Simon on the Streets General Manager, Helen Beachell, gives her view on why it is important to bring focus onto the women we work with.
I have been really fortunate to have been given the support as a child and as an adult, to follow my dreams. The same support has helped me to develop the tenacity and drive to bounce from my own personal challenges. I’ve carved out a career for myself in a sector than I genuinely have a passion for, and corny though it sounds, I’m incredibly glad that I get up each day (well, most – I’m trying to truthful here) with an enthusiasm for the day ahead.
I have spent almost 20 years working with, studying, and researching men and women with multiple complex needs. From my work experience aged 16 through to my degree in Criminology and Social Research, my career has seen me work within the Criminal Justice System, Healthcare and Treatment sector, and now in third sector social welfare and support services. It’s been varied, but the theme has always remained the same. I want to talk here about what I have learnt from working with the women I have supported and known. This is all opinion based on experience but it is informed and it comes from the heart.
The women I have worked with have without doubt been some of the most consistently complex cases I have ever encountered, especially in more recent years working for Simon On The Streets. There are many reasons for this, but I will focus on some of the main ones here. The simple fact is, there are dynamics effecting women that don’t have the same impact upon men. That’s not to say that men don’t face some of them too, but the drivers are often subtly different.
Let me explain. If I start with prostitution, I hope I can help you see it more clearly. A number of the men I have met over the years have at times, sold themselves for sex. However, I have met significantly few who are actually pimped or controlled by another. Usually, for a man, the act is done in a singular episode, when money for drugs is such a driving, all-encompassing need, that they make a desperate decision to sell themselves to earn them enough to stave off the withdrawal symptoms they are experiencing. They make the decision, they carry out the act. There are some women I know who have done the same. However, there are a larger group of women who are consistently controlled by another (not always a man, I hasten to add) and who are forced into prostitution. They are treated as possessions, as commodities, and they rarely see any of the money they earn. It is taken by a pimp who will give them the drugs they need – just enough to keep them on the edge and able to work – but watch their every move do their level best to ensure that support services never get anywhere near them. For these women prostitution is not their choice, nor their decision. The facts of women entering prostitution to provide for their addictions, whether by choice or by force, both are equally horrific. The latter makes it incredibly difficult for support services to even identify, let alone get to, the women who need them most. They live in a world of physical, sexual and emotional violence and feel completely and utterly trapped and cut off. For women living rough on the streets, the chances of her becoming vulnerable to forced prostitution are incredibly high.
Nine years ago I became a mother, and it was the first time in my career that I considered doing something else professionally. At the time, I was working in drug treatment services, and was the child protection lead for the organisation. That meant that I advised on child protection procedures within our service, and sat on a number of panels that considered what interventions, if any should be taken. I often did this with the women and families we were supporting present, and I began to feel as though I was losing my objectivity, and it was becoming harder and harder to leave work at work.
Giving birth to a child gave me a whole new and disturbing level of empathy for the women I worked with. As a human being, I wish that no child should ever be exposed to the horrific things I have seen and heard. As a mother, I wish that no mother should ever experience the loss of a child. You can see my dilemma. I cannot, and do not, believe that a woman who carries a child and goes through the experience of bearing that child, could ever not feel the gut wrenching pain of having that child taken from them. I cannot imagine how it would feel to give birth and to then have that baby taken from me before I could hold it, smell it, feed it. We don’t call it maternal instinct for nothing; it’s exactly that – an instinct – and I don’t believe that having an addiction, a mental health problem, or an inability to cope diminishes that instinct any less. It is absolutely right that in many cases the child is removed, that’s not up for debate here. What I am saying is, that I don’t believe that that kind of loss is felt any less by any of us. I have since found my motivation and drive for my career again, and I have it in spades. But, I’ve always struggled to support women to find some motivation for life and aspiration again after such a loss, because I don’t honestly believe that I would be able to find any if I had experienced that loss. And it’s a devastating fact that the large majority of the women that we work with at Simon on the Streets have experienced the loss of one or more children.
Of course men experience the loss of children too, and I would not for one second ever try to undermine that, but I do think that it is something that many women never ever get past, or learn to deal with successfully. Again, it’s that empathy thing – if I had lost a child under any circumstances and someone offered me a syringe with something in it that was guaranteed to take the pain away, I am pretty sure I’d take it.
The vulnerability that single, lone women face on the streets is incredible. Many are unable to fight effectively or to defend themselves and are easy targets for exploitation of many kinds, and I have seen a pattern of women jumping from one damaging relationship to another during their time on the streets. Do I believe they fall in love more easily than I do? No, not at all. What I do believe is that they seek the protection of another, that there is safety in numbers, and that the overwhelming desire for human contact, support and touch overrides all else. We’re not designed to be independent beings; we need companionship, support, love, acceptance and understanding, and these women often fall quickly and hard for those who are able to offer at least some of these needs, often confusing that relief with love. It’s those driving unmet needs that often lead them to tolerate the violence and abuse that seems to be synonymous with such relationships. It’s a kind of better the devil you know, scenario.
I have only been able to give a brief insight here into the complexities facing the women that we work with. Over the next month we will be sharing a lot more information, sharing case studies and blogs from other people working in the field. So; women. For me and my role at Simon on the streets; I still love the challenge of trying to understand them well enough to design a service that can offer them the support that they need in a way that they can access it. The women I have met have without a doubt made the biggest impact on me, and taught me the most valuable lessons of my life.