Virginia Anti-Violence Project

Give OUT Day is June 4, 2026, and VAVP is raising $2,000 to support LGBTQ+ survivors of violence with care, advocacy, resources, and community-rooted healing.

Every gift helps move us closer to the goal and makes sure our people have access to support when they need it most.

Give today: tinyurl.com/VAVPGiveOut

Join VAVP and Virginia Legal Aid Society for a virtual legal and community resources session created for LGBTQ+ survivors of violence.

This informative session will help connect survivors, advocates, service providers, and community members with legal support, survivor-centered resources, and pathways to care.

Friday, May 15 at 11 AM
Zoom Link: shorturl.at/rzXpB

Whether you are seeking support, supporting someone else, or working to strengthen survivor resources in your community, this session is for you.

Support. Empower. Justice.

Some survivors learned how to survive before they ever learned how to rest.

You are not weak for needing support.
You are human.

Mental health support is violence prevention.

VAVP offers survivor-centered mental health support navigation for LGBTQIA+ survivors.

Start at VirginiaAVP.org.

Healing beyond survival means learning that your body deserves peace too.

This Mental Health Awareness Month, VAVP honors every LGBTQIA+ survivor working to reclaim rest, joy, softness, and emotional safety.

Need support?
VirginiaAVP.org

Therapy referrals may include BetterHelp and additional affirming care options.

Hyper-independence.
Emotional numbness.
Always expecting something bad to happen.

These can all be trauma responses.

You do not have to navigate healing alone.

VAVP can connect survivors with affirming mental health support and therapy referrals, including BetterHelp.

Complete the intake form at VirginiaAVP.org.

Survival mode was never supposed to become a permanent lifestyle.

Many LGBTQIA+ survivors are carrying:
• anxiety
• hypervigilance
• exhaustion
• grief
• emotional shutdown

This Mental Health Awareness Month, we want our community to know:
healing matters too.

If you need support, VAVP is here.

Complete the Mental Health Support Intake Form at VirginiaAVP.org to connect with affirming support resources and therapy referrals, including BetterHelp.

Your healing matters.
Your life matters.
You matter.

Nancy Metayer Bowen. Cerina Fairfax.

Two Black women leaders whose lives were taken in acts of domestic violence. This is not separate from power. This is what power looks like when it goes unchecked.

Justin Fairfax was a Black man with access, proximity, and institutional credibility. And still, harm showed up in devastating ways. That is not a contradiction. That is a warning.

Oppression does not disappear when we gain access. It embeds. It adapts. It shows up in how we lead, how we relate, and how we exercise control when we feel threatened.

What we are witnessing is not isolated. It is patterned.

Look at our workplaces.

Thousands of highly qualified women and q***r professionals are sitting “open to work.” Experienced. Capable. Ready. Passed over.

At the same time, organizations are struggling with culture, retention, and trust in leadership.

That is not a pipeline issue. That is not a talent shortage. That is a leadership failure.

We have normalized environments where ego is rewarded, accountability is optional, and harm is managed instead of addressed.

This is not working.

Representation alone is not liberation. Access alone is not transformation.

Power without self-examination reproduces the very systems many claim to oppose.

If we are serious about equity, then we have to tell the truth about what leadership requires. Emotional intelligence. Accountability. The discipline to not turn personal pain into public harm.

Protecting Black women is not a slogan. It is a standard.

Until that standard is upheld in our homes, in our leadership, and in our institutions, the outcomes will not change.

This week we honor Black Maternal Health Week.

Black women have long led the movement for birth justice, fighting for safer pregnancies, respectful care, and the right to bring life into the world with dignity. Their leadership continues to shape how we understand maternal health and reproductive justice.

At the same time, we recognize that Black trans men, nonbinary people, and gender non-conforming womb holders can also experience pregnancy and birth, and often face additional barriers, stigma, and medical violence in healthcare settings.

Honoring Black maternal health means protecting all Black birthing bodies while continuing to uplift and respect the leadership and legacy of Black women in this movement.

Every Black birthing body deserves safe, respectful, and affirming care.

🖤 We see you.
🖤 We honor you.
🖤 We stand with you.

virginiaavp.org