If you grew up in a home with domestic violence, you experienced Childhood Domestic Violence or CDV.
We are currently conducting a story search for video stories about CDV that will be shared on our website and social media platforms. We are looking for women who want to share their story of growing up with domestic violence in their childhood home and their journey to overcome its impact in adulthood. We prefer your story in video format, but if you’re not comfortable sharing on camera, we are still interested in your story in written form.
If you are interested in contributing your story, please complete the form and follow the detailed filming and submission instructions below. Our vision is for interested woman to send in short videos (they can be filmed on your cell phone) answering a few questions about your experience growing up with CDV and where you are in life now.
Childhood Domestic Violence Story Submission Instructions
Childhood Domestic Violence (CDV) impacts 15 million children in the US alone and 40 million adult Americans grew up with it as children. It’s very common for those who experienced CDV (as well as other major childhood adversities) in their home to carry one or more of the following 10 faulty beliefs into adulthood: guilt, resentment, sadness, feeling alone, anger, hopelessness, worthlessness, fear, self-consciousness, and feeling unloved.
Also, CDV is a lightning rod for other major adversities. So if you experienced CDV, you most likely also experienced one or multiple other major Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) in your childhood home, which may include physical child abuse, sexual abuse, emotional abuse, physical neglect, emotional neglect, divorced parents, parental alcohol or drug abuse, mentally ill parent, incarceration of a parent.
Criteria for Your Video
Please submit a short 2-5 min video, filmed vertically (in portrait mode) and/or horizontally (landscape mode) of you speaking directly to the camera. Your video can be filmed on a cell phone.
Filming Tips:
•If you have a tripod or cell phone holder of some kind, please use that; alternatively, either hold your cell phone in your hand (with your arm fully extended) or sit down at a table or desk (about 18 inches to 2 feet away from you) and set up your camera with something behind it/under it to prop it upright
•Make sure your lighting is good and that there is nothing too distracting in your background
•Try to center your face in the top third/top half of the screen
•Avoid a lot of movement and background noise
•You can also use your laptop or computer camera for landscape videos
Topics and questions to address in your video:
• Describe your experience growing up in a home with domestic violence.
• Did you have a name for that experience growing up? Do you now? Did you know that you experienced “Childhood Domestic Violence (CDV)”? Does having a name for what you experienced help you?
• In your adult life, have you struggled with feeling guilty, resentful, sad, alone, angry, hopeless, worthless, fearful, self-conscious, or unloved?
• Have these negative feelings/beliefs impacted your physical health, emotional well-being, behaviors, relationships in negative ways?
• When and how did this begin to change? Did someone step in for you? Or if not, what other circumstance or event triggered a shift?
• Describe your journey to heal and overcome the negative impact.
• What is your life like now (e.g. work, relationships, hobbies, mental and physical health)?
• How did growing up in that home make you stronger? Do you feel like you are on your way to reaching your full potential?
• Do you have any inspirational words of hope for anyone else who grew up with CDV and is still struggling with the impact or repeating the cycle of violence?
How to Submit
Please send all video and written submissions to info@cdv.org. Videos should be in MP4 or MOV format. Written story submissions should also respond to the above bullet points and be submitted in a DOC format or in the body of an email. Please write “CDV Story Search” in the subject line.
Questions: If you have any questions, please reach out to Anna French at info@cdv.org.
