Annette John-Hall: The force behind the Walk to End Domestic Violence still rising

When LeAnna Washington first got up the strength to go public about her private life, all she would do was cry.

Merely giving voice to her horrific story was too painful even for her to hear.

Washington would talk about her life and wonder how she possibly endured all the abuse: the beatings by her mother, the sexual abuse by her mother's boyfriend, and, later, the unending violence inflicted by her husband.

"I never thought I was a victim. I just thought I was a beat-up wife," Washington says of her torturous eight-year marriage.

These days, victim is the last thing Washington is.

She is LeAnna M. Washington, Pennsylvania state senator, serving the Fourth District, which includes parts of Philadelphia and Montgomery Counties. She advocates tirelessly for her constituents, especially women and children. She cosponsored legislation that requires people who have Protection From Abuse orders filed against them to turn over their guns.

And at a youthful 65, she's a proud mother, grandmother, and great-grandmother.

Washington may have been beaten up, but she was never beaten down. And that's the message she's trying to send to women like her - that you can overcome your circumstances.

Which is why, three years ago, Washington established the Walk to End Domestic Violence. This year's 5K walk down Martin Luther King Drive is on Oct. 23 and 1,000 participants are expected, with proceeds going to support four Philadelphia domestic-violence programs.

Hard to imagine, looking around her spacious Mount Airy office - the walls adorned with three honorary doctoral degrees, civic citations, and public-service honors from her sorority, Alpha Kappa Alpha - that she was once homeless and on welfare, struggling to support three children.

"I should be crazy - eating out of a garbage can," she says.

The abuse started early, after her father left.

"When my father didn't want my mother anymore, she didn't want me," says Washington, an only child.

Washington's mother beat her with an ironing cord. She locked her daughter in the bedroom for hours. And when LeAnna was molested by her mother's boyfriend, her mother looked the other way.

It's not surprising, then, that the only way Washington knew how to express herself was with her fists. She got kicked out of West Philadelphia High School in 1961 and subsequently dropped out.

Pregnant at 17, married by 19, Washington was determined to make a home with her husband for her growing family.

From the outside, everything appeared sublime. The couple had a home in Mount Airy and a car and a truck parked in the driveway.

But, as everybody knows, appearances can be deceiving.

"He stayed out all night and didn't provide," Washington says of her husband. "We fought all the time - there was blood on the walls. We had no [drinking] glasses because we had thrown them all at each other."

"Every time he gave me a black eye, he told me he loved me."

But one incident pushed Washington to the brink.

The family puppy had had an accident on the floor. Washington's husband came in from work and stepped in it.

"He got me out of bed, twisted my arm, and stuck my face in the dog poop," she said. "I just decided I would kill myself."

The vodka and pills didn't work. After Washington was released from the hospital, she packed up her kids and the few belongings she had and fled to Detroit. It was 1972.

Eight months later, she returned to Philly, and slowly began to rise.

David Richardson, the late state representative, encouraged Washington to get her GED - and therapy. She eventually earned a master's in human services at Lincoln University.

While working for State Sen. Joe Rocks, she was elected representative for the 200th District in 1993, where she served until she won the Senate seat vacated by Allyson Y. Schwartz in 2005.

Washington plans to run for one more four-year term. By then, she'll be 71 - still enough time to try something new, she figures.

"One thing I've learned is that being a survivor is not the end of the world," she says. "It's the beginning."