"Tell Somebody: Two Years, Four Months, One Week, and A Day - The Memories and Musings of a Battered Wife - A Trilogy, Part I" is the first leg of the journey of young Stephanie Sweeney from friendship to courtship, to a perfect love, and an early marriage to her first love--her one true love, Henry Earl Henderson.
I own it..
It is all mine.
All the good, all the bad, all the unpleasantness--the hurt, the pain, the naivete.
My truth is what it is.
I am there, finally.
I also could not Tell this story before I was healed enough to reveal my truth.
I did not want to hurt my mother-in-law more than she was already hurt either.
I did not want to hurt my parents more than they were already hurt by my ordeal.
But I had to wait to Tell Somebody .
Whenever I heard on the news of a woman being beaten by the man she loved, especially being killed by him, I knew I had to Tell my story.
Nothing could quieten the anguish of that still, small voice inside the head and heart of Stephanie, haunting her, saying, "Tell Somebody, Tell Somebody, Tell Somebody." Just as that annoying buzz of a mosquito around your ear at bedtime keeps you awake, so did Tell Somebody .
Fast forward, Years later, the pain and the shame that was Stephanie\'s life with Henry, demands to be heard.
Stephanie believed that the love Henry claimed to have for her would eventually stop the beatings; so, she continued to try to love him-- until that day.
Tell Somebody deals openly and honestly with domestic violence from the perspective of the victim.
Though the abuse silenced Stephanie in her marriage, Stephanie had her inner thoughts to keep her company during those difficult days.
Even as the Years passed by, the pain, the memories, and the shame persisted.
The story hovered uncomfortably in the untouchable places of her mind and heart.
Just as she was not forthcoming about the beatings, Stephanie stubbornly resisted that plea from within to Tell Somebody of her past experience.
As the heart beats regularly--in season, out of season, on a mundane day, as well as a special day--without prompting, so were the heartless beatings by the man who claimed to love Stephanie, as he often said, \'from the first time I laid eyes on you.\' Each beat of Stephanie\'s heart recalls the beatings she suffered alone in fearful silence.
Denial only made it worse.
I diligently tried to ignore the pain my heart recalled--of him, and what he did to me all those Years ago.
Tell Somebody is my experience.
But this experience had to come out of the shadows.
The secrecy, the silence had to end.
Tell Somebody is a story that did not want to be told.
Tell Somebody recounts the quest for the redemption of love Stephanie and Henry once shared, always with a hopeful desire for a "happily ever after" ending.
Stephanie, however, continued to hold high hopes for the cessation of the emotional abuse and physical violence that had become her life.
When unforeseen, unexpected violence occurred early in her marriage, Stephanie was frightened and confused. "Tell Somebody: Two Years, Four Months, One Week, and A Day - The Memories and Musings of a Battered Wife - A Trilogy, Part I" is the first leg of the journey of young Stephanie Sweeney from friendship to courtship, to a perfect love, and an early marriage to her first love--her one true love, Henry Earl Henderson
