When Kaitlin began her first year at Kansas State University in 2009, she never imagined how much her life would change.

 

For decades, movies and television have portrayed domestic violence largely as the physical abuse of women. Less seldom does it illuminate verbal or mental domestic abuse. Psychological and physical abuse are painful realities for one in four women in the United States at some point in their lifetime, according to the National Institute of Justice and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Women ages 20-24 are the most vulnerable to intimate partner violence, 

 

Kaitlin is one of those women. 

 

Due to the constant presence of abuse within the media, the idea of it occurring insmall communities such as Riley County, Kan. seemed unreal. For Kaitlin, domestic violence is no longer a foreign problem that only television characters face. It is a sobering reality.

 

During her freshman year, with the coaxing of her mother, Kaitlin began dating a male who grew up near her hometown. He treated her well, at first.

 

“I was doted on,” Kaitlin said. “He would spend a lot of money on me and constantly take me out. He would say ‘you need new shoes, you need this, let me buy your art supplies for you’.”

 

Over the next two and a half years the relationship escalated from a loving one into one of manipulation and controlling aggression. Shoving, yelling and being called degrading names such as "slut" began normal dynamics in Kaitlin's relationship with the man she had promised to do whatever it took to stay with him. 

 

“I would do what I always did... apologize,” Kaitlin said. “That’s all I could do because I knew what I had done during the conversation. I felt like I pretty much signed my life away.”

 

After two years of abuse, Kaitlin sought assistance through the K-State Women’s Center, and left her boyfriend. During one of her first sessions, Kaitlin’s counselor compared her story with a cardboard cutout featuring signs of mental and physical abuse.

 

“I would make up every excuse to make him not sound bad. Every time I would say something, before I would say it, I would say ‘he’s such a good person, he’s such a good friend, he’s such a good brother’.” Kaitlin said. “[The counselor] basically walked me through each step and it was like check, check, check for the things to look for. I was just a textbook case of mental and physical abuse. Everything I said and everything he did lined up perfectly.”