*Last name has been removed to protect privacy
Elizabeth* feels the scar every time she eats. A gash on her lip that took four stitches to repair is a reminder of the many years she endured domestic abuse at the hands of her partner.
For five years, the list of physical scars grew: five concussions, six staples in her head, numerous bite marks and bruises.
Although the physical wounds have mostly healed, she’s just beginning to recover from the mental, emotional and financial abuse she also endured. “It’s a slow process getting back to myself,” she told NationSwell.
But through all of this, she’s had a constant companion who has played a key part in the recovery process so far.
His name is Bebe, and he’s a tuxedo cat.
Elizabeth adopted Bebe from the ASPCA as an apology present the first time her abuser attacked her. She went into the animal shelter with plans to get a kitten. “Something tiny,” she said. But when she stepped into the cat-filled room, one cat immediately gravitated towards her, rubbing against Elizabeth’s black-heeled boots. They quickly fell in love.
Four months ago, Elizabeth’s abuser kicked her out of her home. She decided she wasn’t going back. She took her 2-year-old daughter and the $40 in her pocket and left permanently. At a friend’s apartment, she connected with a domestic violence shelter. Quickly, Elizabeth realized she was leaving behind an important part of her family.
She remembers a wave of worries racing through her thoughts. Will her abuser remember to feed him? Will he hurt Bebe? How can I trust this man with my cat?
After getting connected with the Urban Resource Institute (URI), the largest provider of domestic shelter in New York City, Elizabeth learned that she could bring her cat with her to the shelter.
Within three hours, Bebe and Elizabeth were reunited.
“Once I had Bebe, I knew I was home and I was safe,” she said.
Elizabeth is thankful that she was connected to one of the few domestic violence shelters that welcome pets. In another circumstance, she would have had to bring Bebe to an animal shelter or leave Bebe with her abuser.
And if she chose the latter, Bebe, too, was likely to suffer from abuse. Multiple studies and surveys show a link between domestic abuse and pet abuse. Women in domestic shelters were 11 times more likely to report that their partner had hurt or killed pets compared to a control group of women.
But even more alarming is the fact that women are refusing to seek shelter for fear of abandoning their pets. Surveys show that up to 40% of women report being unable to escape out of fear of what will happen to their pets.
“[Survivors] had risk factors, obstacles preventing them from seeking shelter,” said Nathaniel Fields, the CEO and president of URI. “Part of our work here today is to help understand those obstacles and not judge those obstacles.”
URI believes that by housing pets, it’s one less obstacle for seeking help.
But URI is an outlier when it comes to pets. According to Sheltering Families and Animals Together, there are about 150 shelters that allow pets — an average of three per state.
URI has been providing shelter for pets and families since 2013, and last fall, it opened up the nation’s first shelter built with animals in mind called PALS. Of the nonprofit’s 12 shelters in New York, seven can accommodate pets — everything from dogs to bearded dragons have found a home under its roofs.
Danielle Emery, the director of the PALS program, said she’s seen growing recognition of the importance animals play in domestic violence situations. More shelters are accommodating pets, and more survivors are learning about the options they have when leaving an abuser. Part of her work includes advocating for domestic hotlines to ask questions about pets during the intake process that way women and men know from the start that their pet has options, too.
URI leaders are working with other shelters to adopt similar pet-friendly accommodations and extend the PALS program nationally, said Fields.
But Emery notes that it not as simple as a rule change.
At URI shelters, survivors are connected to veterinarian support, animal behavior specialists and groomers. Carpet is removed, furniture is bought with dogs and cats in mind, and things like play space have to be reimagined in a shelter situation.
For example, at PALS shelter, an indoor pet park was built. Animals have a place to play while survivors can stay safe.
Leaders also see animal abuse as a point of intervention. Summer Dolder, the senior manager at New York City’s Animal Care Centers, oversees the surrender prevention program. People bring their pets to her and her team when it’s the last resort.
“Oftentimes people think that animals coming into the shelter are unwanted, and that’s really not true,” she said. “It’s just people facing acute issues in their life.”
And one of the many issues Dolder sees is people are experiencing a form of domestic violence.
While Dolder and her team work with the person to plan the best course of action for his or her pet, whether that’s an animal shelter, temporary foster or something else, they’re also there for the human. Dolder, who has worked at the shelter for six years, has seen her work as a point of intervention for humans.
Recently, Dolder had a woman come in with her deceased cat looking for after-life services. Through intake interviews, Dolder’s team quickly learned that the cat had died because of the woman’s partner. They helped the woman with her cat, helped file a police report and get the woman connected to other resources.
“It’s turned into as much of a prevention program for the animals as it is for the humans,” she said.
Dolder makes sure the help doesn’t stop there. The shelter helps to supply places like URI with the resources they need. Litter, pet food, crates, toys, leashes.
And even cat scratchers.
“He’s been scratching up the whole apartment,” Elizabeth laughed. Dolder’s team will send over a scratcher for Bebe this week. It’s moments like this that remind Elizabeth that she’s no longer alone.
“There are days that I don’t even know what to do with myself because I have never felt this free.”
More: How Do You Stop Abusive Relationships? Teach Teens How to Be Respectful Partners
Tag: Domestic Violence
This Photographer Is Shining a Light on the Dignity of Indigenous Women
Indigenous women face disproportionate levels of violence. 84 percent of them experience some form of violence during their lifetimes, and one study found that in certain regions, native women face murder rates more than 10 times the national average. One photographer is using her art to call attention to the issue — and, in her own way, fight back against it.
“People go missing on the reservation like it’s going out of style,” says Toni Roth, a photographer and resident of the Yakama Indian Reservation in Toppenish, Wash.
Roth has been a photographer for the last five years, but recently her work took on an entirely new meaning. In January, Roth started taking portraits of women and girls from the Yakama tribe decked out in their traditional regalia. The photos are striking — colorful, regal and almost ferocious — and she hopes they’ll drive awareness and action on the epidemic of missing and murdered native women.
“I wanted to portray them in their natural state,” Roth says, “showing that these women are strong, they’re independent, they’re needed in their community [and] they’re just as important as anybody else.
“I feel like if more people brought light to the situation and took it seriously, then maybe more people would get involved, and actually realize that this is an epidemic,” Roth says. “This is real, and it’s something that needs to be taken care of.”
Watch the video above to see Roth’s work and find out how you can help fight the epidemic of missing and murdered indigenous women.
If you have information on the whereabouts of missing individuals on the Yakama reservation, please contact the Yakima Police Department at 509-575-6200.
MORE: Serving Victims on the Rez, How Today’s Street Artists Are Mobilizing Activists
Serving Victims on the Rez
Domestic violence has long plagued the Fort Berthold Reservation in North Dakota. But recent advancements in oil and gas drilling have brought an influx of new workers, and as the population around the reservation has grown, so too have the rate of assaults. For some family members — such as Matthew Lone Bear, whose sister, Olivia, disappeared in 2017 — the search for a missing victim means scouring the massive, roughly 1-million-acre reservation. It can often leave loved ones feeling hopeless.
That’s where TAT Victim Services comes in. The organization works with Fort Berthold’s tribal members, known as the MHA Nation, in dealing with domestic and sexual violence, human trafficking, elder abuse, and missing or murdered people on the reservation. By hosting events to raise awareness, providing survivors with safe shelter, and assisting in the opening of missing-persons cases, TAT helps tribal members in need.
Watch the video above to see the work TAT Victim Services is doing on the Fort Berthold Reservation to help families like Lone Bear’s.
—
Editor’s note: Some faces and names in the video have been obscured to protect the privacy of the people involved.
Working Their Way to Independence
On a recent Monday afternoon, in an office tower in Manhattan, Judy Matthews sat around a table with three other domestic violence victims and talked about her résumé. Through a nonprofit, she’d recently taken a Microsoft Word course for the formatting, but Matthews, a black, middle-aged mother from Brooklyn, was worried about the content. The problem? A 10-year gap, the result of pressure from her abuser to drop out of the workforce.
“For the past decade, I spent most of my time near the window, while my husband went to work,” says Matthews. “I didn’t have any friends, and I didn’t have a career. I completed my degrees and I put them in a box. I didn’t know who I was, other than who [my husband] told me I was, which was a woman who’s got nothing to offer. It was a sense of: ‘Why did you even waste time going to school?’ That’s why I spent my time at the window, watching everybody else walk their kids to school, go to work, do everything they need to do.”
About a year and a half ago, Matthews (whose name, like other survivors quoted in this story, has been changed) packed a few belongings into a plastic Marshall’s bag and made her way to Sanctuary for Families, New York’s largest nonprofit for victims of domestic abuse, sex trafficking and other gender-based violence. There, she enrolled in the Economic Empowerment Program (EEP), a workforce-development program to help survivors regain the self-sufficiency and financial independence they lost during an abusive relationship. Today, Matthews, a victim of childhood sexual abuse who was once too scared to take the subway, has an internship with the city’s Human Resources Administration, which distributes public assistance.
Founded in 2011, EEP’s 15-week program prepares survivors for entry-level openings in fields with potential for significant career growth. During the first two weeks, sessions focus on workplace readiness: punctuality, email etiquette and proper attire, for example. But the bulk of EEP’s training focuses on math, literature and computer programs. Throughout, the women revise their résumés and practice mock job interviews.
“We don’t want them working in fast food or at a clothing chain. Not that those aren’t honorable work, but it can’t get a person off public assistance,” says Judy Harris Kluger, who was a New York State judge for 25 years before becoming Sanctuary’s executive director in 2014. After EEP, she says, “I hope they’re in a position to support their children; to live on their own in an apartment, not a shelter; and to find healthy relationships and people who care about them.”
Nationally, an estimated one in four women and one in seven men will experience serious violence at a partner’s hands. Within New York City, police responded to 279,051 domestic violence incidents in 2015 — roughly 32 calls every hour. For each of these victims, an intimate link binds her checkbook to the risk of abuse by her partner. When a couple’s finances are strained, the chance of violence triples. An abuser who can’t find work for months may lash out at his spouse, the one aspect of his life he can ruthlessly control. The victim, meanwhile, her bank account depleted, can’t afford to stay at a motel for a few nights, much less pay for her children’s basic needs or see a psychiatrist or divorce lawyer. Money, in other words, can force victims to stay with their abusers.
And when battered women do work, holding down a job is a constant struggle. In one survey, nearly two-thirds of victims said abuse interfered with their work performance. Of that group, two-fifths were harassed by a partner’s phone calls or in-person stalking. For others, the difficulty started before they even left home. To disrupt a victim’s schedule, an abuser might deprive her of sleep, unplug the alarm clock, hide clothes or car keys, refuse to babysit the kids, cut and bruise her or physically bar the doorway. Distracted or depressed, these survivors showed up late or not at all; one study showed these women earn less as a whole.
Faced with these challenges, how does EEP perform? In its five years of operation, 564 survivors enrolled in the program, and nearly all of them — 88 percent — completed it. By the end, two-thirds of the graduates land internships or jobs. A year later, at least 65 percent of those alumnae report keeping the position. EEP aims to place enrollees in fields such as workplace administration, construction management and medical billing. On average, EEP graduates are paid $13.71 an hour, well above New York’s $8.75 minimum wage.
Angelo J. Rivera, EEP’s director, believes the model works because it establishes a clear path off welfare. When a person starts the program, Rivera’s team sits down with a chart of seven “keys,” which demonstrate career readiness and includes benchmarks like reaching a 10th-grade reading level, earning a high school diploma or GED, and gaining intermediate computer skills and prior work experience. (On average, participants enter with only three or four of these skill sets.)
To start meeting the seven keys, EEP readies survivors for office culture, beginning with how they dress. At the program’s start, each class heads to Macy’s to pick out a suit and two blouses, which they’re required to wear to class on Mondays and Wednesdays. Dressing professionally — or in other words, putting on the appearance of success — is an important first step in the transition to the business world, explains Sarah Hayes, EEP’s deputy director. “A number are homeless and living in shelters. They’ve had to leave their possessions behind to flee an abusive situation,” she says. “Being able to put on a suit is dignifying. They don’t feel like they’re different from anyone else traipsing around Wall Street. It’s a powerful anonymity that you get to wear, and it helps you envision yourself as the professional that you want to be.”
Once they look the part, the women in EEP run through a crash course in sophistication, in part by catching up on well-known literature. Under Rivera, the reading list is a guide to power relations: “To Kill a Mockingbird,” “Animal Farm” and writings by James Baldwin. The group also recently toured the Metropolitan Museum of Art, many for the first time.
Though EEP’s classes avoid discussions of the women’s abusive relationships — a marked shift from other social programs that deal with trauma through support groups — counseling and other services are available at Sanctuary. Immigrants who need work authorization can seek remedies from the legal team, for example, and someone facing an eviction can receive emergency monetary assistance and defense in housing court.
But there’s another reason why EEP so clearly divides its efforts from the rest of Sanctuary’s services. Below the surface, EEP’s architects have an ambitious plan: To see their workforce-development program applied to other demographics, like foster youth, single mothers in public housing and the formerly incarcerated. The victims of gender-based violence that Rivera sees regularly come in believing they are worthless, after hearing it repeatedly from their abusers. The 15-week program works to reverse that by convincing battered women they’re worth a decent salary and empowering them to work their way to independence. The question for Rivera and his cohorts now is whether the EEP model can uplift other struggling populations toiling under their own trying circumstances.
If you are experiencing physical violence, emotional abuse or financial control at home, you can call 800-621-HOPE in New York City, 877-384-3578 in San Francisco or 800-799-7233 for all other locations.
One Man’s Plan to Green the Coal Industry, Spotlighting Urban Blight With Public Art and More
A Curious Plan to Fight Climate Change: Buy Mines, Sell Coal, The New York Times
The lines in the so-called war on coal were drawn long ago: Sierra Club lawyers, on one side, clashed with Republican legislators and energy companies on the other. Tom Clarke, owner of a chain of nursing homes, set up a lonely camp in the battlefield’s middle ground. His nonprofit is buying up mines at bankruptcy proceedings, then selling the coal bundled with carbon offsets from tree-planting.
The Art of Breathing Lights, Albany Times-Union
At sundown in upstate New York, the blight is aglow with light. For the next two months, as part of a massive public art project, hundreds of vacant clapboard homes in Albany, Schenectady and Troy are being lit from inside with LED lights. Pulsing as if they were slowly exhaling, these abandoned houses refuse to be ignored.
The Children Who Saw Too Much, RYOT
Whipped with a belt buckle by his abusive stepfather, 17-year-old Ryan grew up believing all adults deal with their problems through aggression. At least, until he attended the nation’s first summer camp for children marred by domestic violence, where he learned, amid the Northern California pines and Klamath River rapids, about a different emotion: hope.
These Yoga Teachers Empower Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault Survivors to Reclaim Their Lives
Tara Tonini slept with a shotgun. After months of being in a violent relationship, she found the strength to leave and get her own apartment, but her abuser was stalking her and threatened her life.
Sadly, Tonini’s experience isn’t unique.
In the United States, about one in four women will experience domestic violence during her life, according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention. It’s extremely dangerous for a battered woman to leave an abusive partner, and those who are brave enough to do so often suffer from PTSD for years.
Tonini is now the program director of Exhale to Inhale, a nonprofit that brings free yoga classes to shelters and community centers that serve domestic violence and sexual assault survivors. It also trains volunteer instructors to lead trauma-informed yoga classes. Tonini credits yoga for where she is today.
Check out the video above and witness how the regular practice of yoga can help trauma survivors in tremendous ways.
MORE: Meet the Doctors Building an Innovative, Holistic Bridge to Healthy Living
Can Peer Pressure Stop Violence Against Women?
Who can offer support to the 25 percent of American women who experience violence or abuse during their lifetime? Perhaps the best advocates to fight against this mistreatment are the majority of men who never think of hurting a woman.
That’s the idea behind Te Invito, a new program of the National Latin@ Network that reaches out to Latino men in Spanish and English to encourage them to speak out and work for an end to violence against women. Their website offers an Engaging Men and Boys toolkit that includes resources on programs throughout the country that have been proven to work. The campaign kicked off with a video they hope will reach Latino men to introduce them to the program.
One such program is Coaching Boys Into Men, which teaches techniques to athletic coaches that engage their team members in discussions about domestic violence. The goal? Preventing teenagers from ever abusing a partner. A study by Elizabeth Miller of the Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh of UPMC suggested this program increased teenagers’ recognition of abusive behavior, reduced their likelihood of abusing a girlfriend, and often led them to intervene in stopping such abusive behavior in others.
“As with every other culture, there have always been Latino men who oppose violence against women,” Juan Carlos Areán, Director of the National Latin@ Network told Pierre R. Berastaín for the Huffington Post. “Te Invito is an opportunity for those men to lift their voices and make it clear that this [violence] is unacceptable behavior.”
Men and boys who have engaged in domestic violence prevention are invited to share their ideas with Te Invito so they can increase their list of resources throughout the country. The idea is if more men become aware of how many men are opposed to abuse of women, it won’t be culturally acceptable to engage in this violence. Which sounds like a pretty terrific idea to us.
MORE: We Can Save Some of America’s Most Vulnerable Women From Violence
SXSW: How Benevolent Gives a Voice to People Who Aren’t Usually Heard
While others talked about cloud robotics, tried on wearable technology, or watched a 3-D printer spit out custom-made Oreos, Megan Kashner focused her SXSW Interactive session on video interviews with low-income Americans and the lessons that we can learn from listening to people in need.
Kashner, a clinical social worker, is the founder of Benevolent.net, a website that helps low-income people raise funds for things they need. “We at Benevolent are not the only people talking about listening, and not just listening, but following the lead of low-income Americans,” she said of the motivation behind her panel “Listening to People in Need: Lessons for America.”
On Benevolent, people tell their stories and describe what stands in the way of their success. The platform also aims to provide a simple way for those who want to help “to step into the stories of those who are trying to reach their goals” by donating to individuals whose videos and needs are featured.
Here is what we learned from the video interviews with John, Tasha, Kris, Melissa, and Danielle:
Lesson #1: “Getting and keeping a job is expensive.” The costs of uniforms and tools needed for certain jobs are costly and can be a barrier for low income Americans needing work to improve their situation.
Lesson #2: “Transportation is a huge issue.” Sometimes public transportation is the only option — given the cost of buying and maintaining a car. But it can prevent someone with good intentions and a great work ethic from making it to work or class on time.
Lesson #3: “Being employed is not enough.” Finding work is only half the battle, as low wages and high costs of living mean that many people who are working long hours still need food stamps, subsidized energy and childcare, and housing assistance to provide for their families.
Lesson #4: “Kids need more than a roof over their heads.” Housing instability can hold kids back from getting the most out of their education. And beyond a safe place to life, kids also need a parent who can pick them up if they stay after school for activities, who can help them with homework, and who can pack them a school lunch.
Lesson #5: “We need to change the rules.” By listening to the stories of low-income Americans and learning from them, we can fix the systemic problems that lead to poverty.
As Kashner wrote in a Huffington Post piece, where she previewed the five lessons she discussed at SXSW, “How would we re-structure supports and employment practices to make it possible for low-income Americans to set their goals, get help overcoming hurdles, and know that people believed in them? Let’s start that conversation and stop the vitriol that has marked recent conversations about poverty and progress.”
Through these stories — both in the session and on the site — Benevolent is able to simplify an issue as complex as how to pull an individual out of poverty. How does the site do it? By breaking it down in human terms. The story of John, who needed steel-toed boots and precision instruments for his job as a machinist, brought a human face to the American issue of, as Kashner put it, “people needing to spend money they don’t have to take a job they desperately need.” The video featuring Tasha, who was able to escape domestic violence only by moving to a shelter two hours away from where her kids went to school, brought life to this statistic: Low- to moderate-income households spend 42 percent of their total annual income on transportation.
The last lesson built off of a video of Danielle, who looked to Benevolent donors when she needed money for a security deposit in order to live in a safer place with her son. Danielle, who cuts railroad tracks for a living, quoted Robert Reich on how being poor is the hardest job in America. “And I gotta tell you as a poor person, as a working poor person, it definitely is,” she said.
When NationSwell asked what is working when it comes to changing the rules, and who beyond Benevolent is listening to the stories low-income Americans, Kashner mentioned the Family Independence Initiative, which weaves together these experiences with hard data to challenge the stereotypes holding low-income families back, and LIFT, an organization that connects trained advocates and community members to help low-income Americans get ahead.
“They are pioneering some really interesting ways to listen to and shape their policy positions and their programmatic approach based on what their clients are telling them,” Kashner said of the LIFT team.
“The people who are doing the real work everyday to help and walk alongside low-income families as they try and reach their goals are small, local organizations,” she added — saying the solutions lie not with one organization but with the numerous school counselors, social workers, pastors, and others who listen to these stories and use them to change the rules.
Watch one of the videos from the session above then let us know what you think about some of the questions Kashner posed: What would our nation be like if we listened to what low-income Americans had to say? How might that change our approach as a country, as policymakers, as employers, as voters, and as community members?