Partnered with a Survivor: David Mandel and Ruth Reymundo Mandel

We’re recording from Okayama, Japan, and the shift you’re about to hear is bigger than language. Professor Kanako Masui of Nihon Fukushi University joins us to explain why so many domestic violence an...

The most useful conference debriefs aren’t about highlights—they’re about what shifts in you when you listen closely. From the Sydney coast, we wrap up a three-and-a-half-week Asia Pacific tour and ta...

Domestic abuse gets dangerously easy to miss when our systems can only imagine one story about who victims are and what abuse looks like. We sit down with Luke Martin, a UK-based domestic abuse traine...

Artificial intelligence is already in social work and child protection, and its use is deepening. The question is: How safe, effective, and equitable is it? In this episode, David and Ruth talk with D...

What if medicine is trained to see bruises and fractures—but misses the injuries that leave no visible mark?In this episode of Partnered with a Survivor, David and Ruth speak with Dr. Norell Rosado, c...

We start with a snow-bright morning and end with a sharper lens. We sit down with advocate and system analyst Valerie Frost to explore how systems built to protect families can become tools of coerciv...

What happens when David turns the tables on Ruth and interviews her—seven years into their shared body of work?In this special anniversary episode, David marks seven years since Ruth joined the Safe &...

We are starting our 7th season and asking the question: "What if love wasn’t the soft side of this work, but the method that makes healing possible?"We chat again with Nneka MacGregor—co-fou...

Mist, wind, the volcanic island of São Miguel, and a hard look at the words and jargon that decide families’ futures. We begin in the Azores, Ruth’s ancestral home, where arguments for European westwa...

Rain on the windows, a century-old clock in the kitchen, and a plate of bacon by the coffee set: David’s 60th birthday set the scene for a raw, open conversation about vocation, love, and the future o...

What happens when men are finally invited to speak from the heart? We sit down with Kenneth Braswell, founder of Fathers Incorporated and author of Too Seasoned To Care, to explore fear as a learned b...

The house looks perfect from the street—until you step inside and feel the air shift. We sit with survivor, campaigner, and author David Challen to trace the shape of coercive control through a child’...

The conversation opens with end-of-the-year reflections and personal milestones—international book releases, masterclasses, collaborations, and community work—and quickly moves to a timely, thorny que...

A stadium’s worth of men—every year. That’s the scale of new intimate partner violence use suggested by Ten To Men, Australia’s landmark longitudinal study of male health. We sit down with Karlee O’Do...

A woman calls for help after being strangled in her own home. He shows a scratch; she leaves in handcuffs. From that moment, the system that promised safety starts to mirror the control she’s trying t...

A clear map beats chaos when lives are at stake. We sit down with Dr. Kate Fitz-Gibbon to draw a sharper line between “losing control” in life and being coercively controlled by a partner, and we keep...

Blame doesn’t make families safer—clarity does. We sit down with Scottish survivors and practitioners from Equally Safe Falkirk to explore how a survivor-centered, perpetrator-focused, child safety–dr...

The weaponisation of immigration status has become a powerful tool in the arsenal of domestic abusers. For migrant survivors, the choice between enduring abuse or risking deportation represents an imp...

Religious teachings wield profound influence over family dynamics and human behaviors, sometimes enabling abuse under the guise of spiritual teachings and guidance. This raw and revealing conversation...

When a perpetrator targets a family pet, they're sending a clear message about what they're capable of—and revealing a dangerous pattern that threatens everyone in the home. This eye-opening...

When churches call clergy sexual abuse “moral failings” or “affairs,” they obscure the truth: Predatory pastors groom adult congregants using tactics that mirror coercive control and intimate partner ...

Surviving trauma isn't evidence of brokenness—it’s proof of extraordinary strength. Yet traditional therapy approaches often miss this crucial reality, focusing instead on deficits and pathology ...

What does it take to transform domestic violence practice in an organization? In this illuminating conversation with Safe & Together Institute’s Systems Change Champion Kyra Feetham from the Centr...

When Kelly Daley, Community Connection Practitioner at Upper Murray Family Care, stood to accept her Champion Award for case practice in the Asia Pacific region, she was not just celebrating professio...

Imagine a world where our most vulnerable babies are protected without automatically severing their connection to their family. That's the vision Lauren Seager-Smith brings as Chief Executive of ...

What if ending violence against women isn't just about asking men to stop bad behavior, but inviting them to embrace a more meaningful definition of strength and leadership? This question forms t...

When Bruce Bieber's phone rang at 2:50 AM, his world shattered. Three deputies stood at his door with news that his daughter Abby, a dedicated police officer known for her compassion and professi...

David Mandel and Ruth Reymundo Mandel share highlights from the 2025 Safe & Together Asia Pacific Coercive Control and Children's Conference in Melbourne, Australia. Listen in as they reflect...

In this episode, David and Ruth speak with Dr. Anni Donaldson about her groundbreaking research examining domestic abuse in Scotland’s rural, remote, and island communities.Dr. Donaldson, an honorary ...

"Single mothers are essentially the unofficial reserve army of prevention agents in this country and around the world." - Jess HillIn this episode, David and Ruth speak with Australian exper...

In this episode, David and Ruth explore why coercive control must be at the center of how we understand the impact of domestic abuse on children. Moving beyond just focusing on physical violence or wh...

In this thought-provoking first episode of 2025, David and Ruth explore how displacement-based responses to domestic violence reflect and reinforce gender double standards while often creating additio...

What if understanding power dynamics could transform the way we approach domestic abuse and trauma? Join us for this special live recording of the Partner with a Survivor podcast, where we invite you ...

What if the institutions we turn to for solace are also the ones trapping us in cycles of harm? That’s the challenging reality we confront in our latest episode featuring Reverend Geneece Goertzen, af...

Unlock the secrets to supporting children affected by domestic abuse with insights from Dr. Asha Patel, CEO of Innovating Minds. In this episode, we explore innovative approaches like the Healing Toge...

In this thought-provoking episode, David and Ruth explore the nuanced intersection of father engagement and domestic abuse–informed practice with Chris Brown, President of the National Fatherhood Init...

Join us from San Miguel, Azores, Ruth’s paternal ancestral home, as David and Ruth take a hard look at how performance metrics, KPIs, and ideas of “professionalism” can quietly reinforce bias, distanc...

In this episode, David and Ruth speak about the “Myth of the Domestic Violence Incident” chapter of David's recently published book Stop Blaming Mothers and Ignoring Fathers: How to Transform The...

The recently published, groundbreaking, population-based study of child maltreatment in Australia found exposure to domestic violence is the most common form of maltreatment (39.6%). In this interview...

Partnering with survivors is a sacred act. Listening to survivors, hearing their stories, and working with them as equals is uplifting for practitioners and their clients. In this episode of Partnered...

In this episode, David and Ruth have an intimate discussion about how we can be emotionally and behaviorally responsible even when we have been trained into fear and reactivity through violence and ab...

Discover the hard truths about the impact of domestic violence on children as David and Ruth discuss the “Myth of the Child Witness” chapter from David’s book Stop Blaming Mothers and Ignoring Fathers...

In this episode, Ruth and David start with a roundup of their March 2024 trip to Australia and New Zealand—with highlights from the 7th annual Safe & Together Model Asia Pacific Conference and its...

Both men and women can be violent and controlling. In this episode of Partnered with a Survivor, Ruth and David speak with international expert Lisa Young Larance about her research and clinical pract...

Sexual and domestic violence in the military challenges recruitment, retention, team cohesion, operational readiness, security, and organizational health. Yet, most militaries around the world are sti...

Historically, research hasn’t always involved or benefited the population being studied. Dr. Elizabeth Dalgarno, the director and founder of the SHERA Research Group, is a staunch advocate of research...

Consider this…Domestic violence represents 27% of violent events in the workplace22% of victims required 31 or more days away from work to recover22% of victims missed 3–5 days of work56% of victims a...

Are children domestic violence victims in their own right? Are they co-victims with the adult survivor? What is the relationship between the child and the adult survivors’ experiences?How do we hold d...

The problem of dating violence and coercive control among young people has been sorely overlooked, and educational resources are hard to find. In order to make coercive control visible to youth and to...

In this episode, Ruth and David speak with Lisa and Jack Bulman of Mibbinbah Spirit Healing about their work in the community to facilitate healing from intergenerational trauma, support healthy relat...