Adele's journey from lifetime of abuse to building tribe of support
Friday, 7 August 2020
Adele Keefe had been free of an abusive relationship for two years when her ex-partner cornered her in her driveway and hit her over the head with a cricket bat.
It was at that point she contemplated taking her own life as it felt like the only way out.
The abuse in the preceding 20 years had been extreme. On one occasion, Keefe was kidnapped at gunpoint and thrown 30 metres from a moving car somewhere between Napier and Taupo.
It wasn’t uncommon for her to be hit over the head and knocked out. She recalled times when she had two black eyes, swollen to the extent she couldn’t see.
Keefe recovered from those events and many others like it. She believes she survived so she could help others.
**READ MORE:
* Mana Wāhine: Eight years of helping young women find their place
* Women speak about overcoming abuse at Mongrel Mob Kingdom event in Hamilton
**
“I was saved for a reason, there has to be some good out of it otherwise it is a waste of my life.”
Keefe said she was “brought up in the gangs”. Her father was violent to her mother. As a teenager, she struggled with the loss of her older sister to suicide.
Keefe met her first partner when she was a 14-year-old and dropped out of school. It was the beginning of an 11-year relationship which often involved violence.
When she left that relationship, she thought the violence had ended, but with her next partner, a gang member, it was even more extreme.
About seven years ago, police visited her home after neighbours called 111 over another domestic dispute.
A detective told Keefe the next time he left her home, it would be with her in a body bag. That struck a chord and it was the start of a chain of events that set her on the path to where she is today.
The detective worked to get Keefe into a safe house. She spent two years on her own, before her ex-partner, recently released from prison cornered her in the driveway.
Without hope, down on her knees and at a loss at what to do, Keefe said she felt a calling to head to the South Island.
“I didn’t actually know where I was going to go, I just put my three kids in the car and left.
“I said to mum, ‘I just feel like I’ve had this encounter, I feel like I want to get to know Jesus and I feel like he is my way out’.”
Several days later, she was driving along State Highway 6 into Nelson with the Western Ranges stretched out in front of her. As she followed the road, weaving around the coast at Atawhai, Keefe broke down.
“The boys said, ‘why are you crying mum?’ and I said, ‘this is where we are going to start our new life and this is where we are going to be safe’.”
Keefe was starting from scratch. She knew no-one in Nelson and had no family here.
She has since worked hard to overcome what she experienced earlier in life. For domestic violence survivors, issues with trust, abandonment, jealousy and identity were common, as was post-traumatic stress disorder.
“The most dangerous time is when you leave the relationship and once you get through that, you are left with this whole mess to clean up and it’s you, you’re the mess, but you weren’t.
“It’s like our mana gets stood on and near ripped out from within us but it is never lost because it is who we are.”
Keefe said after the police and Women’s Refuge had done their job, it could feel like the support dropped away. She couldn’t even walk into a coffee shop.
“You are starting over, you have to recreate yourself.
“When everyone is gone, you think, who am I? What do I do? I don’t know anyone here, I don’t know how to socialise, I am anxious around people.
“You need a squad of mana wāhine, you need a tribe of women that can say, hey I got you.
“So basically I am building a tribe.”
She’s had weekly therapy for the last two years, taken part in parenting courses and experienced the support of a mentor, something she credits with being a crucial part of her recovery.
“She took me to a cafe and I felt like a lady, like I was finally being listened to and she just let me babble on, she built a relationship over time with me.”
Now, Keefe is bringing that support to other women in need. Her charitable trust, Mana Wāhine: women of strength and dignity, aims to empower women of any culture, ethnicity or religion to rebuild themselves after an abusive relationship.
She plans to launch the programme in October, it will include a marae wānanga that teaches women how to deliver their pepeha, an introduction in te reo Māori and will also feature mau rākau, traditional Māori martial art.
With the support of Paul Hampton from Victory Boxing, she planned a six-week box fit class.
Keefe had put together a boundaries programme that she would teach herself.
Other activities would include art classes, budget and business advice, and hiking trips.
“When you have been so held down and you are not allowed to associate with anyone, you are isolated and you haven’t been able to reach any goals, just being at the bottom of that hill and getting to the top of it will be so empowering.”
She had found others in the top of the south who had fled here to escape abusive relationships. She is already working with two women and is holding her first event to raise funds for Mana Wāhine this weekend.
The ultimate goal was to support women so they could go on to support others.
“That’s just my heart’s desire, I have a passion for it, I know I have some tools in my kete from walking it and the journey I’ve had to help other women.
“It’s not so much that I wanna empower them as it is I wanna remind them who they are.”
A fundraiser for Mana Wāhine is being held at The Beachcomber Hotel, Nelson on Saturday at 12.30pm. Tickets are $25, more information about the event can be found on the Facebook event page.