Zenda-Lee Williams
Rise Survivor

My name is Zenda-Lee Williams. Most people call me Zen.

I am a survivor of domestic violence. I am also the founder and director of Rise Against Domestic Violence SA, a nonprofit I built from a kitchen table in Gqeberha alongside my husband, who directs Rise with me.

Rise is volunteer led. It was built in real life, with real people, real messages, real court dates, real fear, real paperwork, real survivors, and real women giving their time when nobody was watching.

Rise does not exist because of me alone. Rise exists because of the women who keep showing up.

Our Head of Legal gives her time, knowledge, and experience to survivors who need legal guidance and do not know where to start. Our Head of Counselling holds space for people in some of the most painful and overwhelming moments of their lives. Our Head of Intake is often the first calm voice a frightened survivor hears after finally reaching out. Behind them is a team of volunteers who answer messages, sit on calls, guide survivors, explain processes, help organise support, listen properly, and carry parts of this work I could never carry alone.

Without these volunteers, Rise is nothing.

Without them, I am one woman with a laptop, too many open tabs, and a heart that wants to do more than one person can safely carry. With them, Rise is a working, breathing organisation that has supported more survivors than I can count.

I am an accredited divorce and family mediator. I am trauma-informed trained. I am autistic, which means I see patterns most people miss, and once I see them, I cannot unsee them.

I am divorced and remarried to a beautiful man who stood beside me through the hardest part of my life. He supports me in every way, and he loves my children like they are his own. I did not think I would ever be this happy in this life, not after what I experienced, but here I am, and I do not take that for granted.

I am also a mom, and my children are my world. My home is loud, full, messy, and alive, exactly how I like it. I am also mom to two black labs, who are very much my children too. They just came with fur, more attitude, and slightly worse boundaries.

I also write.

I write because I lived it, and because the version of me who was still inside it could not find anyone saying the truth plainly enough. Every book felt clinical. Every quote felt too neat. Every explanation seemed to miss the part where you are scared, confused, ashamed, exhausted, and still trying to act normal while your life is quietly falling apart.

So I started writing what I needed back then.

Short pieces for the survivor who has five seconds before the person who hurt her walks back into the room. Longer pieces for readers who want the parts people avoid because they are uncomfortable. Pages from my old notepad, written when I was still scared and trying to make sense of things I did not yet have language for. Blunt pieces from the other side, where the behaviour finally has a name and the confusion starts to clear.

I do not soften it. I do not perform healing. I do not pretend I have it all figured out.

What I will not do is lie to you about abuse, the systems survivors face, or the road that starts after leaving.

Everything I share here comes from lived experience, the survivors I have walked beside, or the work carried by the volunteers who built Rise with me.

That is the only rule.