Do I Belong Here? Experiences of Transgender Survivors of Intimate Partner Violence in Domestic Violence Shelters

Study Procedure and Data Collection

Participants were recruited from two women serving IPV shelters in the Southern United States. Researchers posted study information at the shelters and were also assisted by shelter staff to send the study information on email listservs. Participants who wished to participate first completed an online consent form and demographic survey. At the conclusion of the survey, they were asked to provide their phone number so they could be contacted for a qualitative interview. Interviews were scheduled at a time that was convenient for the participant and took place over the phone. A member of the research team contacted the participants and completed the interview following a semi-structured interview guide that asked participants to discuss their accommodations within the shelter and the impacts of the coronavirus pandemic on their daily lives. The last four digits of the participant’s phone number were used to link the online survey with the qualitative interview. Interviews were audio-recorded and then transcribed using a professional transcription service called Rev.com. Participants received a US$10 Walmart e-gift card for completing the web survey and an additional US$20 gift card for completing the interview. This study received institutional review board approval.

Data Analysis

This study utilized a multi-case study design (Yin, 2017) to explore the experiences of trans women who were survivors of IPV in a domestic violence shelter that housed exclusively women. Yin (2017) defines a multi-case study as a method that allows researchers to explore the perspectives of cases (i.e., individuals) who are uniquely bound to the context in which a phenomenon is taking place. For this study, the research participants were uniquely situated to provide their perspectives on what it was like for them to live as trans women in a shelter that housed exclusively women.

The authors worked collaboratively to generate propositions related to life in shelters for those identifying as transgender (Yin, 2017; Miles et al., 2019). Yin (2017) defines propositions as emerging themes within the data that warrant further exploration and inquiry. Before beginning the analysis, each author bracketed their experiences related to the topic of study to eliminate potentially biasing results (Tufford & Newman, 2010). The authors also clearly stated their positionally to contribute to the validity of the results. The first and second authors identify as white, cisgender females with research and practice experience with survivors of IPV but have not experienced IPV personally. The third author is an immigrant, female scholar of color. She has extensive research experience with IPV in minoritized communities but has not personally experienced IPV. The fourth author is a Latina, cisgender woman who has experienced IPV and has provided psychotherapy to IPV survivors. Finally, the fifth author is a white transgender man who has had an experience of IPV in his history. He currently runs a long-term housing initiative that serves a diverse population, aged 18 to 24, including multiple people of color who have experienced both IPV and/or familial domestic violence.

Once the interviews were transcribed, the first and second authors reviewed each transcript. The first author read through each transcript in detail and recorded memos related to patterns found within the data. Then the first author independently coded each of the transcripts making sure to record a definition for each newly generated code (Miles et al., 2019). The first author then met with the second author to further discuss and illuminate the findings. When any disagreements occurred, the first and second discussed the differences until they reached a consensus. The first and second authors then generated a list of propositions based on the codes. Finally, the list of propositions was reviewed with the fourth and fifth author to ensure the validity of the final propositions. The participant demographics and resulting propositions are presented.

Proposition 1: Do I Belong Here?

In the participant’s descriptions of what it was like to be in the shelter, participants communicated they questioned if they belonged in a shelter that housed women. Participants explained that staff at the shelter increased their sense of belonging, but micro and macro aggressions from the other residents of the shelter made them feel as though they did not belong.

Participants described the concern the staff showed to them made them feel more comfortable being at the shelter. Participants described that staff would frequently ask if they had any needs or if they felt comfortable being in the shelter. One participant described her interactions with staff saying:

If you have no one to talk to or you’re feeling alone, the staff is always there for you. They would come around when they’re doing room checks and just make sure that everybody’s okay. They’re also making sure that everybody is there, but also checking on you, like, are you okay? Do you need anything? They basically just go out of their way to make sure that everybody is okay and everybody is feeling okay. They also have little treat bags, so they’re making sure that everybody is good.

Participants described they felt more comfortable being in the shelter because the staff showed genuine concern for them and took steps to make them feel comfortable. Similarly, participants explained that when staff used their correct pronouns, this also increased their sense of belonging and comfortability. Participants commented they noticed that staff used the appropriate language and pronouns when talking to them, which demonstrated staff had received adequate education and training related to gender identity. One participant commented:

People make mistakes; sometimes, they might refer to you as he. The pronoun thing is very new to us when they’re dealing with people like me, but they try. But the staff has not made a mistake, not even one time. They asked me my pronouns. Yeah, I like that too. But what it shows is education. They’re being educated in some class somewhere that when they become a staff member here to treat people that way.

Asking for pronouns and being willing to correct themselves when they used the incorrect pronouns demonstrated to participants that staff genuinely care and are taking the necessary steps to ensure they are making all residents feel welcome regardless of their gender identity.

Although staff took positive steps to make participants feel welcome, the other residents in the shelter frequently made participants feel as though they were not welcome by committing micro and macro aggressions, such as giving them judgmental looks (micro) or making inappropriate comments (macro). One participant described her experience, saying:

Some of us are very friendly toward each other, and we’ll hug each other and say, “Hey, how are you doing?” Well, some will not speak to me or look at me because they’ve already prejudiced me. Therefore, they said that I’m not even there or human, so they just look past me. And I’ve done nothing to them, they just know that I’m a man transgender. They call it playing a girl, that’s what they call it. So, “Why is that person here playing girl when they shouldn’t be here?” It’s a microaggression.

These aggressions led participants to feel as though they were not welcome in a space that served women survivors. The juxtaposition between the actions of staff and residents caused participants to question if they belonged in the shelter.

Proposition 2: Safe, But Unsafe

The next proposition included participants’ comments related to their perceptions of safety while at the shelter. Similar to feelings of belonging, participants also had vacillating feelings related to their safety. Participants described they felt safe from their abusive partners but, due to comments from other residents, felt increasingly unsafe within the shelter. First, participants expressed feeling grateful to have a place to go to be safe from their abusive partners. One participant commented this was the first time she was seeking support for an abusive relationship and was grateful to have a safe place to sleep at night. Another participant described the features of the shelters, which helped her feel safe, saying, “The fact that they keep the location confidential, and they are always monitoring the cameras, so they make sure nobody gets in or gets out without them knowing.” Another participant agreed about the safety features saying:

It’s very secure. I feel that, for sure, no one is going to be able to come and get me here and that anybody that would try to harm me is not going to be able to get into this facility and surprise me.

Although the features of the shelter increased participants’ perceptions of their safety, their experiences with residents decreased their sense of safety. Participants expressed that negative comments related to their gender identity and presentation led them to feel as though they were not safe within the shelter. One participant described her experience, saying:

That makes me feel unsafe because I feel like I can’t be myself or I can’t just walk around without somebody making a comment here and there and talking about me. Or saying things to anybody because they want to say something about my voice, or other things like that.

Another participant also described feeling unsafe due to the inaction of staff when a macro-aggression was committed against her by another resident. She described her experience, saying:

I felt unsafe because when I was outside with my roommates with the cigarette, one of the other residents made a comment when I was getting up to come back inside the shelter. They said, “I don’t understand why they let these men dressed like women in the shelters.” I felt some type of way. I went to the staff and told the staff and the staff talked to them or whatever. But it’s like all they did was just talk to them. What I was told when you sign the honest relations policy, all that it states is that it’s terms for immediate termination. But it didn’t happen.

These macro-aggressive comments and the inaction of shelter staff to address them lead participants to feel unsafe. Although they were grateful to be safe from their abusive partners, they did not feel safe and comfortable within the shelter.

Proposition 3: My Eyes Were Opened

The last proposition includes a conversation with one participant about her experience being in relationships when she identified as male versus when she identified as female. For this participant, her eyes were opened to the plight of women who experience intimate partner violence and the role of toxic masculinity in society. This participant started by saying:

Yeah, I feel sorry for women; I did not realize that was still endemic in society. I had heard about it. You see it on the news, you see it on TV shows and stuff like that, but I just never really thought it was that bad.

She continued to tell her own story saying:

No, I never had an abuser until I started transgendering. I’ll tell you this, I never, ever got beat up in my whole life, given a black eye, stab wounds, and all this stuff, and all the verbal abuse, and this is the second time it’s happened since I started making the decision to become transgender.

For this participant, her eyes were open to toxic masculine culture, and she felt this is what led men to abuse women. She said:

It is systemic in men to just beat the shit out of women, and I didn’t ever believe that, but I think there really is something to that. Something about being the submissive partner in sex, the way they talk to you, and the way they treat you is like you’re less than them and they are higher than you. I never saw my father treat my mother like that. My father treated my mother like a queen. I supposed I was going to be treated like that, but I’ve never had one yet. I did not realize that I had put myself up for this, to be beaten the crap out of.

For this participant, being in the shelter around other survivors, as well as her own personal journey, opened her eyes to the influence toxic masculinity can have on intimate relationships.

Implications for Practice

The provision of culturally responsive services by service providers at shelters is an integral step in ensuring that trans women who access services feel comfortable. Cultural responsivity allows for an examination of “power and oppression, positionality, cultures, values or norms, language or other structural barriers” (p. 5, Rai et al., 2023). Culturally inappropriate approaches may dissuade participation (White et al., 2013) or serve as barriers for trans women to seek help in case of IPV victimization. Therefore, the fact that participants felt validated and welcomed by service providers is important to note despite the small study sample. In particular, the strategies of frequent check-ins, providing treat bags, and reconfirming gender pronouns utilized by providers can be pivotal for other shelters serving trans women to ensure a welcoming and culturally responsive environment at the shelter.

As part of culturally responsive practice, it is critical that shelters develop policies that ensure transgender survivors are treated according to their gender identity. The need for culturally responsive practice is supported by the current study as well as prior research which highlights the discrimination faced by trans survivors in IPV shelters (Guadalupe-Diaz & Jasinski, 2017; James et al., 2016; Kattari et al., 2017) and studies that illustrate that shelters report they are not prepared to provide services for trans survivors (Ford et al., 2013). Training for victim services providers is available (online and in-person) on a broad range of topics, such as how to create a trans-welcoming agency (FORGE, n.d., National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs, n.d.). FORGE (n.d.) also provides technical assistance for agencies that may need a resource or referral or an assessment to examine how well they are serving trans survivors. In addition, practitioners should consider using a trans-specific safety planning tool (FORGE, n.d.).

While staff training is critical to creating a culturally-responsive environment, transferring that to residents could be difficult due to a lack of previous experiences with transgender people, limited knowledge of oppression, and few opportunities to explore how these norms create and maintain a general attitude of lack of acceptance. Shelters have an opportunity to educate staff and residents about micro and macroaggressions, particularly with regard to ensuring the emotional and relational safety of all residents. This could easily be done in existing house groups, where residents convene to talk about shared experiences. Members of other marginalized groups have similar experiences. Education around this topic creates an increased ability to recognize and change behavior in addition to decreasing shame through understanding how societal and cultural systems perpetuate these aggressions. This allows for a self-reflective piece to learning, which deepens the training process. It is imperative that shelters implement appropriate anti-discrimination policies and staff training to follow through on anti-discrimination policies to protect individuals of all gender identities. Furthermore, opening doors to facilitating conversations around gender identity within the shelter could lead to increased knowledge and acceptance among all women living in the shelter and could eliminate potential conflicts and fears associated with individuals who are transgender.

It is important to note the limitations of the current case study. Since this is a cross-sectional case study of the experiences of three trans women survivors in two shelters in the Southern United States, there is limited transferability to trans women living in other areas of the United States. Future research is needed to further explore the experiences of trans women living in IPV shelters in other areas of the United States. Furthermore, this study conducted interviews with participants exclusively over the phone, which could have limited the data given that participants may have conducted the interview at the shelter location and may not have felt comfortable to freely discussing their experiences. However, conducting the interviews over the phone may have allowed participants to feel more comfortable as they did not have to be concerned with their appearance. Future research is needed to explore the best methodology for this population.