Surviving with sunshine, Verna’s Story

SHERMAN, Texas (KXII) - This is the seventh edition of HER Story, KXII’s partnership with the Grayson Crisis Center designed to highlight women who have redefined success.

We set out in March with the goal of changing the way our community values each other and we believe it’s working.

But for this edition of HER Story, we are changing the script.

October is domestic violence awareness month, so to lead into that, we chose to highlight someone who overcame a domestic abuse situation.

She is more than a survivor.

She is a ray of hope for anyone who is walking the path she once did.

Verna Morneau is a wife, a mother, a grandmother, a career woman, a volunteer and an advocate.

Her friends say she never stops moving.

“To me, it’s just fulfilling in its own way and it gives me great joy,” she says.

For Verna, finding joy wasn’t always this easy.

“I like to have that attitude of I want to do everything 110% with a smile on my face,” says Verna. “Because you never know who needs that smile.”

Verna is a domestic abuse survivor.

“I got away from that, with the help of the crisis center,” says Verna.

She says after eight years of horrific abuse she is counting her blessings.

“Daily, daily. I’m going to get teary-eyed,” she says. “Daily, I mean I look at where I am and where I could have been.”

She knows the fact that her story has a happy ending is rare and many others end tragically.

“About eight years ago when he went to prison, I was like I want to be involved in the community because I want people to know that they can get past this,” she says.

So she set out to help others like her.

“If I can be just one, that one voice, for that one person, for that one woman that needs to hear that, that’s everything to me,” says Verna.

She says success comes from thinking outside yourself, providing others with the hope it takes to lift them out of circumstances like hers.

She challenges everyone to open their eyes and their hearts to the people around them.

“They need to care about it,” she says. “It’s someone’s life.”

It took a long time to get there. But Verna says that makes her success sweeter.

“Would you say that you’re successful?”

“I would.”

To nominate someone you think has redefined success, or to learn more about this program and how it aims to prevent violence in our community, find the Grayson Crisis Center’s HER Story page here.

This publication was supported by the Cooperative Agreement Grant # 6 NUF2CE002508-02-02, funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Its contents are solely the responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Department of Health and Human Services, the Texas Department of State Health Services or the Texas Office of the Attorney General.

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