A day in the life of a domestic violence helpline

“There’s an intimate, terrible kind of synergy to the way in which each women on the phone is a kind of mirror of the other.” 

“Hero” is a word that has been batted around a lot lately. The NHS staff, grocery store workers, key workers. To describe someone as a hero places them above being human and it’s dangerous.

The impact on mental health of Covid-19 on domestic violence helpline workers cannot be underestimated. Since lockdown began there has been a 700% increase in visits to Women’s Aid’s sites, nine homicides in the UK in the first week of April and a 120% in the number of calls made to Refuge. The women manning the other side of the phone, giving advice, information, recommendations and sharing in the pain of victims of domestic violence have had struggles of their own facing this increase in pressure. This week, I interviewed helpline workers from domestic violence charities Women’s Aid Ireland to find out the true emotional impact of being a so called “hero” at this time.

One of the huge issues for the Women’s Aid team manning the helplines at the moment is the huge sense of “sadness” they feel for the victims of domestic violence, as Linda the Helpline Manger of Women’s Aid Ireland explained. The circumstances created by Covid-19 in which everyone is “working from home”, unable to see friends or family, pop to a cafe or the cinema means that for many women they are living with their abuser “twenty four seven” and “there’s no organic way to escape it”, says Linda. There’s an overwhelming sense of “isolation, sadness, anger, frustration” and “desperation” coming through the phone and resting on the shoulders of helpline workers. A desperate situation in more normal times – a woman suffering domestic abuse – is suddenly critical but potentially without end. Laura, a helpline worker for Women’s Aid Ireland explained that for many of these women find “having privacy… difficult” because they are “unable to speak” with the perpetrator of abuse at home all the time. With no clear sense of when lockdown will come to a close and normal life will resume, an increase in familial stress with many facing redundancy, housing uncertainty and children stuck at home –  it’s a “pressure cooker” scenario for many in abusive relationships. 

With no clear sense of when lockdown will come to a close and normal life will resume, an increase in familial stress with many facing redundancy, housing uncertainty and children stuck at home –  it’s a “pressure cooker” scenario for many in abusive relationships. 

For the month of April there was a huge increase in calls and messages to Women’s Aid Ireland’s newly launched instant messaging service. Often that is the only line of communication which is safe for these women to use, particularly if their partner is monitoring their call activity. Consequently, Linda has felt that it’s “harder to finish off your work in the current climate”, so those “two emails that are coming in at the end of the day” or “text messages, it just seems to become….”. Linda tails off, without finishing her sentence. One can imagine her line of thought. It seems to become unmanageable, impossible not to continue working and respond. Considering the amount of bravery it takes for a woman to finally contact a domestic violence charity, often when they are at their wits end, and then to potentially have that message unread and not responded to fast enough… It could be a life or death situation. Many working from home have felt it difficult to switch off, sure, but when a life is potentially at stake. How can you?

Working from home has brought a new dimension manning the helplines which is difficult to navigate. For the team as Linda explains, it has been a “real struggle”, because the “issues are in the ether of your own home”. There’s no “clear disconnect” between the physical workplace and the “personal” anymore, you can’t leave the conversations you’ve had behind and close the door. The way in which the world of work has invaded the familial space in current times is well documented but this is particular poignant when working for a domestic violence charity. 

There’s an intimate, terrible kind of synergy to the way in which each women on the phone is a kind of mirror of the other. Linda feels it acutely that she is “in [her] own home, I’m safe, I’m working and this woman is dealing with these traumatic events that she’s trying to manage at home, to keep herself and her children safe”. One woman manning the helpline, safely working, perhaps even once a victim herself, speaking to another woman, stuck in a dangerous home situation, who is gripping the phone close, sat in a wardrobe, or their child’s bedroom at bath time, seeking out a moment of privacy to try and save herself, her children. A temporary lifeline, a brief respite provided through this one conversation. It’s a huge amount of pressure to manage conversations like these, but particularly at a time where helpline workers don’t have the opportunity to debrief in the kitchen over a cuppa. Or pop into someone’s office after a particularly difficult conversation. The effects of this intense, daily emotional intensity is incredibly taxing for those working the helplines and in lockdown it’s particularly difficult to lean on colleagues for support. 

It has been a “real struggle”, because the “issues are in the ether of your own home”. There’s no “clear disconnect” between the physical workplace and the “personal” anymore, you can’t leave the conversations you’ve had behind and close the door.

There’s nothing which can substitute that “natural environment” of an office and Linda feels that sense of “isolation” acutely. Even if technology allows team members to link up quickly, there’s something about the “tangibility of the work that we do which makes it harder” to properly express these intricacies over a zoom call. Conversations between survivors and helpline workers are nuanced, sensitive, difficult, emotionally draining. It’s nigh impossible to capture all of that at a meeting with colleagues where the wifi drops out, a team member freezes every few seconds and housemates or family members wonder in. Laura, also from Irish Women’s Aid highlighted the importance of “good self care” in times like this, and to also be open about the fact that “we’re in a bad situation”. She also feels comforted, despite the difficulties that she is “supporting other volunteers” to be able “to support women”, so there’s this wonderful, chain of connection, of women leaning on each other. A sisterhood over the phone. 

Sometimes act of heroism are in the little things.

That’s not to minimise the difficulties in inherent in these brief relationships. A sisterhood makes it sound like every conversation always ends happily, with a positive resolution. Often, as Linda explained you may go through a list of different options for a women, such as a “domestic violence order” or moving in to live with friends, but for some reason that could “escalate the risk to her” or the woman’s children. It can be the case that you “list off all of the different things” and “none” are viable. And even though every helpline worker wants with every fibre of their being to support every woman, “we can’t work this journey for her”. It’s a sad, painful truth. Each conversation is about arming each women with the knowledge and the power in that relationship should they choose to leave. 

Often, there is no easy resolution. And the difficulty here is that even when the clock strikes 6, and the working day ends for most, the pressure inherent in these homes, towering over these women in abusive, dangerous scenarios does not. And neither does the pressure on helpline workers. The emails continue and so too do the instant messages. It’s a true attest to the human spirit that these women continue to pick up the phone again and again. To pour themselves into something so entirely, which may never reach a satisfying conclusion or a definitive end. Sometimes act of heroism are in the little things. To work over time. To pick up the phone. Reply to the message. To willingly open your heart again and again even when it is painful. Even when the phone goes dead in the middle of a sentence and a helpline worker is left wondering… it is a truly triumphant, emotionally heroic act, even if it is one that too, has a cost.