Survivors’ Anthem Series #57: “A Broken Wing” by Martina McBride
For My Mom, Who Went Through Hell and Back, and Still Came Out Singing
Welcome to Domestic Violence Awareness Month. 💜
To begin this month, I knew I wanted to return to the artist who started the Survivors’ Anthem Series.
Now, 56 songs later, we're coming full circle with another Martina McBride song that has always carried an incredibly powerful message:
But this time, I'm not writing primarily about myself. This one is for my mom. The woman I watched go through hell and back. The woman I watched survive domestic violence.
The woman whose wings were hurt again and again, but who somehow never completely stopped trying to fly. And most importantly, the woman who still came out singing on the other side.
Before I Understood the Word “Survivor”
When you're a child growing up around domestic violence, you don't necessarily have words for what you're witnessing.
You just know something isn't right. You notice the tension. The fear. The control. The way everyone learns to read a room.
You see someone you love being treated in ways they don't deserve. And when that person is your mother, you carry pieces of it too.
I watched my mom endure things no person should have to endure. There were times I wished I could protect her. Times I wanted to make everything stop. Times I couldn't understand why our lives had to be this way.
But I was a child. I couldn't fix it. What I could do was watch. And what I witnessed was a woman surviving.
A Broken Wing
That's why this song makes me think of her.
There is something incredibly powerful about the image of someone whose wings have been broken but who still finds a reason to sing.
Domestic violence doesn't only hurt someone physically. It can chip away at confidence, independence, identity, self-worth, and dreams. It can make someone question whether they're capable of building a different life.
And when you watch someone you love experience that, there are moments when you wonder how much more one person can possibly carry.
My mom carried a lot. But somehow, underneath everything, there was still her. Maybe battered. Maybe exhausted. Maybe unsure. But still there.
I Saw Her Go Through Hell
I don't use those words lightly. I watched my mom go through hell. I saw the realities of domestic violence from inside the home. I saw what control could do. I saw what fear could do.
I saw what happened when the person who was supposed to love someone became the person causing them pain.
Those experiences shaped me. They shaped the stories I eventually wrote. They shaped the advocate I became. But as an adult, I can also look back and understand something I couldn't fully appreciate as a child:
My mom was surviving too.
She wasn't simply my mother inside those memories. She was a woman trying to navigate circumstances that were incredibly complicated. She was a human being carrying her own fear, trauma, responsibilities, hopes, and dreams. And she deserved so much better.
And Then I Watched Her Rebuild
This is the part of her story I never want lost. Because her story didn't end inside that house. She got out. And then she rebuilt, piece by piece.
She went back to school. She built a career. She rediscovered independence. She learned what it meant to trust again. She found love again. She became a grandmother. She created new memories.
She kept living.
The woman I once watched endure so much refused to let what happened become the entirety of who she was. And that has taught me more about survival than she probably realizes.
She Still Sang
There is one idea in “A Broken Wing” that reaches me more deeply than anything else:
She still sang.
That's my mom. After everything, she still found reasons to laugh. To love, to learn, to build, to help other people. To be there for her children, to enjoy her grandchildren. To make memories. To keep becoming herself.
That's what survival can look like.
It doesn't mean the wounds never existed. It doesn't mean there aren't scars. It doesn't mean the past magically disappears. It means the person who was hurt is still allowed to have a future.
And my mom did.
The Woman Behind “Mama”
Readers of my books know her as Mama. You've seen pieces of her through my eyes. You've seen the home we lived in. You've seen pieces of what we survived together.
But there is an entire human being behind the word Mama.
A little girl who experienced her own losses. A young woman who had dreams. A mother trying to protect her children while navigating abuse herself. A woman who eventually had to figure out who she was outside of survival.
And someday, I hope to tell more of her story. Because she isn't only a supporting character in mine.
Her story matters too.
What My Mom Taught Me About Strength
Strength isn't always loud. Sometimes strength is making breakfast the next morning, going to work, taking care of your children, going back to school, starting over when starting over feels terrifying.
Allowing yourself to love again, building a career, laughing after years when laughter felt impossible.
And sometimes strength is simply refusing to let someone else permanently silence your song.
My mom taught me that you can go through hell and still find beauty afterward. She taught me that rebuilding doesn't happen overnight. She taught me that your past can be part of your story without being allowed to write every chapter that follows.
And she taught me something else:
A broken wing doesn't mean you will never fly again.
From “Independence Day” to “A Broken Wing”
There couldn't be a more meaningful way for me to begin Domestic Violence Awareness Month.
This series started with Martina McBride.
#1 — “Independence Day.”
And now:
#57 — “A Broken Wing.”
Both songs bring me back to the realities of domestic violence in different ways.
But today, I'm thinking about the woman I watched live through those realities.
My mom.
This month isn't theoretical for me. Domestic violence shaped my childhood. It shaped my family, it shaped my writing, it shaped my advocacy.
And it shaped the woman who raised me.
But abuse does not get to claim the entirety of our family's story.
We survived it.
And Mama's story didn't end there.
Mom, This Anthem Is for You
Mom,
I saw more than you probably ever wanted me to see. I saw the hard days. I saw the fear. I saw the pain. But I also got to see what came afterward.
I watched you rebuild. I watched you go back to school. I watched you create a career. I watched you find yourself again. I watched you love again.
I watched you become so much more than what someone tried to reduce you to.
And through every chapter, somehow...you kept singing.
I am proud to be your daughter. I am proud of the woman you became. And I hope you know that your survival helped teach me how to find my own wings too.
So Survivors’ Anthem #57 belongs to you.
For everything you endured.
For everything you rebuilt.
For every time life tried to silence you.
And for the fact that after going through hell and back...you still came out singing. 💜
💜 Domestic Violence Awareness Month
As we begin Domestic Violence Awareness Month, I want to remember that behind every statistic is a human being.
A mother.
A daughter.
A father.
A son.
A friend.
A coworker.
A neighbor.
Someone with dreams, relationships, fears, talents, and an entire life beyond the abuse they're experiencing.
Survivors are not defined solely by what was done to them.
My mom isn't.
I'm not.
And neither are you.
Awareness means listening to survivors, learning the many forms abuse can take, supporting people without judgment, and remembering that leaving and healing can be complicated.
Most importantly, these conversations cannot disappear when October ends.
🛡️ Survivor Support & Safety Awareness
That's also why I'm proud to collaborate with Hootie Personal Safety Alarms as part of my advocacy.
💜 For every 4 Hooties I sell, 1 is donated to a domestic violence shelter.
Visit gethootie.com and use code JANE for 10% off.
A personal safety alarm is one possible tool, not a substitute for an individualized safety plan or professional support. Every survivor's circumstances are different, and survivors deserve choices and control over decisions involving their safety.
This Domestic Violence Awareness Month, I want to continue turning awareness into action wherever I can.
💜 Continue the Journey
57 songs. 57 stories on the Survivors' Anthem Series. And this one belongs to Mama.
🎧 Follow the Survivors’ Anthem Series: The Music That Helped Us Heal on Spotify, YouTube, and my blog.
📖 Read the International Impact Book Award-winning Because of Jane, where pieces of Mama's story and our family's survival are woven into my own.
📚 Hot of the press, Because of Maddie: The Girl Who Said, “ENOUGH!” continues that story during Domestic Violence Awareness Month.
🦋 And through The Jane Project, survivors can share the people, objects, songs, and memories that helped them keep going.
This month, wear purple.
Learn.
Listen.
Speak.
Support.
Believe survivors.
And remember the people whose wings may have been wounded but whose voices were never truly gone.
Mom, they tried to break your wings.
But you still sang.
And I heard you. 💜
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