Susan Dean joins us to share a Survivors many hurdles

Susan Dean was born on June 27, 1973 and lived in Hammond, Indiana for twenty-one years. After losing a child at the age of 16, she married for the first time a year later. The couple gave birth to a daughter and remained together until the abuse from her husband was too much to handle and they divorced a few years later but shared joint custody of their daughter. After finding her second husband and struggling to find work, the two of them, on the advice from her husband's friend, moved to Indianapolis, Indiana to make a fresh start. Susan was glad to go, after hiding the shame from her friends and family of yet another abusive husband. She found a promising career in the concrete pipe industry as an engineer and became very close with her co-workers. So close that they became concerned when she would show up at work with injuries inflicted by her husband. Her co-workers had enough and were willing to help her out of the situation she was in; and it was a success but it came at a large price. During the years she was married to her second husband, she was going through a custody battle with her first husband over their daughter. Many of the court dates she was unwilling to attend because of her appearance after an attack by her second husband. She eventually lost her rights to her daughter.