Being 8 years old for most children is a time when they can be as carefree as the wind, with stress-free play activities being the highlight of their day.

Not so for Valerie Nicholas. Her life at that age, when she lived in Roanoke, Va., was anything but carefree. For Nicholas, it was a time when a real-life nightmare began that started with the death of her mother, a nurse, who died of cancer in 1972.

"My mom only lasted a month after being diagnosed with lung cancer, and she died in front of me, holding my hand," Nicholas recalled.

After her mom died, Nicholas' father, an actor, tap dancer and singer, started having parties at their house. He became an alcoholic and often brought home his drinking buddies, who Nicholas said sexually abused her.

At the time, Nicholas' older sister was overseas in the military. One of her two older brothers still lived at home, but she said she was too afraid to tell him what her father's friends, including his girlfriend, were doing to her.

"She (his girlfriend) choked me once and said she'd kill me if I told anyone about the sexual abuse," Nicholas said. "She gave me bad beatings and at a time when I was already feeling abandoned with the death of my mom, she said they'd send me away if I told."

When Nicholas became a teenager, she found herself in battered relationships with boyfriends that continued when she became an adult. When she was 22, a man she was dating beat her almost to death after she confronted him publicly about cheating on her. After the argument, he lured her away from home by promising to take her to dinner to make up for his behavior.

"I'd put on my finest dress and when we were driving on the highway and passed by the exit for the fancy restaurant, I asked him where we were going," she said. "I noticed then that he'd taken the knobs of the door locks off, and he told me he was going to kill me because I had embarrassed him by confronting him. He took me down a dark road and beat the crap out of me. I played dead and he finally left me there."

Nicholas walked home, several miles away, bloody and bruised. Because at that time her father was a blind, double amputee due to diabetes, he told her he couldn't help her and encouraged her to leave town, which she did. With $4.73 in her purse, Nicholas went to Washington, D.C., where she found a job as a clerk-typist with the Department of Justice.

"But I didn't break the cycle of violence because I stayed in denial and didn't address it," she said. "After the physical scars are gone, you have to deal with the emotional scars, which can drive you crazy if you don't address it."

And since she didn't, over the next 10 years Nicholas went from one abusive relationship to the next. When she worked for a member of Congress on Capital Hill, she often wore shades to hide black eyes or turtlenecks and long sleeves in the summer to cover bruises. But in 1995, a deeper tragedy struck when a boyfriend beat her when she was seven months pregnant with his child.

"He was beating me and my baby's heart stopped. He got two days in jail and a fine of less than $100 for it," she said. "That experience caused me to take a good look at myself."

But even so, like many victims, Nicholas had no point of reference of what a healthy relationship looked like. She went back to her boyfriend, who continued to beat her, got pregnant again and had a miscarriage that required surgery. Shortly afterwards, Nicholas lost her home, filed for bankruptcy and went into a deep depression.

"I was at my lowest point and couldn't function. I turned to God," she said.

As she fought to recover physically and mentally over the next two years, Nicholas said her true breakthrough came when she began seeing a therapist.

"It was hard getting back on track, but the counselors told me I was wonderful and didn't deserve to be hit, which was foreign language to me because my father's girlfriend always told me I wouldn't amount to anything," Nicholas said. "Diana Ross' song, 'I'm Coming Out,' became my theme and I warped that album I played it so much."

Nicholas' luck with men didn't improve and she had two nervous breakdowns and a heart attack in the early 2000s. To motivate herself, Nicholas put positive phrases on her refrigerator that she read daily to keep from slipping back into her old ways.

In the end, she said, it was her strong faith in God that caused her to turn her life around and accomplish goals such as working in the White House, on the U.S. Senate's Commerce Committee and, in 2005, graduating from Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government Senior Executive Fellows program. She now works full time for a lobbyist in D.C.

This year, Nicholas founded her own organization, Love Is Not Enough, so she can mentor other victims. She leaves her business cards in restaurants and grocery stores with the hope that someone who needs help will pick one up. She also talks to strangers: While getting her car repaired she started up a conversation with another woman, Sonya Britt, of Laurel, who turned out to be in a verbally abusive relationship.

"She prayed with me and said whenever you want to talk call, and I would after my husband and I had arguments, sometimes 10 and 11 o'clock at night," Britt said. "She suggested we go to counseling, which we did, and now he's in Bible study and we're fine. I'd probably be divorced now if I hadn't talked to her."

One day last month, as she sifted through stacks of brochures and pamphlets on domestic violence that she wants to share with others, Nicholas became reflective and said, "I get asked all the time how did I break the circle of violence and I tell them I had to decide that the abuse I was going through was not normal and that it was going to stop. When I see warning signs in a guy now, I back off ... because no man will ever take a swing at me today. "

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