ABC/Kelsey McNeal "DWTS" pro Cheryl Burke.
In a new video, Dancing With the Stars pro Cheryl Burke opened up about her past when it comes to abusive relationships in order to help anyone who may be going through something similar to what she experienced in the past.
Burke opened the video by welcoming viewers to her YouTube channel and saying that she would be talking about something a little darker than she usually does. Burke has opened up in the past on her channel about being sexually abused as a child as well.
“I wanna share my experiences with all of you because I hope, you know, in turn, that it could help anyone who may have experienced something similar to know that there is hope on the other side,” Burke said.
Burke Says She Hasn’t Always Been Self-Assured and Confident
Burke shared that she has been in therapy for many years and has learned in her adult life that healing is important and is the only way she was able to post a video about the situations. She urged anyone in an abusive relationship to reach out to a therapist, family, or a friend to talk about their situation.
“I would describe myself as someone who is pretty self-assured,” Burke said when explaining who she is now. “I’m definitely not afraid to stick up for myself… but when I was younger, that was definitely not the case. It was quite the opposite.”
She said that Dancing With the Stars helped her to find her voice and be more herself.
Burke Shared Details of Abusive Relationships
Burke opened up about her dating history, saying that she first started dating when she was 13 years old. At that age, Burke said she was already traveling the world by herself and felt “pretty grown up.”
She shared that she started dating a senior in high school when she was a freshman. She said he fit all the ‘bad boy’ tropes that she was looking for and that he already had a baby.
“I remember sneaking around with him… and him having sex with me after telling him I didn’t want to, and it ended pretty forcefully,” Burke said in the video.
She said she felt like she needed to go along with it so he wouldn’t break up with her and the relationship lasted about a year and a half longer even though he was cheating on her the whole time.
“Looking back, I can see that that whole relationship was one big, giant mental f***,” she shared. Then, she continued to get into abusive relationships, she said.
Burke Shared That She Has Been in Multiple Abusive Relationships
Continuing in her story, Burke said that her next relationship was also when she was in high school and that she and that boyfriend broke up what felt like every week for years. When she broke up with him and left, he followed her and hit her car.
“So I pulled over, and he came into my car, he took his belt off, and he whipped me with it,” she said, adding that his parents were watching the whole thing and didn’t do anything about it.
They were together all the way through Burke’s senior year, she said. When she went to New York for dance, he followed her there as well and she said she saw him everywhere even when they weren’t talking to each other anymore.
“This whole thing was such a bad, toxic cycle,” she said. “And I would really get affected by everything on such a deep level.”
She had a dance partner later that helped her get out of the cycle of abusive relationships.
The first relationship that was not abusive, Burke said, was her first relationship with her now-husband.
“I’m just so grateful and happy that the universe really brought him back into my life when I was ready,” she said.
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