John,
Many youth in our Survivor Care Program have learned that relationships can feel fragile or conditional. “I will care for you, but only as long as you do what I want.” Traffickers teach this pattern, and it often stays with young people long after they leave their trafficking situation.
Healthy relationships can feel unfamiliar or even scary for the kids we work with. If you have never experienced a healthy relationship, how do you know you can trust it? How do you know someone will stay? It is common for youth to test us, to push us away first, to guard themselves from being hurt again.
Our work at Love146 happens through the transformative relationships youth build with our creative and compassionate social workers. Survivors deserve care that does not cost them anything and does not disappear when things get hard. So we keep showing up. Week after week. Even when it is messy. Even when they expect us to walk away.
