Hi, welcome to Houston newsmakers extra are continuing conversation with Heather
bellino. The CEO of the Texas, advocacy project with the
Texas legislature
in session right now. The question then becomes,
are there things that your
organization does maybe especially so during the legislative
session to try to get things done?
What goes on extra?
That’s a great question. Thank you for answering or for asking that
we try to bring the voice of all of the survivors.
We serve
to
the
Elected officials,
we are not allow being group in any way, shape, or form, but
you know, we do close
5,000 cases on average every year.
That’s 5,000 individuals.
When you say, you say close 5,000 cases, what does that mean? When you say
close a case?
That means that we’ve had a client come to us that needs a legal
Remedy
or advice and counsel
and we speak to them, help them get their court orders, walk
alongside them
as they become empowered and in the restorative process,
Us
and get them to safety that they deserve in the long term
because the passion that it takes to do what you do. I would imagine that whenever
you find or you are able to help solve somebody’s issue
or
bring at least closure
for the immediate
period of time to their
dangerous situation.
It’s almost like when somebody rings, the bell when they’re getting, when they think, when
they clear cancer, I would guess that’s a moment of celebration for you to
know that you’ve done that much to help somebody get normal. See,
it is a huge moment of celebration for us because
You are the ones that receive so many gifts
from
these clients.
These people that have been abused for so long. When
they have the courage to say no more,
I need a little help but they’re the ones doing this. They’re
the ones that are taking that step
to leave an abusive relationship. Remember abuse
is about power and control
they’re taking back their control,
we get to walk alongside them
with the expertise. We have to make that available.
Able to them
and when it’s done and they get that court order.
Oh yeah. It’s a beautiful day at Texas, advocacy project.
I would imagine it is, is they get a chance to start out a new life,
whatever they had, they can leave that behind, you know, I’m looked at some of the statistics
about what’s going on.
I opening 41 percent of women,
and 26 percent of men have experienced sexual
violence, physical violence.
And/or stalking by an intimate partner,
61 million women, 53 million, men of
experience psychological aggression.
By an intimate partner in their lifetime as well. We don’t often think about
that part but the psychological part really a lot often times
precedes the physical part does it not
yes it does. And oftentimes that’s the hardest part to get over
really you know, I mean, a broken arm, it can meant
but
what is done to you, emotionally and psychologically,
it
mends also. But that takes really hard work.
And again it goes back to the courage of survivors
because they want to start anew.
This whole process, it seems that one of the challenges is
starting early enough,
so that behaviors
don’t
do
the negative behaviors that lead to this. Don’t get developed in the first
place. What is your challenge with that?
Well, I think that the challenge is getting to people young enough
and helping them to understand what healthy relationships
are what unhealthy relationships are
conflict, resolution,
things of that nature,
how to have a healthy argument.
How
How to say no? This is not acceptable.
How to stand up for your friends when you see something going
wrong.
So, getting to people young enough, I think that that’s one of our biggest
challenges.
We have that great teen ambassadors program that starting this month and
that’s,
you know, that’s my most exciting program, okay, talk about that, what does that involve?
It
involves a teens throughout the state of Texas, we’ve got a hundred
kids in the cohort this year.
Of course I’m sure they wouldn’t like me calling them kids young people, right?
And they kind of hard it is. Sometimes reality is tough to handle.
But right on right on. But we talked to them about what healthy relationships
are and what healthy conflict resolution is, we do these
physical exercises around that and then we have
a world-renowned leadership, coach come in and talk to them about being
leaders, in their spheres of influence.
And we do some, you know,
business planning work with them because they go out and
fundraise and do Outreach on behalf of Texas advocacy project. It’s such
a cool program, absolutely. And where you start, you start
planting the seed in those babies early. Yeah.
And that really hopefully you can spread that and they can influence their peers
that sort of thing. Absolutely. And we’ve heard that it’s happened. Time and time again,
we have kids that I say, you know, I was on the bus with somebody and
they showed me pictures of what their boyfriend sent them. And I said, well, that’s not
love.
Yeah,
for that kid to say, that’s not love to understand that difference.
It’s wonderful on a program. You talked, about you, the article, you wrote
about family physicians and the, the role that they can play, talk about
that again because that a lot of people aren’t really aware of that. First
of all, many people, there are a lot of people who may not have
A regular family physician to begin with but those who do
that
person or that man or woman does play in a real big role. Do
they absolutely. I mean you go to your family physician and that’s your Confidant,
right?
And if that family physician can notice the signs and offer
you a safe space
to say, you know, yeah, I’m scared and I need help
and then that physician knows the community resources that
are available, right? We all work at the top of our profession,
The Physician needs to make sure that somebody is healthy of mind
and body
and then
Then they can say, okay now
I’m going to hand you off to this resource that we know
has
solutions that help will help you to get a legal remedy
that helps you to get out of an abusive home that gets you,
the divorce, the custody, the protective order, whatever that maybe
that’s going to get you safe, that you’ll identify
as your safety. It’s just wonderful to have these relationships.
This is
the Texas, advocacy project, Heather bellino is the
CEO
of that organization.
This is the first part of a conversation.
It’s a part of this week, KPRC 2 is doing a week called
Breaking Free. Hopefully, you’ll be able to tune in across all
platforms. As we talk about the ways that Intimate
Relationships can go wrong, but better how
to not get into them and how to get out of them, if you get into that situation circumstance.
So please watch all of our information this week and
use this Houston newsmakers extra and share it with everyone,
you know.