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This story contains adult content and language.

Listener discretion is advised.

It's around nine o'clock, I believe at night.

We hear the garage opening and my son hears it.

We freak out.

Honestly, I didn't tell my son this, but I thought that was it. I he's gonna you know hurt us like this is it welcome to the knife i'm hannah smith i'm Eaton.
And this week, we'll speak with a woman named Toni Nova. In 2020, Toni was living in San Diego when she met a man and quickly fell in love.
Like so many people experienced during COVID, her relationship timeline escalated since she and her boyfriend seemingly spent every waking moment together as the world shut down around them. Toni hoped that this would be the start to a long, beautiful life together.
Instead, it morphed into a dangerous nightmare. She had always avoided dating men who seemed angry or violent, but somehow she found herself trapped in a dire situation.
Thousands of miles from friends and family, Toni fought to protect herself and her children. Now, Toni is sharing her story in the hopes that she can offer insight to others who might find themselves in a similar situation.
This conversation with Toni happened on February 15th, 2025. Let's get into the interview.
Toni, thank you so much for speaking with us today. Do you want to go ahead and just start with a little introduction? Yes, and thank you for having me.
I'm Tony. I'm a mother of two, and I share my story after surviving domestic violence.
I recently became a single mother after leaving my ex-spouse. So first, you know, we'd love to start off with, if you could tell us a little bit about your upbringing, where you're from.
Yeah. So I was born in Virginia and I would live there until I was about, I want to say three, and moved to Delaware for about a year.
And then after that, I had moved to Philadelphia and that's when I was placed in foster care with my siblings. So we were placed in foster care up until about age 11.
Me and my younger sister were adopted together. And then I have five brothers whom none were adopted.
So I grew up in foster care. I was adopted.
You know, when I think of my upbringing, I think of a lot of trauma and trying to survive. And I think that molded, unfortunately, the person I am today in good ways and in bad ways.
When you were a kid, when you like thought about your life or your future, do you remember like what kind of hopes and dreams that you had? I actually only just wanted a family. I always wanted a mom.
I had this thing where I just wanted a mom that loved me and was all about me. Those are the little things I would, you know, daydream about, fantasize.
That was an important thing. It wasn't about what I wanted to be when I grew up.
It was about having a family. And then as I got older, teenage years, it was actually me, the idea of what type of family I wanted to have.
Your typical American family is what I thought in my head.

We left our biological family because we were neglected.

They were not capable of taking care of us.

There was no physical abuse on me and my sister,

and there was no sexual abuse on me and my sister.

When we entered our adopted home, not our foster home, our adopted home,

that's where we both experienced physical and sexual abuse for the first time.

At age 16, Toni became pregnant, and at 17, she gave birth to her son. Toni's adopted household was not a place that she felt loved or supported.
She knew she needed her own space where she could create a loving home for herself and her son. So on her 18th birthday, Toni signed a lease on her own apartment.
And shortly after, her younger sister also moved in. By age 19, Toni was employed full-time as a bank teller, and over the years, she worked her way up into management, a career that nearly a decade later presented an opportunity for her, managing a bank in San Diego.
She and her son traded in their East Coast routes for sunny weather and warm beaches. Everything was going well.
until one day in November of 2019, Toni was at work when she heard the unmistakable sound of a gunshot. I believe I was living in San Diego for about a year and a half, and things were going pretty well, to be honest.
I met a lot of people. I had a group of close friends.
It was going good. But at this particular job I was at, it was a Wednesday.
I always remember it was Wednesday and it was dark. So it was November on a Wednesday and it was dark outside.
And this particular job, I am a manager here. So I'm a bank manager again.
And I'm sitting with one of my employees, who, by the way, is my best friend now. And all of a sudden there is a gunshot that goes off and something flies between us.
And I stand up because I'm very confused. She bends down and I look down at her.
And to be honest, the rest is kind of like a blur because at some point I kind of did things like lock the door, things

that I don't remember doing, but it's on camera of me doing it. I can't get too much into that,

to this because there was, you know, a lawsuit involved and that's all been settled, but it

traumatized me. Tony reached a settlement with the bank she was employed by that doesn't allow

for her to say much about what happened, but the incident was traumatizing. And all of a sudden, Toni had time off work, something she'd never had since becoming a single parent.
So she decided to download a dating app. So I swipe on this guy named Alex.
He's not the typical type I go for. But again, I think he's super cute.
I remember on his Bumble profile, he had a lot of outdoor activities of of hiking. And I love hiking.
So that was like the first thing I liked is seeing that he hiked probably just as much as me, according to his pictures. I think the outdoorsy piece connected us the most.
I don't remember the bio, to be honest with you. I have no idea what it said, but it had to say something good because when I swipe, I actually read bios to make sure it's not anything crazy or rude.
By the way, Alex isn't his real name. We've changed his name and the names of others for Tony's privacy.
As soon as Tony and Alex matched on the dating app, Alex reached out to schedule a date. Tony accepted his invitation, but decided to cancel at the last minute and gave the excuse that her leg was hurting.
Alex didn't take it personally, and instead, he called Tony to check on her. And then he, you know, called to check on me and say, like, how's your leg? What happened? And it's just a casual conversation.
Then we started talking and goofing and laughing. We ended up being on the phone for about an hour, just goofing around, because he called me to check on my leg to make sure I'm okay.
The next morning, after talking to him, I was like, all right, my leg's going to be fine. I think, I don't know what reason I gave him, but I'm like, we could go out tomorrow.
Suddenly it feels great. Yeah.
You're normal. You seem nice.
Yeah. So we went to breakfast that morning.
We went to this place called mom's. It was like a breakfast place in San Diego.
First of all, he arrived before me and then he stood up, walked, you know, behind me. We got our table, very gentleman-like.
I know this

sounds silly, but little things like, let me order first, wait till I'm done. The little

things that you notice. He had bright eyes, happy eyes.
I really pay attention to those things about

people. I don't know, because I feel like sometimes I have sad eyes, even when I try not to.
He had

really bright, happy eyes, which drawed me in because I like that. I remember our first date, we did a lot of talking, but I don't think we got, we did not get deep.
We didn't get super deep. We talked about like our siblings and things like that.
I let him know I was adopted, but we didn't get like deep on this first date. Was there an immediate chemistry? Yes.
I thought he was cute as hell. Yeah.
I remember thinking that. I remember thinking like, oh my God, he's really adorable.
Actually, I remember thinking adorable because he was three to four years younger. Okay.
Ironically, that's also what made me think I'm not going to really take him seriously because he was also younger. And I think I did say that.
I was like, oh, you're so young though. But he was like, oh, you know, the typical, it's just age.
This doesn't mean anything. So after the first date, the same day he had texted me and he said, thank you for going out with me.
I thought that was cute. Another winner right there.
Like that's a cute. No, that is cute.
I agree. Yeah.
And I replied like, well, thank you for taking me out because you paid in my head. I remember saying that.
So about, I would say four weeks after just going on dates, having fun, hanging out, he had went on leave.

So I think it was like a week leave in which, you know, I took him to the airport, but we went out to eat before the airport.

And that was a very pivotal conversation because we're sitting, you know, in this restaurant and I'm about to drop him off at the airport.

He's not my boyfriend. We're just dating.
And he's going to be gone for just a week or two. He says, like, I don't know what you're going to do while I'm gone.
But just so you know, like, I only want to date you. So that was like that exclusive conversation before he was leaving.
How did that make you feel? I remember being really excited. I was kind of shocked he brought that up because I wasn't going to.
And I wasn't dating anybody else at the time. But I think I was just not going to bring it up.
In a way, it was only like a month, right? So in my head, like that's a good amount of time to figure out if you like someone and,

you know, have that conversation.

But I also didn't want to add pressure.

Again, that age thing is where I kind of was okay being a little bit more casual.

So you have that conversation and I said, oh, like, you know, I'm going to do the same.

I'm not dating anyone else anyway.

And that was kind of like when we decided we're not, you know, boyfriend, girlfriend, but we're just not seeing other people. Dropped him off at the airport.
And then when he came back is when we made it official. He was saying how much he missed me and all those things.
And then we decided to date. Yeah.
And how long did you two date before, you know, talking about marriage? Not long enough. About four months.
Four months of dating. You know, when you think back on it, it's like red flag right there.
Four months is not enough time. What prompted the marriage conversation so early? Did he bring it up? Did you bring it up? So COVID was happening around this time and he was supposed to go away again for a deployment, but things got delayed because of COVID.
And when they got delayed, that meant we were around each other a lot more because of lockdown and things like that. We were always together.
We were just always around. And we had this linging thing of, oh my God, randomly, they're going to tell him it's time to go.
He's going to go for six months. He shared with me that he had a fear that when he went, I would leave him because he did share that happened to one of his older brothers who was in the military.

So he had this overwhelming fear that when they called him to go on deployment, he would come back and I would be with someone else or just moved on.

And I kept telling him, no, that's not going to happen.

But it did put a rush on things of the longer that they pushed it back, the more we felt like we had limited time.

I don't know.

He felt like that, but I also felt it too for some reason. When we started talking about marriage, that was a big factor of it.
We knew that if we were married, in a sense for him, probably, I wouldn't leave, I guess. But for me, it was more so like, maybe I could show him that I'm not going to just leave.
Like, I really care about him. I love him at this time.
It's interesting, this idea of like a fear that he would be left prompting a marriage and not sort of this overwhelming desire to build a life together. Right.
And I never had anyone have that particular fear. Ironically, I would have that fear in family situations.
So seeing that he had that fear, I really did feel like I wanted to show him that that's not going to happen. Saying it wasn't enough because he always had that fear.
Even though I knew in my heart I wouldn't have done that, I felt in a sense loved that he was worried about losing me that much. Yeah, that makes total sense.
What was it about him that made you love him? Like, was there anything about him that you were like, this is something I really love about this person or I'm attracted to, or I could build a family family with him or what was that feeling? It was how he was with my son right off the bat. When they finally met, he was just really communicative with him.
My son had had a birthday and he was like, hey, like, do you need me to do this? You can do that. He would take the time to bond with my son, like without me, which is a big thing for me because I don't want to date someone that's just liking my son because he's my son, right?

Like I want them to get to know him on his own.

And he did that.

He would go on hikes with him without me.

They would plan their own little things, kind of gang up on me in jokes and situations.

They had their own bond.

They really did.

And I really liked seeing how much he cared about him.

And that kind of was it for me as far as like he's the one.

And so when did you make the decision to get married? Did he propose? Yes, actually, he planned it with my son. He proposed on a hike.
My son knew about it. My son kind of led me to know about it because of how he was acting.
He was being really odd. He proposed on the hike.
My son was there. It was like a, you know, cute moment.
It was one of those funny moments because it was a hike. So like, it wasn't the easiest hike.
And I'm like, out of all the places, I'm sweating. But it was still one of those cute memories.
And I remember the proposal came and I was excited, but I knew I was like, this is going to be one of those like two year engagements. So we had talked about the wedding being after deployment, like, you know, later, like there's no rush and that didn't happen.
So it went from us getting married after he comes back from deployment. Again, we knew he was going to get deployed at some point and be gone for six months.
That was a perfect amount of time to plan a wedding and figure everything out. Soon the conversation changed from after deployment to he wanted to get married before he left.
The urgency was like there. And I think at first I said like, well, think about it because that's such a short time to plan a wedding.
So I said, well, think about it. COVID was dying down around this point, but there was still a lot of limitations.
So he said, well, we could just do it on the beach. It doesn't have to be a whole plan.
We don't have to plan a wedding. So every opposition I had with, that's a short time to plan a wedding.
It was like, well, we really can't plan a wedding. It's COVID.
COVID's still here. It's dying down, but it's still here.
So it's like he kind of won. But also at the time I was letting him win.
I'm in love. So I'm not seeing this as an issue.
I'm seeing as like, he's persistent. He wants to do this.
I'm okay waiting, but you know what, let's do this. And that's when his parents had flew out to meet me because now obviously I'm engaged with their son.
Yeah. And meeting his family, how did they respond to you? You guys had only known each other and been dating four months.
So his dad seemed nice, you know, talked a lot. His mom barely communicated with me.
I think she would only talk to him mostly. She just seemed very uninterested in getting to know me, more interested in seeing her son again.
I realized that not only was I the first minority that had entered that family in that way, they didn't seem, according to them, to be around many African-American people in general. It's the comments they were making.
This is a really tough time. This is 2020, right? Black Lives Matter going on.
There was a lot happening and they would bring that up, but in a negative way in front of me. So I just would ignore it.
Like they would blame more African-Americans for the issues and that how, you know, his dad at the time was an active police officer. So he would say how he's going to retire and he did retire, but he would say like, I'm retiring because if I don't retire, you know, it's just very negative about Black people maybe like ruining his job in a sense.
It just became very weird. Yeah, when they would make those comments, would Alex stick up for you? Looking back, I wonder if he did hear, but he wouldn't hear all of this.
Sometimes he would and he would say something, but like, according to him, I would have to tell him and he would be like, oh, I didn't even know they said that. And then he would stick up for me.
But he always would often say he didn't hear it or he didn't pick it up. And I believed him.
But he understood why it might make you uncomfortable, some of their comments. He did understand.
We would have like our first big argument because of that. He would say, I told you I'm not that close with him, even though obviously we experienced that he was, but he would say things like that.
So just so that we can be clear, Alex and his family are white. Is that right? Yes.
Yeah. So you have this argument with Alex about these comments coming from his family and that's your first real disagreement.
Is that when you called off the wedding? Yes, I call off the wedding because more comments his father was saying. I don't want to get obviously too political, but he was making a lot of comments that were really just offensive and obviously against me as a woman, a Black woman.
And at that point, I realized like, what am I marrying into really? And I felt like he was dishonest with me about that. He said, he didn't even know they were like this at one point.
And then later on changed it, but it just, it felt so confusing. I felt so conflicted and he had went away for training and I probably shouldn't have did it over text, but I did.
Cause I knew like, if I did over text, like, you know, he's already away, this would be a little bit easier. And I said, like, I still love you.
I still want to be with you, but I just don't want to get married right now. And according to his friends, he had a whole breakdown.
I was crying. And that's when his friends started calling me saying like, don't call off the wedding because of his parents.
He's nothing like them. He loves you.
In a sense, guilt tripping me. And I actually agreed with them.
I was just like, oh, like, you know, you're right. I shouldn't call it the wedding because of his parents.
Like, that's not fair to him. I'm judging him because of his parents.
Oh God. I wish I would have stood on business and called it off because I knew I felt deep in my heart I should have, but I ended up changing my mind and we went on with the wedding.
Yeah. So a month after the wedding, I became pregnant and that was the first time he was physical.
At the time, I don't think it was some big argument. I don't remember it being a chaotic day.
I can say though, life happened fast. So after the wedding, becoming pregnant so fast, life just goes.
And at this particular time, he had really full force started standing up for me against his parents. So he was stressed about a deployment that's coming up.
And then I remember he just is still arguing with his parents about me in particular, going back and forth about me. So I hate that I excused it for the stress he was dealing with, but he was physical for the first time.
And I did call a friend who came over. She did say like, this isn't normal.
He should never have done that. There's no excuse.
She had a talk with him. And I always appreciate this friend because for her to come over, have a talk with him, a stern talk, like as if she was like a parent in a sense, like she said, what you did is manipulative, it's abusive.
I was really proud that I had a friend like that, but I also was like, wow, I wish I could talk to him like that. You know, she's very matter of fact.
And he seemed to listen to her and he apologized and said it wouldn't happen again. Every time I look back on that day, I remember all the excuses I had in my head already.
I was really surprised because I've dated obviously before him and I've never had a man harm me in that way. I've barely had men I dated lift their voice.
Like I kid you not, that's a trigger for me when someone yells at me, especially a man, because what I didn't share is one of the reasons that we were taken from our homeless, you know, our mother showed us abusive relationships often. We've watched her be abused by men as kids a lot.
So when I dated, I always dated with that in front of mine.

I don't like when a man raises his voice to me.

That's a no for me.

So because I've never had experienced that, and I felt like I was really good at dating people that didn't do that,

I was shocked that the man I married ended up being the person to do that.

So I was very confused and shocked.

And I always told myself it would never be me.

And it was.

And that's so scary because you're already married to him.

And it's. And that's so scary because you're already married to him.

And it's just like, he didn't do this until you were married.

Yeah, exactly.

Yeah, that's really scary.

Married and pregnant and purchasing a home in a whole new state.

Exactly. them have too much screen time, and never bribe them for just one more bite.
You say you'd never let them out in public without their hair brushed. Never ever become a minivan mom.
And you'd never give them your phone for a quiet dinner. Calling boss work phone.
So when you say you'd never leave your child in a hot car,

know it can happen. Cars get hot fast, and kids can be at risk in temperatures as low as 60 degrees Fahrenheit.
Never happens. Before you leave the car, always stop, look, lock.
Brought to you by NHTSA and the Ad Council. Tony and Alex saw a therapist following the first incident of physical abuse by Alex.
But Tony didn't tell that therapist about the incident. She was pregnant and hoped that he could better himself before becoming a father to the baby girl they had on the way.
Alex was then deployed for much of Tony's pregnancy, but Tony always had the support of her son who stepped in to care for her. So that's a big gap of time where it was just me and my son.
And I want to highlight him because I was getting morning sickness. My son would hear it, come in with bags.
I know this sounds disgusting. One time he started cleaning up and I'm like, don't clean up.
I got this. Bye.
Just get out. That's how helpful my son was throughout everything.
When we would go to the beach, he'd make sure he's holding my hand down the staff. So I'm like, oh my God, this little boy is amazing.
So when I had ended up moving to Colorado with him and my daughter, it was okay. I know that sounds crazy, but we're okay.
We were okay without him. We managed without him, but I didn't miss him.
Of course. When moved to Colorado.
I had had the baby at this point. So we had our daughter in California and that's when we had purchased the home sight unseen by the way.
So we did it with a realtor virtually. So when we're in Colorado, we miss each other a lot.
Like I remember missing him. I remember being able to be fine with the kids, but we weren't always together because he was in California still finishing off his contract in the military.
I remember that a really important sign that made me very confused of his mental state was there was a day in particular, nothing had happened between us. We weren't arguing or anything like that, but I didn't hear from him all day.
And at first it was nothing. I was going about my day.
But when I started texting and no reply for hours, I'm like, this is so odd. Like, I hope he's okay.
So I had called one of his friends and I said, Hey, like, is he okay? Is Alex, where's Alex? I haven't been able to reach him. So I saw him a few hours ago.
I'll call him. He called me to answer.
He's like, Hey, I don't, I don't know. Like, he's probably fine though.
Don't overthink it. Hours go by.
And you got to think, I haven't heard from him since like eight in the morning. And at first I'm not noticing it.
It's now like seven. And I'm like, oh my God, like he got in a car accident or something.
I'm super nervous. Now I'm like calling, calling, calling, calling his friends some more.
I think I had a whole cry session. I'm like, oh my God, I can't reach him.
He calls back like nothing happened. Like he didn't just disappear all day.
And like, he doesn't have probably 30 missed calls from me. He's like, Hey, what's up? And I'm like, are you okay? He's like, yeah, I'm fine.
I just hurt myself skateboarding. I FaceTime him.
Like, you know, what's going on? And he has, his eyes are red. Like he was crying.
There's blood on his arms from like the skateboard. You can see the scrape marks.
And I was like, were you crying? He was like, I was. And I was like, what's wrong? Are you okay? And he's just like, yeah, I'm fine.
I was so confused. I had no idea what just happened.
I haven't heard from him all day. I FaceTime him and he has red eyes, like he's crying.
And then I hang up and I remember thinking like, what was that? Like, what just happened? So did you ever get answers? Like, why are you behaving this way after a day of no contact? I did in the sense of he said he goes through depression. And this is like one of the first times I had found out his mental state because he told me that he was suicidal, unfortunately.
What was your reaction to that? I felt really bad. I even blamed myself a little.
And like life happened fast for him. Like, you know, baby, marriage.
I thought maybe this was too much, too overwhelming. I thought I was the problem.
I really did. And I hate that I result to that, but I thought maybe like, this is a lot for him.
And I started really thinking about his needs and his mental state more than mine at the time. There was other incidents that had happened, physical and just mental outbursts that would happened throughout our marriage.
And I would hide a lot of it from my son until one time, you know, there was a violent incident where I did call the police because I was worried for my life and my safety. At the time that I called the police, he knew I had called him and left the house with a firearm and was texting me that he was going to use it.
So when the police arrived, I said like, hey, you know, nothing happened. Can you just go make sure he's okay? And they saw his car pull off.
They asked what the ass car that pulled off at the end of the street. I said, yes.
I said, can you go make sure he's okay? He said, he's legally allowed to have a firearm and leave. So they couldn't like go chase after him unless I said something happened.
But I knew that if I said what had happened, he'd get arrested. And I don't know, in my head, I thought when he realized the cops were arrested, he's going to do it.
So I called his mom, told her what was happening, told her to tell him not to do it, had the cops leave, told them nothing happened. I don't want to talk about it.
They left like a domestic violence pamphlet. I think they saw through it, but they couldn't do anything.
He came home the same day. It was probably like three hours after that.
We had already been texting and he had to let me know he wasn't going to do it by this point. Even in text, I told him, you know, hey, I didn't tell the police what happened.
Like, please just come back and don't do it. That was my biggest thing.
So the incident where I called the police, we had been married at this point for, I want to say two years. And again, you know, I want to be clear, things happened before, but this was the first time I had called the police.
Yeah. And so, you know, it's interesting, you're dealing with worrying about his safety because he has a gun that he is threatening to use on himself.
But then he also is clearly threatening your safety and the safety of your children.

Exactly. Yes.

So you're having to feel like you have to protect everybody in this scenario, basically.

Right.

Was this like a breaking point for you? You decided to call the police.

Was there something different in his demeanor or something that had changed to escalate the situation?

Yes. I don't know if I didn't notice before, but he had a different look in his eyes and I truly felt like he was going to unalive me.
I think this is the point where I started realizing all the great things about him wasn't really him, that this is really him. I think this was the point where I stopped thinking I did this.
The stress from marriage and a new baby, I finally got it in my head that it it's not that it's him. That was really important for me to realize because that's the first time I told my son that the cops had came and why it was a weird situation to tell him.
Cause again, he's a teenager at this point and it's odd that I felt the need to tell him, but I thought it was important for him to know because growing up, we knew like when we were kids, we knew what was happening and they pretended nothing was happening. I wanted to make sure that I was honest with him because I think he already knew.
I told Alex, you have to get help or you have to leave. And that's when we had started the process of him getting help.
We got a marriage counselor. He got his own counselor.
He got his own therapist and psychiatrist. He started getting prescribed medications.
And he seemed to, after that begins, he seemed to start doing good for a little bit. But yeah, my son never forgave him.
They never had a close relationship after that. My son truly felt, and he's right, that if a man can put his hands on you, that he's not a good man.
And my son was right. So I told you things were going good for a while.
Of course, it never laughed. We went to visit a friend of mine for her baby shower.
This incident was probably one of the most chaotic ones, but he had attempted on a highway to jump out of a moving car. It was very traumatic.
The kids were there to see it. My sister, we were going to the beach.
So she was there and she saw everything. And because she saw everything, it heightened it because she was so confused and shocked and yelled at him because we have kids in the car.
I was driving with one hand on the steering wheel, the other hand on the lock because he kept moving it. So I had to keep pressing it.
My daughter's crying. My son takes out his phone and starts reporting because he's just like, I need proof of this.
This is insane. It was just a lot.
It was the most chaotic experience I've ever been in because we have so many moving parts here. I'm trying to make sure he doesn't do anything insane.
Trying to make sure my kids stop witnessing this, trying to keep him calm. I ended up calling his parents at this point because I can't do this on my own, right? What happened in the car that day was terrifying.

When they returned home from the baby shower,

Tony and Alex mutually agreed to separate.

He would move into the basement of their home to give her and the kids more space

after behaving so erratically, putting them all in danger.

The moment in the car when Tony tried desperately

to stop Alex from jumping out of their moving vehicle,

all while trying to protect her children

from the trauma of witnessing it,

Thank you. The moment in the car when Toni tried desperately to stop Alex from jumping out of their moving vehicle,

all while trying to protect her children from the trauma of witnessing it, this was a moment of no return for Toni. She knew ending her marriage with Alex would be a long, difficult, and dangerous road, but she no longer had energy to hope for change.
Toni began quietly, making preparations to leave. And about, I would say, a week after him being in the basement, he started crying, saying he's miserably depressed and he wants to come back upstairs, the usual.
And I let him. But my little sister and me were staying in touch about the situation because I was still planning to leave.
I just knew I had to. I started the process of opening an account, you know, just preparing.
I actually joined domestic violence support groups, told them what was going on. Like I couldn't, even with letting him come back upstairs, I felt bad, but I also knew I didn't, I didn't feel safe and I didn't feel like my kids were safe.
And I actually was doing it for my safety and their safety first. I wasn't caring about how much I cared about him and wanted him to be better.
I was caring about us living. So one thing I learned is when you're in a domestic violence situation, you really can't, they say make a plan, but it's so hard to make a plan because your plans will go haywire when you're dealing with a person that is not stable and irrational.
Because while I'm planning and I'm thinking I'm secretly doing this, I'm secretly doing that. I even talked to my boss and let them know like, hey, I might have to, you know, transfer.
So I'm talking to, you know, my boss. I'm getting the support of a domestic violence support group.
I'm moving some of my paycheck aside. Like I'm planning.
Well, randomly one day I wake up and there's another blow up, another blow up in the morning. And I don't know where it's coming from.
It came out of nowhere. And he told me, he said, last night, you told me you hate me.
You don't love me anymore. And you're leaving me.
And I look at him and I'm like, no, I didn't. And I started thinking, did I say this? Like, was I half sleep? We fell asleep watching a movie, by the way, the night before.
So when he said that I said these things, I actually like thought I did or something, but I don't remember saying them. I don't, them.
I still tell today, I know I didn't say them now, but at the time I'm thinking, did I say these things to him? He started saying all these mean things I said to him and I'm like, why would I say that? I know better. I know better than to just say those things because I know they would upset him.
And now I realize that that was just a part of his mental health. I remember him having the outburst, me just crying.
I called a friend, told her what's happening. And he left for an hour, came back with flowers.
I kid you not. I saw him walking in through the window with flowers and I was disgusted.
I remember it just wouldn't throw up. Like, is he serious? He walks in with these flowers and I asked him, like, I put them down because I don't really care about them.
I say like like what was that this morning and he was like I don't know and then he went about his day and I felt like I was in the house with a zombie or something because he was just like going about his day like nothing happened and then we ordered pizza we're eating the pizza I asked him to give me plates because he starts I know this is so silly but we get order the pizza first thing he does is get up get the pizza and then go sit back Doesn't get it for the kids. Doesn't do anything.
I was like, you can at least throw me some plates to help me with the kids. That set him off.
He threw all the plates at me. He went on a tyrant.
Another incident. This time it involved our child.
So I'm not going to get into that too much. Our daughter.
And then my son overheard it and he called the police. And that is when the police arrived, arrested him.
And that was the last time i've been in the house with him. That's the last time we were together So what happened is he was arrested I think he was in jail for two days and the judge released him on a strict no contact order but At night it's around nine o'clock.
I believe night, we hear the garage opening and my son hears it. We freak out.
Honestly, I didn't tell my son this, but I thought that was it. I was like, he's going to, you know, hurt us.
Like, this is it because we heard it opening. And then I rush up, I turn on the lights.
And by the time I get to the garage, it's no longer open. And then I call his brother's wife, the only person I was kind of in touch with throughout this time, and tell her what happened.
And she calls him and he did admit that he was just there. He said it was to get a bong.
A bong. He broke the no contact, scared us to get a bong, so he said.
And then he had opened the garage because we have like a monitor. He opened it halfway just to roll under, which is even creepier.
To get a b. To get a bomb, yes.
Oh. But at this point, the court does state that the only way we can communicate is through a third party about the children only, for needs for them.
I asked his brother's wife, Karen, if she could be the third party communicator. She agrees.
And the reason why I felt comfortable asking her is, throughout the relationship, she was one of the people that would apologize for others behaviors She would apologize for my mother-in-law's treatment towards me She didn't have the best relationship with her either So she understood where I was kind of coming from with some of the issues Hers weren't obviously racially motivated, but it was just the way she treated her She didn't like so we kind of bonded on the fact that like we both kind of don't like our mother-in-law. I guess I thought because she's the in-law too, that she would choose right over wrong.
And she did for a while. She really did.
So she was our third party. When he came by the house and rolled under the garage door, did you call the cops or just your sister-in-law? Just Karen.

Did you guys have any discussion about whether or not it might be best for you to call the cops since he had violated his protection order so quickly?

No, because I knew he was already in trouble with the police.

I guess that where that protection comes in again, I think I wanted to protect him because I didn't want him to be arrested again.

So no, I didn't.

And plus in my head, I'm like, well, at least it was just a bong and not to, you know, unalive us. Since he had agreed to the separation, was the divorce then in motion? The timeframe of him agreeing to the separation was in August 2023.
He was arrested in October 2023. So no, nothing was in in motion.
Even with him, you know, when I told you he was upset, wanted to come back upstairs, he wanted to call off the divorce. That was part of him being upset and wanted to come upstairs.
He actually said he has no reason to live if he doesn't have his family, things like that. So although like I may have, I feel like reassured him, like, okay, like we'll talk about it.
Just, you know, you need to keep getting help. I was still making the plans with my sister and still doing the tasks that I needed to do to make sure I got out.
Once Alex was arrested, Toni felt like she could finally put a plan in place to move herself and her children out of Colorado. She listed their house for sale.
She worked with a nonprofit in her home state on the East Coast to help her find new housing sight unseen. This was October of 2023.
Ideally, Toni wanted her son to be able to finish out the school year before their move. But unfortunately, again, you can't make plans when you're dealing with an abusive situation because they don't always happen and go through.
And that's what had happened. It went from me saying I had till january to february to me having to leave as soon as possible

Because my ex decided to harass me and the children at the family home. So at this time, it's fall in October.
So it's about 30 degrees at night, maybe 34 around that. And because of that, you start turning on your heat.
I turned the heat on, I would turn it, I believe, to 72, 74. I don't remember around there.

I think it was 72.

And every maybe two hours, I'd wake up freezing cold

because the heat was off and the AC was on

and it was to the lowest point.

The lowest you can put it is 62.

You can't put it lower than that.

So it'd be to the lowest point.

And I'm like, why is the heat off?

What's going on?

And in my head, I'm like, I can't fix this. It's just me now.
I don't know how to fix this. So I would go back to the thermostat, turn it back on heat.
I would fill the vent and I'm like, okay, the heat's coming out. And I'll go back to bed.
It would happen again. I woke up the next morning with my daughter coughing.
She's cold. I'm cold.
My son wakes up from school. He's like, why is it so cold in the house? I was like, I don't know.
I think the thermostats broke. This went on for four days.
On the fourth day, I thought about it and I was like, oh my God, could this be Alex? Like toggling on the thermostat. We had a smart thermostat and it was indeed Alex.
I don't know how he was awake all these times a night or day or whatever, but he would literally routinely go in, turn off the heat and turn on the AC so we'd be cold. From his phone? From his phone.

Yep.

He had access just like I did.

So I had removed the access and it stopped.

Wow.

But it's colder than 62 because it's like 30s outside and he has the AC on.

Yeah.

We were cold.

We were really cold.

Do you think he was watching you?

That was another thing he had admitted to.

So we did have cameras. I ended up changing the passcode that he was.
He also tried to log into it after I changed the password. It didn't work because I got the alert.
You had cameras inside your house. It was in the den.
We had a camera in the den and then like the common areas. So he knew when I was home.
So he's like, in theory, watching you get up cold and be confused about the thermostat. Yep.

Did you ever tell your son that Alex was responsible for that?

No.

Because at this point he knew we were leaving and he was already really stressed and sad

to say goodbye to his friends.

I wanted to make the rest smooth as possible.

So I did not.

Karen, you know, she was definitely the only person I felt supported by in that family. So I would tell her these things.
And that's how I found out he admitted it because he admitted it to her. So after he was arrested and she became our third party, she said she laid it out to him.
She called him like, what is wrong with you? And, you know, giving them the whole, you know, what is happening. Right.
And his response was, I sometimes black out and I don't remember what I do you know he was released from jail at this point he said tell her that they said that if she needs help with the kids she has to like amend the no contact so when she called me back it was like he said this he said that and I told her I said I'm not amending no no contact I leaving him. And she had told me he was remorseful on the phone, but I didn't care.
I said, I'm leaving him. So another incident had happened, of course, right? It's around eight o'clock at night.
Me and my daughter were watching TV. My son's in his room.
And all of a sudden, the power goes out. You know how when you lose power in the neighborhood or something like that.
So we're like, oh my God, the power's out. And my daughter's scared of the dark at this time.
She's just a toddler. So she's crying and I'm trying to find a flashlight.
I use my phone to find, you know, the phone flashlight to find a flashlight. I get it.
And then my son meets up with me and he's like, oh my God, the power went out. And we go out on the porch.
The power's not out. All our neighbor's porch lights are on.
It's just us. And we see his car speed by in front of us.
It's like so fast. And my son just freaks out.
And he's very, he's such a nonchalant kid. I've never seen him so upset.
He freaks out. He says, oh my God, it was him.
And I'm trying to listen to him. I'm trying to figure out where the power box is on the outside.
I don't know where it's at. We go around the house.
I see it on the side of the house where there's no cameras. We have to toggle through it in the dark and we lift it up.
All the lights come back on. And that was too much for me.
And I called the police because I knew he was going to keep doing stuff. I knew it.
I was like, this is not going to stop. He's making me pay.
I called the police. I told him everything.
I said, the car sped by. And they said, but did you see him in the car? I said, no, because I didn't.
And that they can't do anything unless he admitted it because I didn't see him. And I'm like, oh my God, it was his car.
They said they'll add it to like, you know, his case in case anything else happens. And I remember thinking like, well, if anything else happens, I'd be too late.
Like, you know, and that's when I said, F it, I'm leaving. Like, I'm not staying here.
He's going to continue to do things. So I had packed in two weeks and left.
I had my car shipped, put items in the car to ship it. I had some type of long distance truck go out.
I didn't drive, but I showed up at the airport with two suitcases and my two kids and a dog. Even that experience as a one person was just a lie.
And my son was doing so much, like what he could do with his hands. Like, you know, he only has two and he had the dog and we had our top, had a car seat by by the way, on top of that.
Because my daughter, it was just, I look back, I feel like I was running on adrenaline because I don't even know how I did all these things. I don't know how I functioned, to be honest with you.
And you moved to the East Coast. Yes, right.
How did you land on that decision? So my older sister, my little sister, my brothers, everyone, we're all from the East Coast. So I wanted to be closer to them.
I wanted to have family support. I thought about staying in Colorado so my son can graduate, but I knew I had a toddler.
My daughter, she was two at the time. I knew that I needed support more than I would get there.
I didn't want my son to be some sort of parental figure for our daughter. I didn't want him to have the burden of babysitting, you know, and things like that, when he should be a child having fun.
I didn't want any of that experience to overtake his life now that I knew I'm a single parent. So I knew if I moved, I had my siblings, you know, as silly as it sounds, like that's what aunts are for, right? They are the babysitters.
But in my head, I just wanted him to have a normal experience. And I have the support that we need to create that normal experience.
When you got to the East Coast and you had your new apartment, did you feel a new sense of relief or safety with that? Yes. By the way, this is another place I moved into sight unseen.
I got pictures and videos, but I walked in. I remember thinking like, oh, carpet.
So it was carpet everywhere. It was like, you know, and I remember thinking like, I hate carpet, but I feel so safe.
I feel so safe. You really feel the change of coming from this mode of survival to like, oh my God, I'm safe.
I thought he didn't know where I lived. So I felt super safe.
I'm like, we did it. We got here.
We did it. And I have a picture of my son just holding my daughter and he's like, they're asleep and they're sleeping on like the couch.
Cause I had a little couch. We're waiting for everything to come.
It was just one of those moments. I think I like cried a little bit because they just look so peaceful after they had just been through, the traveling, the packing, the chaoticness.
And I just felt like we were finally at peace. I remember not forwarding my address because I was scared to forward it.
And then finally I forwarded it to my sister's address instead because I just didn't know if he would find out somehow by logging in. I didn't know at the time I could get an address protection.
I know that now and I have that now in my new place, but at the time I didn't know. So I just didn't share it.
But I did get a call from Karen about three days after being there, letting me know that he did find my address. And I said, how did he get it? And she said it was from Thumbtack.
So remember how I told you I had a long distance mover? I had my car shipped. I got that stuff from Thumbtack.
That's how I arranged the move. And we both had the same Thumbtack login.
However, he would get the alerts and of course didn't say anything. He waited until I provided the moving address because they get the address for me, the pickup where I was at in Colorado.
So he was getting the alerts of everything. He knew what I was doing the whole time.
And I just didn't know. He knew.
And you had just had this really beautiful moment of, you know, you're falling asleep in your new apartment. Your kids look so at peace.
How did it feel to learn that he now, again, knew where you lived? I got scared. I knew he was still in Colorado at this time.
So I felt like I had a short amount of time to figure this out before he gets here. That's another thing.
He had asked permission and it wasn't granted just yet, but to move here to the same state. And that means he would be about an hour away from me living with his parents.
So they may be a little over an hour, but that's around the distance. So I knew I had a short time before they approve it to figure this out.
And it's just a pure coincidence. He happens to also be from the same state on the East Coast that you are from.
And so his parents were already there. Exactly.
That's one of the things we laughed about on one of our early dates was, oh my God, we're both from the same state. There was a court date set up and the DEA assistant called me.
They let me know the plea deal they were offering. If I was okay with it, I said, I don't care.

As long as he stays away from me, I'm okay with whatever plea deal.

And they told me the terms of what his probation would be because that was a part of the plea

deal of probation and dropping some of the charges if he accepts it.

I remember thinking about our daughter who would often ask about him.

And I said to the DEA assistant, I said, how can he talk to our daughter? How can we figure that out besides a third party? And she had said, you have to ask the judge to amend the no contact. So I had to ask permission to allow him to talk to her.
So I went virtually and I had to ask the judge to amend this. And he said, am I sure? And I said, yes.
I asked just for electronic. I didn't want any in-person communication just so he can FaceTime her.
And the judge did granted. So I'm thinking, okay, at least like he could still some way be a father to our child.
However, he did not do that. And he used that to harass me instead.
And then he was able to text me and he would start harassing me via text. The hard part is there was a part where he was texting so fast so much.
And then at one point he called me a racial slur and then he unsent it, but I had already screenshot it. This is something that I wanted to use for court.
So I already had the proof of that, but he kept going on and on and on. Some of his texts were hard to understand.
He wasn't really coherent. He would say, speak to me daughter now..
That's how they were. And I'm like, okay, that's all you should be texting me about.
When do you want to speak to her? And then he would say the time. And then we had set up something and he didn't call.
And I waited with her. Yeah, he stood her up because she knew.
That's why she was at her tablet waiting for it. And I realized quickly, oh my God, this is not working.
I need to get the no contact back to what it was. So it just continued.
And I didn't call the cops. I know I should have, but I didn't.
I mean, who could blame you? That's a terrifying situation to be in. You don't know what he's going to do.
Right. I just want to answer his questions and not get him more upset at this point.
Yeah. It's just like you talking about way back when, when he was not defending you to his parents and pretending like he's not hearing all of this coded language, right? Like, or maybe overt racist language and saying, I'm on your side, I'm on your side or whatever.
And then having mental health issues and very violent and a lot of problems and saying a lot of negative things. But the fact that then he brings out this, you know, racial slur, like, I can't, I don't know, that's horrible.
Did that feel like, oh yeah, like you actually are just like your parents all along. Like, how did that make you feel? It was definitely a gut punch because out of everything, I never thought he'd do that.
Like, I mean, there was, he was already very low, right? Like he was already putting us through a lot. Since the bar was already to the ground, I shouldn't have been shocked, but I was.
He still continued to shock me with his behavior. I did think that.
I was like, oh my God, he is like his parents. I was mad at myself because I was like, I knew it.
I don't know. Deep down, I feel like I knew it when I wanted to call off the wedding.
That was actually a concern. I'm like, what if he's like that? And he just likes me.
And I'm the exception to the rule for him. I thought about those things.
And that was one of the reasons I wanted to call off the wedding. But again, his friend said he's nothing like his parents.
And, you know, it was definitely a gut punch. And it was hard because I also think about our daughter, the fact that I have a daughter with this person.
And then safety comes into play of, oh, my God, will he treat her bad because of that?

And if he does, will his parents do the same?

Like, I just it was a lot.

His family who lives, you know, within an hour or so of you is in law enforcement.

Yes.

His dad is now retired, a retired police officer.

He has two brothers that are current active police officers and then Karen is a police officer.

Oh, wow.

Yeah, I mean, has that impacted your sort of willingness to call law enforcement? No, but I'll explain why. You know, growing up in foster care, police were always there to protect us, you know, as kids.
And I know there's like the controversy and I'm not invalidating anyone else's experience, right? Because things do happen that aren't okay. My experience is I always felt safe with police, always.
Because of course I have a unique situation being as though they were the ones that helped me, right? As a kid, they helped me many times. Now, did it validate or make me feel like maybe I had to, you know, be careful? Yes.
But what I did instead is I would screenshot a lot of things and communications because in my head, I'm like, well, these are police officers. I think I need evidence for everything.
And I know one should not always think like that, but that's how I thought, like evidence for everything, evidence for everything, because it's going to be my word against police officers or police officers' family. Toni was connected with a domestic violence advocate and a therapist.
She knew that Alex would likely continue harassing her, but she found some solace in the physical distance she'd been able to put between them. But then Toni got a call from Alex's probation officer.
The officer told her that Alex had knowingly violated his probation. He was driving from Colorado to where Tony now lives on the East Coast.
Tony had worked so hard to keep herself and her kids out of harm's way, away from Alex. But now, he was headed in their direction, and he had their new address.
Anytime a car drove by that was like his, he had a truck. our maintenance men had the same truck, but the difference is it had like the name of the building on it and it was on the other side.
So whenever I see that truck, my heart just stopped. And then I'd keep looking and it'd be, it'd be the maintenance men.
So it was things like that, that would just panic me. I was just, I was super alerted to the point I did have to go to urgent care because I was having heart poppitations and shortness of breath.
And I was feeling really dizzy. I was having daily panic attacks, just super scared.
And still, I don't call the police. Karen stopped being helpful at some point.
I think at the end of the day, that is their family member. I think they made excuses just like I did where where when someone's in the family, and especially if we're having mental health concerns, I think they probably excused it as that a lot.

You know, his mental health concerns.

I truly can't say exactly what made her change, but I can say she did what a lot of family

members do to abusers, is end up enabling and making excuses.

So the shift really took a hard hit when I had told her about the racial slur and she told me not to report it. She told you not to report it.
Yeah. She texted me.
So now she's telling you don't call the police on him. Yes.
I think she knew I was like really upset. So she even called me and said like, how would my daughter feel if she found out I put her dad in jail over a word? That is so manipulative.

Oh, that's awful.

Yeah. And I think that's when I finally realized she wasn't truly my support system.
She was more

still his. She stopped being the person, obviously, I called.
And I noticed that once she stopped being

the person I called, I finally felt like I could report him when he continued and continued.

And I did. And I ended up reporting him.

And it was the day after the probation team had warned him to stop harassing me.

And then he continued harassing me the same day.

So I did call the police.

I reported it.

They came and they saw the communication.

They had everything they needed pretty quickly.

And I didn't even send them all of it.

They just said, send me these and we're good. Because they't need all of it because it was a clear violation.
They had put a warrant out for his arrest. I don't know why they didn't just go and arrest him, but he knew he had a warrant, I'm assuming, because he stopped harassing me.
It was a good month of him not harassing me. And then one time he reached out towards the end of that month and asked to speak to our daughter.
And obviously I didn't get the no contact amendment. So he wasn't in violation by asking to speak to her.
I set up a FaceTime and he did speak to her. He actually did.
So I was like, okay, maybe like he's getting help. But in my head, I thought maybe he's like doing better.
I don't know. And then the next day he asked to speak to her again.
And this time we were out, we were not home. And I remember saying like, Hey, we're out.
Like, and then he just kept texting, like, so you're not gonna let me speak to my daughter. When am I going to speak to her? And if you see the text, they were coming in minute by minute, like just so much.
He's like, why are you ignoring me? You're not answering. And it was just a lot.
And I had a panic attack while I was out. I couldn't focus.
I drove back and had her FaceTime him. I was that scared.
I was like, you know what? You're going to, I feel so bad now thinking like I should have never let her did it. Clearly he wasn't in the right state of mind, but I had her FaceTime him for just, I think it was like 15 minutes, such a short time.
But in the text, when he kept going on and on and on, he had stated, I can pull her out of the daycare you have her in. I didn't even tell him she was in daycare.
So I was like, oh my God, I just know she's in daycare because she had just started daycare. That was all I needed to obviously go get a protection from abuse order in my new state.
A temporary order was issued. And I think I got it on a Friday.
And the way it works is the next business day, they're served. I believe the next business day was a Monday.
My domestic violence advocate would typically tell me when he served. However, in this case, I got a text from his brother, so Karen's husband, stating in a text that says, you're petty.
Now I know why you blocked Karen and me and Karen are washing our hands of you. That was the text because his brother was served and arrested for that outstanding warrant.
It's so wild to me that these people work in law enforcement. I know.
Obviously, law enforcement had what they needed to move forward with like serving him and arresting him. Exactly.
Still, they're having no compassion for what you're going through or understanding that he is truly in the wrong here. Right.
And I think it goes back to a little bit of, you know, we're not dealing with just domestic violence. We're still dealing with like that, that racism or the prejudice.
I think that fell into the fact that maybe they didn't see me as a victim. Maybe they didn't see me as somebody worthy of safety.
And this is just me feeling like that, but it kind of goes back to that. Yeah.
You know, you've said a couple times, which I just think is such an important point to really drive home is that like, there were so many different times where you, sometimes yourself, but also a lot of people around you, specifically Alex and then his family members who maybe felt like they were on your side, but then very quickly turned against you. All of this is like pointing back to an indication that this is somehow your fault or that you've perpetuated any of this.
Right. I'd love to hear you speak about that because I think that there's a lot of people that find themselves in situations of violence and like where crimes are being perpetuated against them, whether it's, you know, in domestic situations or not, where they're like being told or feeling like they're the ones to blame.
They somehow brought this on themselves. And it's just like, how do you have the presence of mind to remind yourself that that's not true? And what does that take, I guess? For me, it takes seeing the situation differently or stepping out of it.
when you're away from your abuser, you're able to see a lot more clear than you were when you were in it. But also I had told you that my turning point was my son.
So seeing it in a different light, I had to see how it's affecting him to realize this is Alex. This isn't me.
This isn't the kids. This isn't his life being stressful.
This is Alex. And I saw that by looking at it in a different light.
And I needed to see it that way. Because if I didn't, I would probably continue excusing it.
I would probably still be in it. And we'd still be in the cycle.
When the police reached out to Alex's brother and his wife, Karen, they tried to blame Tony and to say that she was actually the one harassing them. The same victim-blaming mentality

that Tony had gotten used to.

But the police saw right through it.

Communication ceased.

Where do things stand now?

With Alex, we ended up going to court again

for this new violation and, you know,

the continued harassment.

I got a three-year protection order in my current state. He was in a violation of his probation order in Colorado.
He had to go back and have court cases for that. I know because this was his first offense in this manner, they were going to do a program where they remove it from your record after some type of deferred judgment or something.
I'm not sure how all that works, but he no longer qualifies for that because he violated probation. They had a warrant issued off for him for a little bit.
So he had additional legal issues that I just didn't get involved in. I didn't care about an update.
All I focused on was the fact that I had a three-year protection order. And I know they don't protect you fully in a sense, right? Like it's a piece of paper, but it still felt good to have it.
I did move again. And I'm under the address confidentiality program in the state.
I did file for divorce and I am divorced now. And I haven't heard from him in any capacity throughout the divorce process.
There's a child custody piece of it. And I felt like if he can get help, I would want him to be in his child's life.
Obviously not my son's. He doesn't want anything to do with him.
But I did ask the judge to grant supervised visits of some sort with him and our daughter. However, he didn't show up for the custody portion of it.
So he has no custody and have full custody of our child. So I would say, you know, we're doing a lot better.
He hasn't reached out since. In my head, I'm like, is three years going to go by and then we're going to randomly hear from him? But I try not to think like that.
I try to be in the moment and be positive and think that, you know what, like we're safe. We're going to continue to be safe and I'm going to continue to take the steps to make sure of it.
I haven't communicated with any of his family, obviously. So my daughter like doesn't know, you know, her grandparents on that side and her aunts and uncles on that side.
So what we do with her and my son is obviously like try to give him as much love as we can um even with extended family my my older sister her husband his family's amazing and we keep you know my daughter around them and that's like her cousins even though they're through the in-law portal of being family we just really want her to have a family and because me growing up in foster care i didn't feel like i had that right like i didn feel like I had family that was for me. So I'm trying to make sure my kids feel that way and they're supported.
Pesha saw your Instagram and, you know, shared it with me. We're both really touched by your story and so glad that you came on here to tell us, you know, more about it.
What inspired you to share your story and kind of what do you hope comes from it? If I could help, you know, just one person, that's what matters to me. And that's what I get.
I get messages about how they're happy I'm sharing my story and they could relate. And even in the comments, knowing how many women could relate, it's heartbreaking, but it's also like, you know, we're not alone and we need to use our voice if we feel comfortable to speak up against it.
And, you know, I did a 5K and my son ran with me in the 5K and it was a fight against domestic violence. And I found by doing that, that like speaking up and standing up against it really does matter.
And at first I thought, how is that going to help prevent it? But it does. It allows abusers to be more scared and embarrassed about their behavior.
It holds them accountable. It lets, you know, states and cities and counties know what women are going through and how we need to be more protected.
And it helps with lawmaking too around this. So I just find it really important to speak up if you can and if you feel safe to do so.
I am so thankful to Toni for trusting us with her story. Yeah, that was a really powerful interview.
I wanted to touch on something that Toni mentioned in her interview that was definitely the more difficult part of what she went through because it involved Alex's family members, which her third party communicator between Toni and Alex was her sister-in-law who was married to Alex's brother and this sister-in-law that Tony referred to as Karen which is not her real name is a law enforcement officer as is her husband Alex's brother. I was surprised when she said that.
Yeah because what we learned is that Karen and her husband sent Tony text messages that were really harmful and manipulative, encouraging her not to report things to the police, victim blaming. And Tony knew at this time that they were no longer interested in right and wrong.
They were trying to protect the family member. And she was very aware of that.
But it was her domestic violence advocate that said, you need to report this to police because you have a no contact order with Alex. And that does extend to his immediate family.
Yeah, which is something that I was not aware of. Me either.
But yeah, because she explained, I believe it was after she moved to Colorado, that Alex's brother was texting her like really rude things, calling her petty just for trying to protect herself and her kids. And that is, you know, harassment.
It's harassment. And they ought to have known that as people who work in law enforcement.
And so it's like, well, did they know that? Did they not know it? And then when Tony did report it to local police where she was living and they reached out,

Karen and her husband then tried to say, well, Tony is harassing us.

And whoever they connected with knew that was not the story and had Tony's back with what was actually going on.

But I just think it's another layer of someone dealing with domestic violence or abuse is going through,

especially if it's a spouse, because you have extended family that has, I don't know what you could call it. there's probably some sort of natural instinct to protect a family member, but you at some point have to say to yourself, can I look at this situation in an unemotional way? Because if I

can't, maybe I should not be inserting myself. Totally.
And then Toni had to kind of make that decision for them and realize that they were not going to be a support system for her. And I think this ties in to something else that Toni talked about being really important and being able to defend herself is that she took meticulous documentation of all of her correspondences.
Even if it didn't seem important at the time or she wasn't sure if law enforcement could use it, she just went ahead and took screenshots. She took screenshots anytime Alex was reaching out to her, as well as when Karen and her husband reached out to her.
And that all ended up being incredibly useful. So that was something that she wanted to communicate to people that it was a really helpful course of action for her at the time.
Definitely. We do want to call out that the National Domestic Violence Hotline, which you can find online at thehotline.org, can help you find an assistance provider if you think you might be experiencing abuse or if you know you are experiencing abuse.
You can plug in your location and find support in your local area. I think it's important to point out that abuse is not always physical.
Justice.gov defines domestic violence as domestic violence is a pattern of abusive behavior in any relationship that is used by one partner to gain or maintain power and control over another intimate partner. It says it can be physical, sexual, emotional, economic, or psychological.
Just domestic violence is an all-encompassing term, but abuse doesn't have to be physical for someone to be right to seek help for it.

So if you think you might benefit from some support, why not just reach out and ask about it?

You can find a link to thehotline.org in our show notes.

We'll see you next week.

If you have a story for us, we would love to hear it.

Our email is thenife at exactlyrightmedia.com, or you can follow us on Instagram at thenifepodcast or bluesky at thenifepodcast. This has been an Exactly Right production, hosted and produced by me, Hannah Smith.
And me, Pasha Eaton. Our producers are Tom Breifogle and Alexa Samorosi.
This episode was mixed by Tom Breifogle. Our associate producer is Christina Chamberlain.
Our theme music is by Birds in the Airport.

Artwork by Vanessa Lilac.

Executive produced by Karen Kilgariff, Georgia Hardstark, and Danielle Kramer.