Women’s Protective Services said it is a common trend for victims to defend their attackers. They say it takes an average of seven acts of violence for a person to come forward.
“There are warnings there, and we tend to ignore it,” said Steven Garcia with Women’s Protective Services. “Before you know it, it grows, it intensifies, it escalates and then by the time it reaches physical or sexual status or assault status, then it’s too late. It’s like, ‘Oh no, I’m trapped now. Now I’m threatened. Now if I call law enforcement, something may happen to me.'”
Garcia said the shelter gets easily more than 500 calls to their lines every month. Right now, they are actually housing more than 50 women and 40 kids.
In 2017, they said they housed just under 4,000 women and children.
“Everyone’s situation is unique. Some people have circumstances where they need to stay the full term. We try to give at least four to six months,” said Garcia.
It could take months or even years of abuse for victims of domestic abuse for a victim to speak up, but why?
“There’s a lot of love involved, you don’t get punched on the first date. There’s a lot of investment. Both physically, emotionally, financially,” Garcia said.
Garcia knows WPS can’t help all victims of domestic abuse, but they can try.
“If you have a healthy self-esteem and good boundaries and don’t compromise those, a lot of times the abusive partner will lose interest and go to someone else they can control,” said Garcia
