Survivor to run half marathon to support Optimism Place and raise awareness of intimate partner violence
- Jan 29
- 5 min read
On the morning of Feb. 14, 2026, Sydney Touzel will lace up her running shoes and begin a 21-kilometre run from Little Falls Elementary School in St. Marys to Optimism Place in Stratford. Touzel’s run will begin at 9 a.m. and is expected to end at Optimism Place around 11 a.m.
The route is symbolic: it starts at the same school where, six years earlier, Touzel was nearly killed by her former partner.
On Feb. 12, 2020, Touzel dropped her son off at Little Falls Elementary as she did every day. After she returned to her car, her ex-boyfriend opened the door, and with a knife in his hand, told her he was going to kill her.
“Next thing I knew, I was lying across the front seat of my car, fighting him,” Touzel said. “I was screaming, doing everything I could to get him off of me, and then I ended up getting the knife away from him and getting out the passenger door.”
“I didn’t know where my son was. I didn’t know if he was inside,” she said. “All I could think about in that moment was, don’t let him take my son.”
Touzel survived the attack and has since physically and emotionally recovered, but she says the experience – and the years of abuse leading up to it – continue to shape her life and purpose.
“The relationship I was in was not a healthy one at all, and I felt isolated with where I was in that relationship, and didn’t really know what resources were available to me,” she said. “I’m hoping, by doing this run, it brings awareness to Optimism Place – what they do, the programs that they have and how they can help women and children.”
Touzel said the abuse followed a familiar cycle.
“They say you leave eight times before you actually leave for good,” she said. “That was me. I tried to leave, I got scared, I came back, and he was very good at the abuse cycle. He would hurt me, give me a gift, everything’s fine for a while, hurt me, give me a gift. So I was living that cycle, and I honestly thought I had no way out.”
She described feeling completely cut off from her support system.
“I just remember how isolated I felt when I was in the relationship,” she said. “My parents didn’t know, my friends didn’t know, and I felt very, very isolated and alone. And when you’ve been in a situation like that for multiple years, you kind of become a shell of yourself.”
Touzel said she was so conditioned that she stopped questioning reality.
“I always kind of joke that he had me so conditioned that if he had told me the sky was green, I would have just said, ‘Yes, you’re right,’ because it was easier than fighting back.”
The court process that followed the attack was long and exhausting, but Touzel said one moment stands out.
“The judge looked me right in the eyes and said, ‘What you’ve been through is being recognized today, and I’m making an example of what needs to happen in the future for domestic violence victims,’” she said. “And I never felt more seen and heard than I did that day.”
Touzel said while the stabbing left physical scars, the emotional damage from years of abuse was just as profound.
“Being stabbed sounds horrendous, and yes, I have scars, and I’m affected, but I’m also affected from the three years I was with him before that,” she said. “I want to be a reassurance for women who are going through this that it’s going to be the most gruelling process you’ll ever go through, but it’s so worth it in the end.”
The idea for the fundraising run came to her unexpectedly.
“I’ve always felt like I wanted to do something to bring awareness to domestic violence,” she said. “I just wasn’t really sure how I could do it. And then I was honestly just sitting at work in my office one day, thinking about it, and I thought, what if I did a fundraising run and I could end it at Optimism Place?”
Although Touzel did not personally use Optimism Place’s services, she said the shelter has deep personal meaning.
“When I was a baby, my mom used their resources,” she said. “So raising donations for a space like this was special, knowing that my mother had been through something similar and was able to seek help there.”
Touzel, a longtime fitness enthusiast, said the run itself has been a challenge.
“I’m a big fitness enthusiast, I do CrossFit, I’ve worked out for years, I even used to be a personal trainer, but running was never really my thing,” she said. “This past summer, I couldn’t even make it five kilometres, but I’ve been training for this. It’s been a little bit of a journey.”
So far, Touzel has raised more than $2,000. Supporters can donate per kilometre or make a one-time contribution, with all proceeds supporting Optimism Place Women’s Shelter and Support Services in Perth County.
In addition to financial donations, Touzel is also collecting hygiene items, including tampons, at both the start and finish of her run. A truck will follow her route to collect donations along the way.
“What Sydney is doing is not only empowering to other women who are experiencing abuse, but it’s an example to our whole community that we can all do something to end violence against women,” said Donna Jean Forster, executive director of Optimism Place.
For Touzel, the run is also about the future – particularly the one she is building with her son.
“It gives me hope that I’m raising a son who is everything that Derek wasn’t,” she said. “I’m teaching him how to respect people of every colour, race and gender and teaching him that violence is absolutely never an answer for anything.”
She hopes her story encourages other women to trust themselves and seek help.
“Listen to your gut. The second you feel like someone is trying to make a decision for you, you’re right, you need to get out,” she said. “The one thing that I kept telling myself over and over is that he’s changed; they are not going to change, they never do. Get out before you end up fighting for your life or losing it.”
Donations can be made online at give-can.keela.co/rise-and-run or dropped off in person at Optimism Place, marked to support Sydney’s Rise and Run.
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