Imagine that feeling where you’ve found yourself stuck behind a locked door.

Now imagine that feeling of being trapped constantly weighing on you – every hour of every day.

This feeling is what countless women experience in an abusive relationship. There may or may not be a locked door, yet either way they are trapped in a situation that is not only ruining their life but also endangering it.

This week is Week Without Violence, an annual event taking place globally to raise awareness and aiming to end violence against women. There is still a long way to go. On average, one woman is killed every week by a partner or ex-partner in Australia. One woman. Every week. What’s every bit as horrifying as the number itself is what it means: domestic violence victims are becoming a statistic. Yet behind each number is a woman who lost her life – a person with a past, a story, a family.

At Open Support, our goal is to help reduce these statistics, by providing support through emergency and transitional accommodation as well as ongoing assistance to domestic violence survivors. We support culturally diverse women who face additional challenges to access safety. Of the women we support, almost half are on temporary visas.

In this video, you will meet a survivor who has escaped an abusive relationship with the help of Open Support.