A 37-year-old occupational therapist had been in an abusive marriage for three years. With a two-year-old son, and another baby on the way, she decided it was time to take her life back.
Kathryn McGuire, now 37, was an occupational therapist, and was about to be a mother of two. Although she thought she and her husband were a great fit, “The first week of our marriage, I realized I was mistaken.” He didn’t share the same goals and dreams as Kathryn did, and didn’t show any interest in the things she wanted to pursue.
They lived first in Jacksonville, Florida, where both Kathryn and her Husband were attending school. When her husband was no longer taking classes in Jacksonville, the couple moved to North Carolina, to his home town. In each place they lived, she made sure her job was at least an hour away from home, “So that I could get it together. Leave my house and get it together on my way to work, so I could function.” Kathryn remembers that it took an hour, to get herself together before work, and then prepare for the abuse on her way back home.
The last straw came when one night, her husband woke up with what she (as a psychological therapist) called the “homicide/suicide look,” and said he wanted to take their two-year-old son to the lake. The thought of what could happen to her children if she stayed in the situation is what motivated Kathryn to finally leave her husband. That morning, after her husband left, she called her father and her pastor for guidance. With their support, she made a very difficult decision. “I packed my car, packed everything I could get into the car, packed my two-year-old and myself, and drove to Jacksonville.”
Another difficult task she faced was finding a lawyer in North Carolina. She had felt isolated the entire time she lived in NC, and didn’t know where to go for help. She found the Rosen Law firm by searching online. “With Rosen, you’re not just getting a lawyer who will walk you through the processes; you’re getting resources that will help you make it through.”
Kathryn had always had a dream of completing her Master’s Degree in Theology, and felt that her husband’s constant verbal abuse stopped her from following through with that dream. She was complaining about this to her lawyer one day, when he gave her what she refers to as the best advice of her life. “He just said ‘Change it. If you don’t like where you’re at, change it.'” This advice stopped her dead in her tracks. It made her realize that she had to stop simply looking at her circumstances, and get back up and move on with her life. She has now completed that Master’s Degree, and hopes to go to foreign nations to do missionary work.
She also has advice for people in abusive relationships: “You’re not better off there, your children are not better off there.” She explains how, by staying in that kind of situation, you are destroying yourself and your family. “And enabling an abuser is never a good thing.”
She also stresses the importance of surrounding yourself with a strong support network, whether it is from your church, your family, or a support group. Kathryn found comfort in the Divorce Care group, “Because then you can see, ‘Wow, somebody’s on the other side of this, and they made it.'”
Kathryn is now the proud mother of a three-a
