One woman raised awareness Saturday night about the difficult choice some domestic violence survivors make to live out of their cars when leaving abusive relationships, with the “One Night Homeless” challenge.
For one night, three years in a row, Tiffany Santana, the executive director of Bethany House of Northern Virginia, has slept inside a car with limited supplies to raise awareness about the difficulties women go through when they escape domestic violence.
“I do choose the month of March because March is Women’s History Month. I usually do it around the 10th of March because that’s Good Samaritan Day, but I do this to raise awareness to the thousands of women who choose homelessness over abuse, who leave abusive homes quickly, usually without next steps, and they end up living in their cars, often with children,” Santana said.
From 7 p.m. Saturday to 7 a.m. Sunday, Santana will have with her a coat, a bottle of water and one small food item.
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During the sleepout, Santana will be joined by four members from her organization’s partner, Women in Aviation Resource Group, from American Airlines.
“And the reason why we do this each year is… as the director, I want to have as much of a clear picture of what the women go through who come to us as possible, and we often get women who come to us after living in their cars for some time, and you can’t really get a full picture of what they go through, but I want to at least get a glimpse so that we can provide the best possible care to them,” she said.
Santana explained that about one third of women in Fairfax County who experience homelessness state that domestic violence is the cause of their homelessness. She has dedicated 10 years of her work to helping those women through services provided at Bethany House.
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“Bethany House of Northern Virginia empowers women and children escaping domestic violence by providing safe, short-term housing and trauma-informed services,” she said. “So we are unique in that we provide four to six months of safe shelter, and while we’re doing that, we give the women in our care counseling and life skills classes and financial planning, legal services, healthcare, child care, anything a woman needs to rebuild her life after abuse. That’s what we try to provide.”
Correction (March 12, 2023 at 11:07 p.m. EST): The statistic in the story was updated to reflect that one third of women in Fairfax County who experience homelessness state that domestic violence is the cause of their homelessness.
