What do you do when you decide to leave?
Be prepared to leave at the right time, when you feel safe. The decision is yours alone, and you should not let anyone influence you. To succeed, we have prepared a safety guide, which includes some of the most important aspects. We suggest that you:
Be prepared for emergencies
– Know the warning signs of abuse.
– Identify safe areas of your home where you can take refuge (avoid small, enclosed spaces with no exits or rooms with possible weapons such as the kitchen).
– Choose a room with a telephone and an outside door or window.
– Establish a code word (or signal) to alert children, friends or neighbors that you are in danger, and they should call the police.
– Identify safe places you can go quickly (friends, family, domestic violence shelters).
– Establish a meeting point with children or other people involved, in case you are separated.
Preparing your emergency bag
– Includes essential documents, money, a change of clothes, medications, and communication devices (see details in the previous message).
– Personal documents to have on hand: ID (ID card, passport), birth certificates for you and your children, marriage/divorce certificates, property or rental documents, important medical documents.
– Financial resources: enough cash for immediate expenses, bank cards.
– Keys and transportation: spare keys for your home and car, and if you have a driver’s license, make sure your car is fueled and functional.
– Essential personal items: a change of clothes for you and your children, necessary medications, emergency personal hygiene items
– Contact information: a list of important phone numbers (family, trusted friends, lawyers, support organizations). Write these contacts down on paper, in case you don’t have access to your phone, so you have them at hand.
– A cell phone with a prepaid card, which the abuser does not know about, to prevent tracking
– Valuables and memories: jewelry, photos, or other sentimental items you want to keep
Make an escape plan
– Keep your car fueled. Hide a spare car key in a place you can quickly access.
– Keep an emergency amount of money, clothes, important phone numbers, and identification documents for you and your children hidden in a safe place.
– Practice your safe escape plan several times. If you have children, practice your escape plan with them as a game.
– Memorize a list of emergency contacts. Ask several trusted people if you can call them if you need to stay overnight or contact the police.
Protect your privacy
– When seeking help, it is important to cover your tracks, especially when using a phone or computer.
– Try calling from a different phone outside of your home.
– Use a prepaid phone card (if you use your home landline, the phone numbers called can be listed on your monthly bill upon request).
– Check your cell phone settings. There are cell phone technologies that an abuser can use to listen to your calls, track your location, or use your cell phone as a tracking device if it has GPS.
– Get a different cell phone with a prepaid card or use a different cell phone that the abuser doesn’t know about.
Computer and Internet Safety
– Learn how to selectively delete your browsing history. Deleting your entire history can be a red flag to your partner that you are trying to hide something, so be very careful.
– Use incognito mode in your browser so that the pages you browse are not stored in your computer history.
– Be careful with the emails and messages you send, your partner may know how to access your account or know your password. Consider creating a new email account that he or she does not know anything about.
– Change your passwords for online banking services, or any other accounts.
– Choose passwords that the aggressor cannot guess, also using combinations of numbers and symbols
– Protect yourself from GPS surveillance and recording devices. GPS devices can be hidden in your car, bag, or other items you carry with you. Don’t forget to check!
– Be aware that your abuser may use hidden cameras to check on you.
– If you discover any tracking or recording devices, leave them there until you are ready to leave. While it may be tempting for you to remove them, this will alert the abuser and make them even more suspicious of your intentions.
– Check which devices your social media accounts are connected to and log out. Change your passwords for your email, Facebook, Instagram, etc.
Protect yourself after you leave
– Protecting yourself is just as important after you leave as it was when you were living together.
– Find a place where your ex-partner can’t find you. If you have children, you may need to transfer them to another school.
– Don’t list your phone number, ask your mobile/landline phone providers to do the same.
– Use a post office box for bills and correspondence.
– Cancel old bank accounts and credit cards.
– Use a different bank if you open new accounts.
– Change your daily routine if you’re staying in the same area as your abuser.
– Use a different route to get to work.
– Avoid places where they might find you, like the supermarket you used to go to together.
Child Protection (if applicable)
– Inform teachers and caregivers about the situation.
– Teach children to call 112 and clearly state the address and what to do if you are in danger.
– Determine who children can go with from school and make sure the institution knows who is not allowed to pick them up in the event of a separation/risk situation.
Keep a charged mobile phone with you at all times and call 112 whenever you feel in danger.