PUBLIC TESTIMONY
Testimony by Stephanie Mansfield on Her Experience as a Domestic Violence Survivor
1:29:07
·
9 min
Stephanie Mansfield, a 36-year-old Haitian American immigrant and single mother of three, shares her personal experience as a domestic violence survivor. She describes her journey from an abusive relationship to finally finding safe housing through an EHV voucher, highlighting the challenges she faced in accessing support services and the impact on her children.
- Mansfield emphasizes the importance of safe housing for survivors and their children, especially those with disabilities or special needs.
- She stresses the need for improved data collection and reporting on domestic violence survivors to drive change.
- Mansfield calls for better recognition of the complexities faced by individual survivors and the need for comprehensive, trauma-informed support services.
Stephanie Mansfield
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Hello.
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Hi.
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My name is Stephanie.
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Do you hear me now?
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Stephanie Mansfield.
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I am grateful to be able to be here and speak with you and just to give my perspective.
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I am thirty six years old.
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I am a Haitian American immigrant, descendant, I should say.
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I'm single mother of 3 beautiful children.
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Their father was my abuser.
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So in 2015, 2013, I was living with their father.
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The the room, the apartment that we were living in was under his name.
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The lease title was under his name.
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And this is where my story begins.
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According to HRA, DSS1 website.
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They state how I'm sorry.
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Domestic violence can include physical violence, forceable sex threatening to hurt you or your children, constant insulting, stalking, obsessively checking up or otherwise trying to control your behavior.
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I was unaware that I was in an abusive relationship.
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I and when by the time I was aware, my I was sexually assaulted by my abuser.
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I had my 3rd son.
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And It took 8 years of living in a home, which I didn't feel like was my home.
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My abuser was had access to my apartment.
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He was able to come in and out.
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And in the end, according to the unite the US Department of Housing And Urban Development, I was homeless.
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They have 4 staples of defining what homelessness is, literally homeless, imminent risk of homelessness, homelessness under federal stature and fleeing or attempting to flee DV.
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8 years of the 10 years I lived in that apartment, I was attempting to flee my abuser.
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I am a proud mama of a neurodivergent son.
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I am a proud mama of a son that has ADHD that's on the spectrum.
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I am myself physically disabled.
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I suffer T.
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V.
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I.
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And these are all barriers that prevented me from fleeing my abuser.
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Not trying to be the best mom that I could be prevented me from fleeing my abuser.
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The people that I encountered along the way prevented me from fleeing my abuser.
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There is multiple contacts of police officers or HRA workers or all of these agencies and organizations that were meant to uplift me as a survivor, and yet I was not supported last year because of the EHV voucher.
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I'm a EHV voucher holder.
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This will be the 10th will be 1 year that I am in my home that I feel safe in 1 year.
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And last year, the incongulancy where it's like everyone has their own definition of what domestic violence is and everyone has their own idea of what domestic violence is.
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And in the end, it made me and my children suffer.
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Housing is so important and is so vital.
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I need to feel safe where I'm going.
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I need to feel that I my children will be safe, that they will be heard, that their tantrums, is not tantrums, is just learning disabilities, is inputting the world differently.
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I did not feel safe.
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I was not safe until I moved.
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It is so important that the ACS workers, I had 3 ACS cases, I had 3 I had 3 ACS cases against my abuser and all of those.
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In all of those encounters with so many people that could help, I still wasn't able to access the services that I needed.
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Microgrants are important.
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The ability to move and know that I'm gonna be safe, that my children are gonna be safe, and that we are not going to end up homeless again, the eviction notice, the eviction process, having the proper supports and people who are trauma informed to help and aid.
1:34:50
New Destiny Housing made an article in 2024, July.
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A crisis compounded on homelessness, DV, and DV survivors.
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They outline concrete steps that can change how we view homelessness how we view domestic violence, and how to best support children that are that are according to New York State disabled, children that are undergoing the disability process, the IEPs, and the neuro you know, neuropsych evaluations, how do we speak up and stand out for those individuals?
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As a youth, I went into the shelter her.
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I was with my mom.
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I was a domestic violence survivor.
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It was a one off incident, and it was her determination to get us out of there that allowed us to be that 1%.
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That was able to leave the domestic violence shelter.
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So for me as a mother of 3 and to place them in a situation where I knew routines are not a thing, that routines will not be able to be upheld.
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I put myself in risk in order to keep my children's sanity.
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And in the end, 3 ACS cases means that they were not safe.
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It means that they were harmed because of my decisions.
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But if I don't feel supported, how can I move forward?
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The two ask that I would like to emphasize is the improvement of data collection and reporting.
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How can you know what's going on with survivors if you don't have the adequate data to port it.
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Data allows change to happen.
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Data allows things to reveal itself.
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The second.
Barbara Manny
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Sorry.
Stephanie Mansfield
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The second is recognizing the whole survivor.
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Recognizing the things, the complexities that come with every single survivor.
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And the differences that make us beautiful, but the differences that makes it more complex, the access, the ability to The ability to see us.
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I will always prioritize my children before myself, and it led to my detriment.
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I was in HOSPITAL A MONTH AFTER I WAS PLACED IN NEW HOUSEING.
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I WAS NOT GIVEN ACCESS TO THE MckINNEY VITA, I THINK IT IS, WHERE YOU GET BUSING.
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For your child when you're a survivor.
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I wasn't given that, and I spent thanksgiving in the hospital instead of celebrating it with my children.
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But that's my disability.
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And if there were services, if there were enough services to provide me what I needed and my family and what they needed, I believe things will be different.
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I am so grateful of where I am now and where I am today compared to where I was a year ago.
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And I would like to thank you for your time.
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Thank you.
