October 7, 2011

A little gift for the volunteers who
attended the 2011 Volunteer Celebration
for Houston Area Women's Center.

I attended a very heart-warming event last night: the 2011 volunteer celebration for Houston Area Women’s Center (HAWC). I was one of the eight board members from Women of Wine (WOW) Charities at the celebration to accept the 2011 Volunteer Group of the Year award for our contributions of time and resources to HAWC.

We were all in tears during the client survivor story. Genova – a well-spoken young woman who suffered from child abuse and molestation before she was adopted away from her single mother by her grandparents – tearfully spoke to the group not as a victim, but as a grateful and proud survivor. She married a man who repeatedly beat her, until one night in April 2010 – as she was being removed bleeding and bruised from her home by EMTs – she promised herself that she would break the cycle of violence she had experienced during her life. After she left the hospital, she went to HAWC, who gave her shelter, counseling and advocacy to support her in building a life free from the effects of violence. The support also included help in getting a divorce, a job, a scholarship so she could go to college ... and a sense of worth. It was a beautiful, touching story that makes me sniffle even now.

Today I’m creating time to contact more potential donors to the WOW fundraising event on October 25. After last night’s HAWC event, I have a renewed inspiration to ask for auction donations for the WOW fundraiser. I’m not asking for myself. I’m asking for innocent women and children affected by domestic and sexual violence.