As a survivor, my interest in this topic stemmed from my personal experience of the devastating consequences produced by intimate partner violence. I felt that by giving a voice to those who have actually lived through these experiences, I might help nurses relate to abused women's individual situations and circumstances in a way that is empathetic and responsive. Using a qualitative, hermeneutic, phenomenological research design, meaningful life experiences of women who have left abusive relationships were interpreted through life patterns. This design was used to develop a comprehensive understanding of the phenomenon as a whole. Gaps in the literature at the time of my research had established the need to identify meaningful patterns of lifetime experiences associated with women who leave their abusive partners, specifically focusing on childhood and the timeframe after leaving the abusive relationship. The approaches of Max Van Manen and Margaret Newman were applied to interviewing, data collection, and analysis of data. This case study takes the reader through the steps of conducting a research study for a doctoral dissertation and examines the challenges related to interviewing women who have been in a particularly traumatic relationship. [This content is provided in the format of an e-book.]