VOICES of Acadiana

Moving Forward Monday by Roxanne Martin💜🤩🧚‍♀️ Since leaving my ex-husband in November 2017 my life has changed... for the better. First and most importantly, I’ve regained a relationship with the LORD. What a powerful GOD we serve. He has stood beside me every step of the way and I can say, I think he kind of likes me:-) I have traveled extensively. Some of the places I’ve been to are Colorado, Alaska, California, Tennessee, Kentucky, and Florida. I've been on several beach and camping trips with family and friends. I’ve also been to live concerts in the Woodlands and Dallas. I was able to buy my OWN home and I absolutely LOVE IT!!! I am the Education and Awareness Chairperson for VOICES of Acadiana. I am actively working with counselors for the Lafayette Parish School System to implement procedures to bring awareness to domestic violence. I am a committee member for ACT 833 for the Lafayette Parish School System. We are working to design procedures to allow teachers across the ...

Our Story Part 2 Roxanne: 1/8/18: My supervisor called me saying that she needed to speak with me. Apparently, my ex had called the school board stating that I was having an affair during work hours. He was going to bring phone records to prove this. What he didn’t know was that I had taken time off from work to put my plan into motion so all the phone calls were not during work time but during time documented as off time. 1/9/18: A domestic violence detective accompanied me to the school board and explained the situation to them. They fully understood and warrants were issued for defamation of character. 1/10/18: He turned himself in. 1/18/18: Bond set at $20,000 for defamation charge. No bond set for breaking protective order:-). 3/23/18: Released from jail with an ankle monitoring device. Chelsea: 4/7/18: My dad was never one to go places, especially not festivals. Yet, he was seen at the Boudin Festival. He had an ankle monitoring device. How was he allowed to go to the fest...

Our Story Part 1 Our names are Roxanne Martin and Chelsea LeBlanc and on November 29, 2017 our lives would be FOREVER changed! After months of secretly planning, I, Roxanne, was finally able to escape 30 years of domestic violence. No one knew of my plans!!! NO ONE!! No family members, friends, co-workers, not even my children knew of my plans. I knew it would come as a shock to everyone!!! You see, when you live with domestic violence you learn to pretend that things are normal. You don’t want people to know how unhappy you are and how crappy life can be. What I didn’t know when I pulled out of the driveway that morning, is that the deep psychological effects would be long-lasting for both myself and our daughter, Chelsea. And the nightmare didn’t end just because I didn’t live there any longer. Here is our story. Roxanne: I knew leaving him would put my life in danger. I knew this because I’d tried to leave numerous times over the 30 years we were together. When I would attemp...

My name is Roxanne Martin and I’m a survivor of thirty years of domestic violence. I’m not quite sure when I actually realized that I was in an abusive relationship. I met my ex-husband in 1987. I quickly realized that there was something not quite right in our relationship. He didn’t  allow me to wear certain things and hated when I did things without him. Nothing much, but it did catch my attention (red flags). My ex-husband and his siblings often mentioned that during their childhood their own father has been verbally and physically abusive towards them and their mother. Their mother left with them many times, but the kids would always beg her to go back to him, and she would. Over the years, I witnessed first hand how verbally abusive my ex-father-in-law was.  In the beginning of our relationship, my ex-husband and I had been in numerous physical altercations. Most of my memories are of him choking me into unconsciousness. Others are of him slapping me so hard I ...

To my abuser,  I guess what made me an easy target for you was my kindness. You used it as a weapon against me. You saw my ability to forgive you as a motive to keep terrorizing, abusing, and manipulating me. But now you can’t get remotely close to seeing all the characteristics that make me a wonderful, beautiful, strong, and decent human being. I finally had the courage to leave you, unfortunately much later than I should have. But this is what I have to say to you now that I can finally think with a clear mind. I went against everything I stood for, everything I believed in; just to try to justify your verbal, psychological, and physical abuse. I used to question my every move. Am I saying the right thing? Should I tell you that? I can't say that or you might get angry and who knows what horrible words you'd say to me. I used to cry myself to sleep at night with pain in my chest. Sure, your words stabbed me like knives but maybe I was just being too sensitive or weak....