Mom and Children Hiding from Abusive Husband

My name is Rachel and I am making this emergency fundraiser on behalf of S, the mother of 3 beautiful children, who have been on the run since Wednesday 4th, October 2023. For the sake of her safety and the safety of her children, I cannot divulge her name or location. She will be referred to as S.

This is S's story. Please consider donating if you're able and sharing this GoFundMe if you can. The money will be used towards getting her reestablished.

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Four days ago, I found myself in an unimaginable nightmare, where religious delusion had twisted my husband’s mind beyond recognition. It was one of the first cold nights this year when my three children and I were forced to leave everything we had ever known with only the clothes on our backs. Not even a pull-up for my sleepy 2-year old, who was still dressed in shorts and a t-shirt from the warm day. We ran for our lives.

The disintegration of our 13-year marriage was a slow descent into madness, driven by my husband’s escalating religious fanaticism. He had been fervently reading the Bible on his cell phone, convinced that he was receiving divine guidance. Just days before our escape, he roamed the woods in the dead of night, proclaiming that God was leading him to some mysterious revelation.

This descent into religious extremism had been brewing for weeks, and I initially attributed it to the recent passing of his father. Little did I know, it was far deeper and darker than grief. It was a Wednesday, and my husband and mother in law decided to intercept my children at the bus stop and hide them with his family’s friends. He, along with his mother, confiscated my purse and cell phone before forcibly taking me away, subjecting me to relentless verbal abuse, withholding my medication, threatening me to obey or lose my children, and coercing me into an unwarranted drug test at the hospital. I was accused of unimaginable things – drug use, drugging my husband, deceit, turning my back on God, and the destruction of our family. I was branded a terrible mother, told I’d never see my children again, threatened with homelessness, and all the while pressured to embrace God and beg for forgiveness.

I was compelled to surrender my phone’s PIN, and I was interrogated about my contact with my sister, the only family I had left and the sole person they believed could come to my aid. I underwent the drug test, which I passed, although it did not seem to matter to them. I was not allowed to spend a single moment alone with a doctor or nurse in that hospital, for fear that I would beg for help. I wasn’t even allowed to use the restroom alone.

I found myself sitting in that hospital waiting room, right between the two of them, crying my eyes out from worry for my children and fear. I was in the same clothes I had planned to wear to the bus stop, with my phone and purse locked safely away in their van so that I could not run. The people that I thought were my family had sinister intentions – to lock me away on the farm, far from civilization, with no means to contact my sister. My husband told me how life was going to be when we got home, he planned to burn my belongings, believing the house needed to be purged of what he deemed evil. He was going to take my children from me, telling them that I wanted time away from them. I was going to be relieved of any money or bank cards I had, I was going to stop eating any of the foods I liked, I was going to have to submit to the counseling they chose, eventually I would attend the church they chose, I would stop taking the medications I was on, and I would not talk back to him in any way while all of this was going on. His mother stood by his side, reinforcing his every word. They were planning to rip away every source of happiness until I found God and was forgiven for what I had done. I have never been so scared in my life.

Earlier, at the moment I knew this was going to be life or death, I managed to send my sister a single text – “911” – before my husband snatched my phone away. That text likely saved my life. My sister has always been my hero, and she knew me better than anyone. She contacted the police and rallied friends to rescue me from that gravel drive way. And they did. My sister saved my life and the lives of my children.

The police were waiting for us when the van pulled into that remote driveway out on the farm. The officer allowed me to step away from that van, and the friends my sister had called arrive at that moment to get me out of there. I ran to them, begging them to help me find my babies. The police allowed us to leave, we got to my babies and after many tearful hugs loaded them in the car, and my friends graciously offered me shelter while I navigate pressing charges and the daunting task of rebuilding our lives, from housing to changing schools. My children and I fled with nothing, in the dead of night. They need warm clothes, shoes, and toothbrushes. They cry themselves to sleep, missing their cozy beds and beloved stuffed animals left behind in that house – a life we can never return to.

We have no car, no income, and no family to turn to. All I possess is an unwavering determination to survive and create a new, brighter future for my children – a future far beyond the horrors of our past. If you can find a way to help us, I will use every penny to fortify a safe and happy life for those kids. They deserve it.