Everything Was Really Hush Hush

In its 51st year, HAVEN continues to pull domestic violence out of the shadows and into the light.

I pitched my tent next to a patch of purple flowers at a campsite near a lake. The evening was cool and windy, and the forest swayed with the breeze. I gathered twigs for my stove, lit a fire, and put a pot of water on to boil. As I tended the flames, I thought about how far I’d come, and how far I had left to go. The miles meant something, but the story of domestic violence meant a lot more. Every conversation led me to a new place and a new perspective.

The next day I packed my gear and biked to the local library. I opened my laptop and greeted Christine Kinal over zoom. Christine is the director and CEO of HAVEN–one of Michigan’s oldest and largest domestic violence shelters. I was curious to hear how HAVEN’s history shaped her understanding of domestic violence. What had 51 years of programming taught her and her team about the nature of violence in the home?

Christine told me how HAVEN began in 1975, at a time when domestic violence shelters were still a radical idea. A group of women in Pontiac transformed an old convent into a shelter, and called it HAVEN. The name meant “safe space” but also worked as an acronym: Help Against Violent Encounters Now.

The idea that violence was happening in the home “was profound,” Christine told me. Before the 1970s, domestic violence wasn’t widely recognized as a crime. Married men could legally rape their wives. And the Violence Against Women Act–which would finally recognize domestic abuse as a federal crime–was still decades away. “This [social movement] isn’t something that started in the 70’s,” Christine said, “It’s just when the conversation was welcomed. Before that, everything was really hush hush.”

Christine explained that when awareness about domestic violence grew, so did HAVEN. They expanded their counseling services throughout Oakland County, and later created a Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner program. About a decade ago, the organization completed a major capital campaign to consolidate five separate service locations into a single comprehensive campus.

What began as a simple shelter in a convent is now a 36,000 square foot facility on six acres of land, providing emergency shelter, counseling sessions, support groups, children's programming, legal advocacy, systems change, prevention education, corporate training, and crisis intervention.

Before leading HAVEN, Christine worked for 21 years in law enforcement. She explained how her job on police patrols showed her the scope of violence in the home: about two thirds of the calls were for domestic violence. “And they're the most violent ones to go to,” she said. “Those were the homicides. Those were the homicide-suicides….The amount of calls for service that ended in that kind of lethality was profound,” she added.”

“So I realized within the first six months, that if people knew about the resources, that it would alleviate some of the calls, you know?” This perspective shaped how she worked with local domestic violence shelters. After she transitioned to HAVEN, it also informed how she worked with law enforcement. One of HAVEN’s many roles now is to distribute information about domestic violence throughout the community.

After our conversation ended, I packed up my bike and headed toward my next campsite. As I pedaled, one sentence kept echoing in my mind: "Everything was really hush hush."

Domestic violence thrives in secrecy, in shame, in the belief that what happens behind closed doors should stay there. Despite this, people keep speaking up. And when individual stories unite into collective narratives, real change does happen.

Fifty-one years of programming at HAVEN is 51 years of proving that domestic violence is not a private problem—it's a community responsibility.