loveisrespect

The need for loveisrespect is growing. The year isn't even close to finished, and we've already seen a 26% increase in contacts from young adult seeking healthy relationship resources than the year prior. Our website, which is full of information about healthy relationships, has also received 100,000 more hits than last year, totaling over 2.5 million hits and counting! 

Although numbers tell the quantitative story of LIR's outreach, stories like this one give a bigger picture: 

An advocate recently spoke with a 19 year old woman who was feeling depressed and practicing self-harm after ending an abusive relationship and more recently cutting off contact. She lives in a small town and runs into him frequently so we talked about safety planning for those situations and how to build networks of support.

We mostly focused on self-care strategies, ways to avoid self-harming and contacting the ex, and the healing process. At the end she said, "these are all such wonderful ideas, thank you again & just the validation & encouragement after feeling attacked on all sides it’s priceless, sometimes you can send happiness by chat, thank you for doing that for me tonight :)"

Recently, a young woman reached out to Loveisrespect who had been in an abusive relationship for five years.  She lived in a small town with little help. When she was assaulted in public her friends told her she was being over emotional. It seemed like there was a lack of support and knowledge about domestic violence in her area.

Since she felt she could not leave him, a LIR advocate discussed emotional and physical safety plans and also focused on being emotionally supportive as she was opening up for the first time. After talking it over with the advocate, she finally realized how dangerous her relationship had become. 

Our LIR advocate was able to find two close by shelters with counseling, which she found really helpful and appreciated the privacy in all of this. In the end she said she felt better, "Thank you so much. I hope you realize how much you are helping me. I have felt so alone in this for awhile now. Thank you again so much, this has helped me so much!"