Survivor Stories

Before DAF, I couldn't eat soup in my chair while watching my stories on the TV without the constant fear that my feet would be injured on the way to the kitchen for a refill. My husband refused to buy a microwave cart with wheels, forcing me to walk — on bare feet — across our laminate flooring every single time. After DAF intervened with an emergency floor rug grant and two pairs of non-slip socks, I can now refill my soup bowl up to four times per episode without incident. Last Tuesday I made it through an entire three-hour documentary without my feet touching an unprotected surface once. I cried. My feet cried. We healed together.

My roommate was what the DAF literature calls a "passive floor aggressor." He bought a used pinball machine off of Facebook Marketplace and set it up in the hallway — the one hallway I have to walk through to get to the bathroom at night. In three weeks I stubbed four toes, two of them twice. I started sleeping in socks and then with pillows tied to my feet. My therapist said this wasn't normal. But DAF said I wasn't crazy. DAF said it was abuse. After the intervention, I now have a lit pathway guide from my bedroom to the bathroom and the pinball machine has been relocated to the garage. I sleep peacefully now. My feet have never felt more seen.

I want to be very clear: I do not blame my cat. My cat did not choose to have talons. My husband chose not to trim those talons for eleven months. I counted. Every morning I would step out of bed onto hardwood and within seconds Mittens would materialize from the darkness and rake her untrimmed claws across my instep. I have photographs. DAF validated my experience and connected me with a mobile pet grooming service. Mittens now has her claws done biweekly. My husband has been on notice. My feet have not been attacked since April and I have started wearing open-toed sandals again for the first time in nearly a year. Progress.

People don't talk about wet grass abuse because they think it's normal. My wife would send me to get the newspaper every single morning — EVERY morning — and the grass was wet. Every time. Without exception and without warning. I asked her once why she couldn't just go get it herself and she said she was busy. Busy. While my feet were out there on that wet lawn absorbing moisture through my socks with no warning and no consent. When I found DAF I showed her the literature. She said it wasn't real. I said my feet don't lie. We are currently in couples' foot counseling. The sessions are intense but productive. I now retrieve the newspaper in waterproof garden clogs and my socks have not been wet since February.

I was a LEGO survivor. I don't use that word lightly. For six years I shared a home with two children and a husband who believed LEGO was "just a toy." Just a toy. I have stepped on approximately 400 individual LEGO bricks across a six year period. I know because I kept a journal. I called it the Brick Diary. DAF has since requested a copy for their research department. After the intervention, we implemented a Designated LEGO Zone with perimeter foam padding and a no-barefoot policy enforced by a small laminated sign I made. I have not stepped on a brick in 7 months. My feet and I celebrated with a pedicure. It was the first time I've had a pedicure where I didn't feel like I needed to apologize for the condition of my soles.

My brother-in-law came to stay for "a few weeks" in 2023. He stayed fourteen months. He wore boots inside the house at all times and would frequently scrape them across the floor, leaving what I can only describe as a debris field of dried mud, gravel, and on one occasion what appeared to be a small piece of asphalt across every room. Walking barefoot in my own home became a daily mine sweep. I found DAF through a search engine. I typed "my feet are being abused at home" and there they were. Like a beacon. We eventually got him to leave by telling him there was a Waffle House opening in a town 200 miles away. He went to check it out. We changed the locks. My floors are clean. My feet are healing.