Vanessa Parish is taking part in a charity boxing match this weekend
A woman is fighting to raise money for a domestic abuse charity. Vanessa Parish, 36, from Withernsea, is “excited and nervous” ahead of Saturday’s charity boxing bout.
Battle At The Seaside is back again for 2025 and being held at Withernsea on Saturday, August 23. Gates open at Withernsea Playing Fields from 1pm and the first fight is at 2pm.
Vanessa’s chosen charity is the East Riding Domestic Abuse Trust, which was set up in 2003. It helps people who are going through “all different types of domestic abuse“, Vanessa said.
The charity is run “purely through donations”, she said. It helps people start again from scratch after leaving an abusive relationship by providing household items and school uniforms for children.
Vanessa told Hull Daily Mail: “You can’t always see domestic abuse, especially if it not just physical, but mental and emotional. It creeps in and you become blind to it.”
She said domestic abuse is “more common than people think”. In the Hull and East Riding area, there are frequent court hearings and Vanessa described the problem as an “everyday occurrence”.
“It is quite scary, you become isolated and you don’t really talk to people about it,” she said. For anyone living with abuse, whether physical or mental, she advised: “Try and talk to someone. Don’t keep everything to yourself.”
She said: “Get some help from anywhere. It can be your friends, family, doctors. If you have got children, then the school or health visitor can always point you in the right direction.
“I know it is not easy. People will look at you and think, ‘If this is happening, then just walk away’, but it is really not as easy as that. People need to not judge and be there to support each other.
“People need to know they are not alone because it is a very lonely place. Hold your head up – you have not done anything wrong.
“There are times it can go around in a circle. Everything is really good for a while, then it switches, and then it starts all over again.”
Vanessa said Battle At The Seaside will be a “good, fun day”. She added: “I am going up so third so it is quite early on which is nice, I haven’t got to wait around and get the nerves later on.”
Training has been taking place at Eastside Gym. Vanessa said: “We have all been training for the last eight weeks, there are quite a few local people, we have been sparring and learning all different techniques of boxing and all the stances and different types of punches we can do.
“When I started doing the first training, I thought, ‘Oh my goodness, what have I let myself in for?’ It is really hard work and quite tiring, but I was up for it and you get to raise money for charity as well.”
She added: “When tomorrow comes, we have all picked a song to walk down to the ring with. We get into the ring and there are three rounds of two minutes and we battle it out.”
Vanessa has picked the song Say My Name by Florence & The Machine and Morgan Seatree. She will be fighting ‘Steph’ and neither of them had any boxing until eight weeks prior and have trained hard.
So far, Vanessa’s Just Giving page has raised £190 and donations are still open. She said: “There are people and organisations ready to help women, men, and children in these situations.”
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