The Childhood That Shaped Me: A Story for Domestic Violence Awareness Month

By Trinity Barnette

The Childhood That Shaped Me

I wish I could say I grew up in one house, one neighborhood, one version of stability—but I didn’t. My childhood was a blur of moving boxes, slammed doors, and police lights reflecting off living-room walls. Home never really felt like home; it just felt like the next place where something bad might happen.

I was born into a relationship built on violence. My dad had five kids by five women, and two of them were lucky enough to escape before I ever really knew who they were. For years I thought they were distant relatives in old photos—turns out they were my siblings, the ones who got out early. The rest of us were left to live in the chaos he created.

My mom, Erica, was strong but human—she had her struggles with addiction, and there were times when she couldn’t take care of me. That’s when I’d end up with my dad. He was living with Melissa back then, my brother Anthony’s mom, and those are some of the clearest memories I have of what domestic violence actually looks and sounds like. It’s loud. It’s fast. It makes you tiptoe through your own house.

There’s one night I’ll never forget. He was in one of his moods—yelling, breaking things, and then the sound of a fist hitting skin. I remember standing by the door, holding a knife, trying to decide if I could stab my own father to make him stop. I couldn’t do it. I was fourteen. I was terrified. I called the cops instead—three times—because the first two didn’t even come. That’s the kind of “protection” Baltimore had to offer.

When I close my eyes, I can still see him on the ground from the day my mom had to run him over just to get us away. I can still hear the yelling. You don’t forget sounds like that—you just learn to live around them.

People like to say time heals everything. But when you grow up in survival mode, time doesn’t heal—it just teaches you how to hide the scars better. My dad might act different now, but I’ll never believe men like that truly change. They just learn to control it.

This is the childhood that shaped me. Not one house. Not one memory. A lifetime of moments that forced me to grow up before I even knew what peace was.

The Hidden Damage—What Abuse Does to the Brain

When people talk about domestic violence, they usually picture bruises and broken things—but the damage runs so much deeper than that. Abuse doesn’t just hurt your body—it rewires your brain. It changes how you see safety, love, and even yourself.

Growing up in violence trains your nervous system to stay on high alert. You stop reacting—you start anticipating. You study every sound, every shift in tone, every slammed door. I used to walk on eggshells around my dad, memorizing his patterns the way most kids memorize multiplication tables. My body didn’t know how to relax, because relaxing meant I might not be ready when something happened.

At night, though—when he was gone—I could finally breathe. That’s when I became a night owl. I learned to exist in silence, tiptoeing through the house when it was finally safe. It wasn’t just preference—it was survival. My brain literally associated peace with his absence.

Studies back this up. Research has shown that repeated exposure to domestic violence causes trauma responses in children similar to those found in combat veterans. The brain becomes wired for survival, not stability. It’s why so many survivors have anxiety, depression, or hypervigilance years after leaving. It’s not weakness—it’s biology.

According to The National Domestic Violence Hotline, nearly 1 in 3 women and 1 in 4 men in the United States have experienced some form of physical violence by an intimate partner. And for the children who grow up in those homes, the trauma is often invisible—but lifelong.

People underestimate what that does to a developing brain. They think kids “bounce back.” But the truth is, when your childhood is built on fear, you learn fear before you ever learn love. You grow up chasing chaos because it’s all you’ve ever known.

That’s why I say domestic violence doesn’t just destroy relationships—it destroys the foundation of who you are. And rebuilding that? That’s the hardest work you’ll ever do.

Breaking My Own Pattern

For a long time, I thought chaos was love. I looked for men like my dad—loud, controlling, unpredictable—because that’s what felt familiar. I used to mistake intensity for passion, pain for proof, and silence for safety. When you grow up watching someone explode and call it love, you start believing that’s what love is supposed to look like.

I won’t lie—there was a part of me that liked it. Not the violence itself, but the pattern. The push and pull, the constant adrenaline, the cycle I’d been trained to survive. I didn’t know peace could exist without fear trailing behind it. So I found comfort in the kind of men who would eventually hurt me, because they felt like home.

That’s how the cycle repeats. You grow up around dysfunction, and it plants itself in your body. It becomes the blueprint for how you love, how you fight, and how you see yourself. People always say, “Just leave,” but they don’t understand that when dysfunction is what raised you, leaving it feels like betrayal.

Breaking that pattern has been the hardest thing I’ve ever done. Healing isn’t pretty—it’s crying over things that happened ten years ago, it’s unlearning habits that once kept you safe, it’s forgiving yourself for the people you let hurt you.

I used to think healing meant becoming someone totally different. But now I know it’s about becoming who I was before the trauma. The girl who didn’t flinch at loud voices. The girl who didn’t have to calculate her every move. The girl who didn’t confuse control with care.

And to anyone reading this who grew up like me—I need you to know something. You don’t have to repeat the cycle. You don’t have to love people who remind you of your pain. You don’t have to carry the same violence that raised you. You have the power to be different, to be better, to build something safe out of something broken.

Raw Reflection—Turning Pain Into Purpose

I used to think I was broken beyond repair. Too damaged. Too traumatized. Too late to change. But I’ve learned that healing doesn’t have an expiration date—it just takes honesty, time, and the courage to face what you survived.

I can’t rewrite my childhood. I can’t erase the sounds, the fear, or the memories that shaped me. But I can decide what comes next. I can tell my story instead of hiding it. I can use the same voice that was once too scared to scream and turn it into something powerful.

The truth is, people like me had to grow up too fast. We had to learn emotional intelligence before we learned algebra. We had to read danger before we could read books. And while it’s not fair, it is what makes us fighters. We know how to survive, and survival is a strength most people will never understand.

But surviving isn’t enough for me anymore—I want to live. I want to teach others that you can come from chaos and still build peace. You can come from violence and still choose softness. You can use your pain to push you forward instead of letting it keep you stuck.

If you’re reading this and you’ve been through something similar, I want you to remember this: you’re not your trauma—you’re the proof that it didn’t win. You can become anything you want to be. A lawyer. A blogger. An activist. A healer. A dreamer. Whatever the hell you decide. Because you made it through the kind of pain that should’ve destroyed you—and that means you already have everything you need to rebuild.

I’m not done healing. I don’t think I ever will be. But maybe that’s okay. Maybe healing is a lifelong act of rebellion. Maybe every time I write, speak, or help someone else out of their darkness, that’s me fighting back.

This is me reclaiming my story.

This is me breaking the cycle.

This is me—turning pain into purpose.