Safety Planning with Survivors
Safety Planning with Victims
3:12Understanding Safety Planning
Safety Planning with Survivors
One way to help a survivor of intimate partner violence is through safety planning. A safety plan is a personalized, practical plan used to improve someone's safety while experiencing abuse, preparing to leave an abusive situation, or after leaving an abusive situation.
How to Support Safety Planning
See if you can help the survivor identify ways that they can increase their safety, and ask how you can be involved in that process.
Examples of how you might help:
- Can you provide them with a place to go if they need to leave?
- Can you check in on them and use a codeword or phrase that lets you know if they are in danger?
- Can you hold important documents or a bag with emergency supplies?
- Can you help them identify safe people in their network?
Important principle:
Try to brainstorm ideas WITH the survivor and don't be afraid to reach out to a domestic violence advocate for help. Safety planning should be collaborative, not directive.
Intersectionality and Individual Needs
Intersectionality and Survivor's Needs
Remember that every survivor of intimate partner violence will have different needs. The word "intersectionality" is often used to describe the intersecting identities every person holds.
Click each identity dimension to explore how it affects safety planning:
Age
Race
Gender
Sexual Orientation
Religion
Culture
Ability/Disability
Immigration Status
Socioeconomic Status
Honoring Autonomy
To focus on each survivor's particular needs, we must understand that person's perspectives, culture, and resources.
A Critical Balance:
Sometimes, it is easier to focus on the survivor's physical safety over letting them make decisions for themselves, but that reinforces the lack of power and control the survivor has in their life.
If the foundation of abuse is that a survivor has had their power and control taken away, then to resolve that, we must help the person regain that control in their life.
The Critical Balance in Safety Planning:
Ensuring Physical Safety
Important for protecting survivors from harm
Honoring Autonomy
Restores power and control survivors lost
⚖️ Both Are Essential:
Sometimes it's easier to focus on physical safety over letting survivors make their own decisions—but that reinforces the lack of power and control they experienced in the abusive relationship.
If abuse takes away power and control, then healing requires helping survivors regain that control in their lives.
We want to promote in every survivor:
Survivor-Defined Safety
Survivor Risk Analysis
Jill Davies, deputy director of Greater Hartford Legal Aid, emphasizes the need to focus on more than just a survivor's physical safety. In Davies' Victim-Defined Safety Planning Summary, she states that "The spiritual, social, and emotional aspects of our humanity are also necessary for security."
Three Elements Survivors Consider When Assessing Safety Strategies:
1. No violence - Freedom from physical and sexual assault 2. Basic human needs - Food, shelter, financial security 3. Social and emotional well-being - Connection, self-esteem, autonomy
Life-Generated Risks
In addition to the risks associated with their abusive partner, a survivor must also consider their life-generated risks—risks in their life that they may have no control over such as:
- Health issues
- Financial concerns
- Social supports
- Immigration status
- Custody concerns
- Employment stability
Reevaluating "Safety"
When deciding if a survivor is "safe," we often look at whether or not they are free from the abuse of their partner. It is important to remember, however, that a survivor's safety also includes their social and emotional needs.
Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs and Survivor Safety
In 1943, psychologist Abraham Maslow outlined five "needs" that drive human behavior. Understanding this helps us see why true safety requires more than just physical protection.
❌ Common Misconception
We often think survivors are "safe" once physical violence stops
Problem: Stopping here means survivors may still lack food, housing, connection, and healing—they aren't truly safe.
✓ True Safety for Survivors
True safety addresses ALL levels of needs
Reality: Survivors need freedom from violence + basic needs met + social/emotional wellbeing + self-esteem + full potential.
According to Dr. Jacqueline Campbell:
"A survivor who is no longer hit by their partner but cannot feed her children or pay her bills isn't safe, nor is she safe if she is still suffering from the effects of trauma."
True Safety Means:
We also want survivors to achieve emotional safety, make social connections, and recognize their strengths.
We also want survivors to achieve emotional safety, make social connections, and recognize their strengths.
If the foundation of abuse is that a survivor has had their power and control taken away, then to resolve that, we must help the person regain that control in their life.
Quiz
Question 1 of 3
Survivor-Defined Safety
According to Jill Davies, what three elements do survivors consider when assessing safety strategies?