Caution: This story contains details of intimate partner violence.
FERGUS – Helene DeWitt has lived a life of abuse and fear, with a disability she didn’t understand – all of which left her feeling abandoned and unloved most of her life.
Things started to turn around for her in her 50s and now, at 71, she has the “perfect” man in her life, God in her heart, and peace in her soul.
It’s been a difficult journey and DeWitt, who now lives in Fergus, has shared her story in book form.
A Broken and Crushed Heart Restored: Surviving in a Dysfunctional Home is available online and in local bookstores.
DeWitt never imagined she’d write a book, but friends who heard her story encouraged her to write it down. The writing was therapeutic; publishing has been exhilarating, she said.
But her story is tragic.
Her mother was an alcoholic with emotional trauma of her own, and she was ill-equipped to be a mother.
DeWitt has Tourette syndrome that was undiagnosed most of her life and certainly back in the day, was vastly misunderstood.
“I didn’t know I was different,” DeWitt said in a phone interview. “My Dad would say, ‘Stop doing that,’ but I never knew what I was doing.
“I was rejected by my mom and at school I was often ignored. I had no social or medical supports. I was not prepared for life as an adult.”
Her first husband had an affair with her mother. Her second partner was abusive, and she describes a particular beating she received that prompted her to leave.
“It was a detective who helped me get out of that relationship,” she said.
DeWitt was raised in the Catholic church and that posed some problems as well.
Her mother said God gave DeWitt her nervous disorder to punish her.
“I always believed in God but never understood why he gave me this disorder,” she said.
It wasn’t until she was in her 50s and in a Bible study group that she came to understand and believe in her heart that God did not give her Tourette’s.
“I felt so happy in my heart,” she said.
“All my life I was told God gave me this.
“Now I know God loves me. God brought me through a lot.”
DeWitt said she feels that God has communicated with her over the years.
It was God who told to her take her kids and leave her second partner. It was God who told her she was loved and loveable. And it was God who told her to write down her thoughts and feelings about her mother.
“When God told me to type it up, I went from self-pity to a free woman who can write a story about my past and give glory to God,” she said.
“God wants to heal you everywhere you hurt. He wants to take your shattered heart and make it whole again.”
DeWitt met Siebe DeWitt, the man who would become her husband, in 2021. Siebe’s wife of 53 years died in 2020.
They hit it off, saw increasingly more of each other, and got married in May of 2022.
The journey has been long and hard for DeWitt, but finding light through the darkness, finding love through the hate, and realizing that God has been with her all along, has been freeing, empowering and enlightening.
“You and I must make the choice to hold to God’s word, it won’t be handed to us on a platter,” she writes in the book.
“We must practice the Word of God. It’s time to get on God’s train, folks. Love God, love yourself, and love others.”
A Broken and Crushed Heart Restored: Surviving in a Dysfunctional Home can be found on Amazon, Indigo and other online book sellers.
Locally it can be purchased at Magic Pebble Books in Elora and Made in Holland shop in Fergus.
