Feb. 3, 2019 – Hartford, WI – In an effort to draw attention to domestic abuse and Friends, Inc. in West Bend reporter Samantha Sali is attempting to run 200 miles by October. Her story is below.
I’m running 200 miles by October (domestic violence awareness month) to shed a light on violence against women and raise money for Washington County’s only domestic abuse and sexual assault service provider, Friends, Inc.
I’ve been advocating against domestic violence since 2015 and, in 2017, when my mom needed help leaving my abusive father, the local Washington County shelter, Friends Inc, went above and beyond to help her heal.
Friends, Inc. Inc is a multi-faceted organization providing trauma-informed services to those exposed to domestic violence and sexual assault. They have been the sole provider of domestic abuse and sexual assault services in Washington County since 1978. Over the last decade they annually provided; 5,680 shelter nights to 100 individuals, responded to over 1,300 crisis calls, provided outreach services to 370 individuals (including 525 art therapy sessions with 75 children), and presented 250 prevention classes to 5,300 youth and adults.
I started this #Running4Her challenge to not only thank Friends Inc. for its services to the people within my community by raising money for them, but I also wanted to use this as an opportunity to bring awareness to this epidemic.
Mile 11 Update
The bitter cold weather and our recent snow day has impacted my ability to do a few runs. Given winter won’t be over for several weeks, I’ll be getting a gym membership in the next few days so I can run some of these miles inside. Until then, if you have any brand recommendations to stay warm, I’d love to hear them.
As of today, I’ve logged 11 miles and look forward to seeing that number increase once I start running indoors on cold days.
The most exciting news I can share in my running update is that two local news channels contacted me about my run.
Click HERE to read more and find out how much I’ve raised so far.