Eva Therapy Service Referrals Are Currently CLOSED
Eva Therapy Service Referrals Are Currently CLOSED
Our organisation started life in the mid-90’s as Sheffield Domestic Violence Forum, one of several emerging UK multi-agency partnerships of voluntary and statutory agencies, meeting to discuss domestic violence issues, with the encouragement of the Home Office.
In Sheffield the Forum quickly became a charity, with an office base provided by South Yorkshire Probation, and support from the Council’s Women’s Officer. Maureen Storey, Vida’s Director until May 2022, was one of the first paid Development Workers, employed in 1995 after many years involvement with Women’s Aid. Her role grew to become the strategic domestic abuse ‘Co-ordinator’ for Sheffield for 15 years, until the Council eventually created a dedicated officer role for domestic abuse.
Over time Sheffield moved towards using the term ‘domestic abuse’ rather than domestic violence, to more accurately reflect the range of abusive and coercive controlling behaviours [and to be more inclusive of the experiences of children and young people affected by living in those households] so we also changed our name to ‘Sheffield Domestic Abuse Forum’.
Women’s movements in photos: the Suffragettes, 70’s feminism & 90’s campaign against domestic abuse in South Yorkshire
Until 2011 we were known as Sheffield Domestic Abuse Forum, and were central to strategic and partnership working to tackle domestic abuse in the city. As a voluntary sector organisation, we decided to change our name to avoid any confusion created by ‘Forum’ and chose Vida because it means ‘life’ in Spanish – a positive affirmation of what our work is all about.
One of our initiatives in recent years has been as lead partner in the Women & Girls Recovery & Empowerment Partnership securing funding from the Big Lottery Women & Girls Initiative for 4 years 2016-2020. Our focus was on exploring more creative approaches to working therapeutically with women and girls affected by different forms of abuse. Information about the services of the 5 partners is summarised in this diagram: WAGI Partnership Services.
We also came together with other specialist women’s organisations and local refuges in the South Yorkshire VAWG Network, to support each other’s work and form a strong collective voice in strategic work and campaigns to tackle violence against women and girls county-wide.
Vida’s then Director also helped to coordinate events during the 16 Days of Activism Against Violence Against Women & Girls in November/December each year, and the One Billion Rising global campaign on 14 February. Vida have also been active in an innovative local awareness campaign against sexual harassment – Know the Line – which has a separate website and twitter account @knowthelineSY
Vida have historically played an active role in strategic and partnership working, and have sometimes delivered commissioned services, while securing charitable funding to create new and innovative projects. Our organisation has grown from a small group of committed individuals to a well established and respected organisation, involved in a wide range of initiatives and campaigns.
Vida’s focus is now very much on making our therapeutic services more accessible to women and girls from a broader range of ages, backgrounds and abilities, supporting them to recover and move on with their lives, while building resilience to future harm for themselves and their children.
It is really heartening to see how far work to tackle Violence Against Women & Girls and domestic abuse has come over the years of our existence, and to an even greater extent in the 45+ years of our sister organisations like Sheffield Women’s Aid and Rape Crisis.
