of her life in high school, but it turned out he would be her future abuser.
“He was so sweet. So I never I never imagined, like I don’t know where the switch flicked. But it did,” Hullaby said.
When it did switch, it never went back.
“I was 18-years-old, and he hit me,” Hullaby said. “Just one incident, didn’t think anything of it.”
One incident in 2002 escalated to more than a decade of abuse.
“I had multiple mild concussions, two, four concussions, hairline fractures, busted lips, bite marks that are visible that you can see that broke skin, black eyes,” Hullaby said. “He told me he was going to kill me.”
>> Ohio BOE votes to send measure to reject Title IX amendment to executive committee
“I wasn’t afraid to die if I died. I was like okay, but if I die, I want to make sure that it’s set up so that someone’s taking care of him,” she continued.
“Him” being her son. That’s why Hullaby was determined to survive, so she issued multiple restraining orders, moved away and asked Artemis for help.
“They made me realize it was not my fault,” Hullaby said. “She gave me the strength to realize it wasn’t my fault.”
Artemis is a safe haven for domestic violence victims. The organization says physical abuse is not the only type of abuse— others are isolation, financial, and a need for control.
Abuse, isolation and the control came to an end for Hullaby when her abuser died in 2019, but the memories didn’t disappeared.
“I still have nightmares,” Hullaby said.
Rather than be labeled a victim, Hullaby says she’s a survivor.
“I truly believe that I went through this. Not to keep the story to myself, but to go out and advocate sometimes you have to flip your world upside down to be a survivor,” Hullaby said.
Hullaby now speaks out against domestic violence and runs a website to help others. You can visit the website by clicking here.