What It Means to Be an Advocate

 

I am honored. Truly honored.

I am honored to do this work on behalf of domestic violence survivors. I am honored to advocate in my city and my state for people navigating domestic violence - often in silence, often in fear, and too often without the protection they so rightly deserve.

Recently, I was informed that I had been selected to be honored on the floor of the California State Assembly as the Woman of the Year for the 19th District. The recognition, presented by Assemblywoman Catherine Stefanie and her staff, stopped me in my tracks. Shocked doesn’t quite capture it. Grateful doesn’t go far enough.

What it did do, though, was force me to pause and ask a much deeper question: What does it actually mean to be an advocate? And why do I do this work day after day, year after year, despite the toll it takes?

The answer is both simple and complex. I do this work because I am trying to be the advocate my two friends needed before they were killed by their partners. I do this work because I am trying to be the advocate many of my friends’ parents needed while they were experiencing abuse behind closed doors. I do this work because I am trying to ensure that someone like me, who was navigating harm, confusion, and survival - will have access to the support that I once needed to leave an unhealthy and dangerous relationship.

Advocacy, at its core, is not about titles, awards, or recognition. It is about responsibility.

To be an advocate is: to speak up, to educate, and to resist - especially when policies, systems, or well-intentioned people create barriers for survivors who are simply doing their best and trying to stay alive. Advocacy means interrupting ignorance with truth, compassion, and action.

An advocate is the person who walks with you through the hardest decisions of your life even when staying feels dangerous and leaving feels deadly. An advocate is the one who helps you navigate through fear that is so real it lives in your body. An advocate sits with you while you wrestle to decide whether to leave, how to leave, and when to leave.

An advocate helps you with the difficult task of finding housing, even if that housing is temporary, or it is in a shelter - because safety today matters more than comfort tomorrow. An advocate helps ensure that you and your children can sleep without fear.

An advocate speaks on your behalf when you are applying for a job after being out of the workforce for ten years because you were a stay-at-home parent, managing a household, protecting your children, and surviving abuse. Advocates help you step into a workforce that may feel unfamiliar, unforgiving, and far removed from your lived reality.

An advocate shows up. They encourage you when you feel broken. They empower you when you have been repeatedly told that you are powerless. They support you in ways you didn’t know to ask for, during moments when asking for anything feels impossible.

This work is not easy. The hours are long. The emotional labor is extremely heavy. The bureaucracy over the simplest things that involve basic rights is exhausting, and all of the current systems move slowly while danger moves fast. There are days when progress feels impossible and setbacks feel extremely personal.

And yet, the rewards are immeasurable. There is nothing like helping to guide a family to safety. Nothing like witnessing someone reclaim their voice, their autonomy, and their future. Nothing like seeing a survivor reestablish a life that is free from violence, and full of possibility.

So yes, I am honored. But more than that, I am committed. Committed to continuing this work, even when it is hard. Committed to telling the truth about what survivors need, not just what is convenient, comfortable, or politically easy. Committed to being present, persistent, and unapologetic in the fight for safety, dignity, and justice.

That is what it means to be an advocate and I am honored and proud to be one!

📸 Credit: Desmond Rodgers of DRod Photography

💄 MUA: Martha