Fighting back: A survivor's story

“I tried to make it work…”

Too often this is the mentality taken by victims of domestic violence. More often than not, the effort to try and make it work comes from things like shared households, children, money, and even more commonly — fear.

A shared home and 18 years of shared life was what kept Trina (an alias) in an abusive relationship with her boyfriend.

Trina had lived all over the country and even in other countries before she met him. She had done a little bit of everything in the 40-plus years of her life, including joining the military, but her passion was skiing.

“I was living in Colorado and I was working at night so that I could ski during the day,” Trina said.

But then she met him.

He was handsome and funny and had a bit of a rough past, but he was trying to better himself — or at least that was what he kept telling Trina.

“There was good (redacted) and then there was bad (redacted),” Trina said. “He was smart and he was funny. And at times he was so incredibly artistic, but he had a darkness. I could see when it was coming too, his eyes would get dark and he would get almost delusional.”

By saying he got delusional, Trina describes him as the textbook definition of a narcissist.

He would say things like, “I’m the greatest blacksmith in the world,” or after he finished beating her up, he’d tell her that, “this is who I really am.”

It finally came to a head one night in 2019, when after a day of unpacking boxes from their most recent move for her — and after a night of drinking for him — Trina asked that his newly made bar friends didn’t come over to their house after they left the bar.

“He was angry with me for uninviting people, it really set him off,” Trina said. “When we got to the house we had already been arguing in the truck. He got out of the truck and started walking to the house, I had driven home and he waited for me to get out and that was when he attacked.”

It began with a look, one that Trina could recognize from a mile away.

“His eyes would get so dark,” she recalled. “His whole demeanor would shift.”

Trina tried to run back to the truck to hide, but when she got inside, she hit the wrong button and didn’t lock the door. She was then dragged from the truck where he began to hit and kick her.

“He was telling me that he would kill me if I didn’t go up to the house,” she said.

After such a vicious assault, Trina absolutely believed his threat, so she obeyed his order.

On her way up to the house, she saw another chance to make a run for it — through a gap in the railing and the staircase. She made a break for it and once again, he caught her at the truck before she could close the door.

Now stuck inside the cab of the truck he began to unleash every ounce of his undeserved fury on Trina.

BANG!

BANG!

Every hit to her skull resulted in a bigger flash of light in her eyes.

“I thought that he was going to kill me right there in the truck,” Trina said.

She finally fought her way out to the street, where the hitting turned into choking and it became clear to Trina that this night was ending one of two ways.

“He said that he was going to kill me if I didn't get up there to the house right away and I thought that if I went inside the house I was gonna die anyway,” Trina said. “He had never beaten me up outside of the house before, it had always been behind closed doors…and it had never been this bad before. He had cracked my rib and bruised my hands and face and head. I knew I was going to die.”

Trina began to think of what she could do as she climbed the stairs and suddenly she remembered that she’d unpacked a gun earlier in the day. A single shot, Thompson-Encore handgun. This realization gave Trina the last drop of energy she had left in her reserves.

She ran inside the house, grabbed the gun, and when the moment was right — she shot him.

The bullet didn’t kill him, instead it passed through part of his face and exited his head.

In a moment of compassion, Trina called 9-1-1, unable to let a person whom she had trusted, lived with, and even loved, die in front of her. Even though this person had made her once vibrant life a clouded, bruised, living hell.

Shoshone County Sheriff's Office dispatchers had already been informed of a domestic disturbance in the area after a neighbor heard screaming and called the police. Upon arrival, they found him bleeding on the porch from the single gunshot wound, but it was plain to see that the shooting had been done in self-defense.

Trina was taken to Shoshone Medical Center for treatment, where the injuries sustained were described by the ER nurse as the “worst case of domestic violence she’s seen in her 26 years working the emergency room.”

Maybe a part of Trina died that day…

But another part of Trina woke up.

Trina the survivor.

Trina the overcomer.

Trina the fighter.

In the two and a half years since that fateful night, Trina has begun a journey of healing and helping.

With the assistance of the Shoshone County Crisis and Resource Center (SCCRC), Trina is now an advocate for those who have survived, those who need help, and those looking for even the tiniest bit of hope.

She had to walk through the jury trial of her attacker, where she was painted as almost deserving of the beatings that she had taken and that if anyone was the victim — it was him.

“He couldn’t recognize any fault in himself, during the trial he called it a tussle,” Trina recalled. “He tried to turn it around that he was the victim because he was the one who had been shot. They said that I had premeditated it.”

Despite the futile mud slinging, he was found guilty of attempted strangulation and domestic battery and is planned to be sentenced in the coming weeks.

Trina’s message to those other people who are in the same situation as she is simple.

Get out.

She understands how and why that may be difficult, but when you weigh your life against survival, getting out may be the only option.

“You had to love them at some point, even just a little in order to get through it and to stay,” Trina said. “You think you can change the person or help them to be better, I know I thought that, but that isn’t your job. I was there for him, I protected him, and he just knocked me around. That was the appreciation I got. I’m a little angry at myself for not getting away sooner, but it’s just not easy.”

What Trina realized is that it’s not your job to fix a person who is hurting you, but it’s also not your job to be their punching bag while they figure it out.

This is where resources like the SCCRC can be incredible assets to small communities like the Silver Valley, as they can provide assistance to entire families in times of crisis.

“They sought me out and found me,” Trina said of SCCRC. “They came knocking on my door the following day and they were with me every step of the way.”

Trina is rediscovering friendships, some from as far back as her grade school days. She’s even connecting with some people in her community and building new relationships in a way that simply felt like it was impossible to or wasn’t allowed before.

Trina says her knees need a little work, but one day she might even try skiing again.

October is National Domestic Violence Awareness Month and the Shoshone County Crisis and Resource Center wants all residents of the Silver Valley to know that there is help out there.

If you or anyone you know is in an abusive relationship of any kind, they offer a 24-hour crisis hotline with trained advocates who can help. That number is 208-556-0500.