What Is a Personalized Safety Plan?
The most important thing in your life should be your safety, period. Are you being safe and happy?!
If not, have you realized why?! If you’re in an abusive relationship, your safety is in grave danger. And, you need to do something about it.
Domestic violence accounts for a major chunk of different crimes. Homicides and rapes are the most dangerous ones.
And, no victim thinks that they’re going to suffer. But, aren’t they utterly wrong?!
Being in an abusive relationship is already a very troublesome situation. Getting out of it is a whole different story. With a proper plan, you can get out of your misery safely.
Personalized Safety Plan – Everything You Need to Know
So, what’s a personalized safety plan?! You may ask!
A plan that’s personalized and practical, with which you can stay safe while being in a relationship, planning to get out, and even after you leave.
It teaches you how to deal with emotions, discussing with your family and friends about your abuse, taking legal action, and many more.
A good safety plan lets you know all the important information about dealing with a DV relationship.
Domestic Violence Safety Plan
If you’re being abused, don’t worry. You can get out of it and end it for good. Knowing what exactly to do and how to do can help you by leaps and bounds.
To help you with that, here’s a thoroughly-researched and well-articulated plan for you.
When you’re in an abusive relationship
- Keep the important phone numbers handy. Make sure that your kids have access to them as well.
Numbers of friends, family members, police, local shelter, and hotlines are the most important ones to have.
When you do this, you can instantly call someone when you’re in trouble. You don’t know what’s going to happen in the next minute. So, don’t neglect it. After all, it only takes a couple of minutes to do this.
- Have some people around you. Keep your friends and family close. Don’t isolate yourself from your peers.
When you’re being attacked, you can let them know, as they can inform the police.
Teach your kids how to dial 911. Prepare a code word and tell your kids about it. So, when you’re under an assault, speak out the keyword, as it informs your children that there’s trouble.
- When your partner abuses you, it’s quite difficult to get out of the home. They may even lock the doors, making it tough for you to get out.
Plan ahead! Prepare yourself by rehearsing how to get out of your place. With that, you can run away from that horrible place, when your mate attacks you.
- Mark all the safer places in your home. We’re talking about the places where there’s an exit. Or, where there are no weapons.
When there’s abuse happening, try to get your partner to that place. Either you can de-escalate the situation or you can simply get out through the exit.
A place without weapons helps too. As you can avoid any type of extreme violence.
- Abusers, when triggered, may resort to using weapons to inflict pain upon their victims. Some terrible things can happen in just a matter of seconds.
There’s no use of thinking what you could’ve done to be safe. It’s better to take precautions beforehand.
Search your place for weapons and try to get rid of them. This step helps you very well, especially if your partner is a maniac.
- You may not be planning to leave. Maybe it’s just some negligible friction between you and your spouse. It might even cool off soon.
But, you should never take chances. What if they turn violent?!
And, when they do, you should leave the place as soon as possible. But, how?!
You shouldn’t make your partner feel suspicious. It’s better to leave the house by using the excuse of daily activities. Like, taking out the trash, walking your pet, or anything similar to that.
Also, get all your essentials into a bag and hide it safely. It comes handy when you leave.
- Alright, now you have all the things you should know about your safety when in an abusive relationship. Is it enough?!
Yes and no! Even when you note down all these things, you may not remember them while being attacked. You might panic and have a brain fade.
To avoid that, go through your safety plan regularly. It helps you remember these tips.
When you plan on leaving your batterer
- Four of five places you could go after leaving your house. It can be your parents, friends, colleagues, or a refuge shelter.
It’s good if you let them know that you might crash over there, when things go south with your partner.
Write all these places down along with the addresses. Don’t ever discuss this with your partner.
- Think about all the people who might help you in case of a disaster. Consider the people from who you can lend some money in an emergency.
Also, think about people who may come to your rescue and assist you in moving your bags or pets.
Keep their contacts in your fast dial list. It comes handy when you have to contact them and you don’t have much time to do so.
- Always have some change. It helps you when you want to make phone calls from a public phone.
Make sure that you keep some money aside, so that you can buy a new phone when you’re in this crisis. Who knows?! Your partner may take your phone away or destroy it altogether.
Without a phone, it’s quite difficult to get away, as you can’t contact people Oh, by the way, sync your contacts to your cloud account.
By doing so, you will be able to restore all your contacts when you get a new phone.
- It’s very important that you have a bank account on your name. When things are good, you might think that a joint bank account is pretty fine.
Or, maybe you got used to using your partner’s bank account. But, when things go down, you will definitely need your own account.
The abuser may block your access to their or family account. You will be helpless when that happens.
- Here comes probably the most important thing. Make a perfect plan on taking your children. Remember, when abuse happens, you all are vulnerable to danger.
You have to deal very carefully when your kids are involved. It’s better that you plan everything ahead.
Because your mind may not be very active when you’re in such threatening situations.
- Think about all the items you would take with you. They may include:
- Money
- Keys to work, house, and car
- Clothes
- Important papers and certificates
- Medicine
- Social security cards
- Driver’s license
- Car registration
- Medical and social records
- Welfare identification
- Work permits, Green cards, and Passports
- Insurance papers
- Address book
- Jewelry, Pictures, and anything that matters a lot
- Things for your children like blankets, clothes, and toys.
When you left your abuser
- Dump the safety plan. Throw it into the nearest garbage can. You don’t need that anymore, right?! WRONG!
Don’t commit this mistake. You will still need it, as you don’t know what’s waiting for you right around the corner.
Keep it safe and secure. You can even have a digital copy of that and upload it to your email
- Get a new cell phone. It stops your abuser from contacting you or tracing you. By doing this, you can avoid a lot of hassle.
HAVEN can provide you with a cell phone, that lets you call 911 and nothing else. Such a device can be very helpful in times of crisis.
- Consider getting a PRO. You can contact the local court for this. Always have a copy of that all the time. Also, you deliver one copy to the police as well.
Oh, you may have to give a copy to the people that takes care of your kids, their school, and your employer.
- Enhance your home’s security system. Change locks. Get stronger locks and doors. For better security, consider getting a smoker detector.
- Intimate all your friends, neighbors, family that you’re no longer living with your abuser. Also, request them to call the police when they see your batterer near you, your home, or children.
- Tell your closest co-worker about all the abuse you’ve experienced. When the offender approaches your workplace, your colleague can report it to the police.
- Change the stores you visit and buy things. Start going to new shops. This will protect you, as your batterer only knows the places you used to go when you’re with them.
- Think about the people whom you can call and talk about when you’re feeling low. When you’re sad, don’t hesitate to speak to them. Take care of your mental health.
- Read your safety plan often. Make sure that you’re doing everything accordingly.
Important
Abusers like to control their victims. It’s what gets them high. And when they sense that they’re losing control, they may resort to violence.
So, be cautious when dealing with the situation. Don’t leave out any signs. Even after you left, you should keep your safety in mind. You can never be too careful.
