“What does safety really mean?” This is the central question that the Maine Coalition to End Domestic Violence (MCEDV) asked during Domestic Violence Awareness Month (DVAM) this year. This is also the central question of a recent conversation between Caring Unlimited’s own Deputy Director, Sherry Edwards, MCEDV’s Executive Directory, Francine Garland Stark, and the host of the Daughters of Change Podcast, Marie Sola.

Listen to the full episode on the Daughters of Change website, or wherever podcasts are available.

In this forty-three minute episode, Marie asks Francine and Sherry to broaden the listener’s understanding of safety beginning with the question, “What does safety really mean?” to which Francine responds that we ought to look more deeply at our basic human feelings to understand safety.

“When people talk about safety in the context of domestic abuse and violence, they set a really low bar,” Francine shares, going on to describe some of the monitoring techniques that survivors set up to protect themselves from bodily harm. There are individualized safety nets that can help survivors feel protected, and places survivors can go to escape from partners using abuse.

But safety is about more than that. It’s about literal peace of mind.

Francine recalls the peacefulness of her sleeping infant daughter, who had no reason to worry about her own safety, and suggests, “An adult person who has been subjected to harm is safe when they have a deep, central conviction that in fact, there is no known threat hanging over their head.” Sometimes, as Francine shares in another anecdote, that does not happen for a survivor as long as the person who harmed them is alive.

These compassionate and wise women offer further insight into the impacts that community health access and financial freedom have on survivors, and they encourage anyone who wants to get involved in the movement to end domestic violence to reach out to their local domestic violence resource centers. There are coalitions in every state and territory, and volunteer-driven helplines are always in need of additional support.

As the episode concludes, Marie asks for any words of wisdom from her guests. As Sherry simply states, “Be kind.” We never know what someone is going through, and we never know how much our support can mean to someone. To end domestic violence, we need systematic change, and we all have a role to play.