Overlooked Voices: Teenagers in Domestic Abuse Refuges
- Dr Kelly Bracewell
- 7 hours ago
- 3 min read
When we talk about domestic abuse, we generally think about adults. Indeed, much policy and guidance still refers to adult victims and their children. This creates two key issues. Firstly, it fails to recognise children and young people as victims in their own right, they remain an appendage despite experiencing abuse directly. Secondly, the word ‘children’, whilst meaning all children up to the age of 18 years, still evokes images of small hands, teddy bears, and the fragile dependency of early childhood.
But what about the 13‑year‑old who knows exactly why they packed the car in the dark? The 16‑year‑old who has spent years managing their own fear while keeping younger siblings safe? The 14-year-old helping with translation, solicitors rehousing? The 15-year-old who has carried more responsibility than many adults ever will?
These young people are routinely overlooked - in policy, in commissioning, and in how services are designed and delivered. My recent book chapter continues to highlight the experiences of teenagers living in domestic abuse refuges (shelters).
The Domestic Abuse Act: Progress and Gaps
The Domestic Abuse Act (2021) was hailed as ‘landmark’ legislation. It provides a statutory definition of domestic abuse and, in principle, recognises children as victims in their own right - a term I adopted in my PhD, and which has since become more widely used.
This shift was intended to reshape how agencies understand and respond. The accompanying statutory guidance highlights the profound impacts of growing up with domestic abuse on health, wellbeing, and development, positioning children and young people as a priority group requiring specialist support. Part 4 of the Act also places a legal duty on local authorities to provide safe accommodation and support for ‘victims and their children’. This language is problematic. It separates children from victimhood and directly contradicts and undermines the principle of seeing them as ‘victims in their own right’. It also leaves teenagers largely invisible due to the common depiction of ‘children’ noted earlier.
In theory, this legislation should mean teenagers receive more tailored, consistent support when entering refuge spaces. Yet, this promise has not fully translated into practice. Although teenagers are now legally recognised as victims (as ‘children’), services still struggle to meet their specific needs. Many young people continue to feel unheard, unseen, and unsupported.
A Liminal Space: Not Children, Not Adults
Teenagers sit in an in‑between space - too old to be seen as ‘children,’ yet too young to be treated as independent. They’ve lived through the abuse with their parent/caregiver, but are then expected to adapt to communal living, unfamiliar adults, security measures and rules that often feel infantilising.
Many arrive carrying heavy emotional labour. They have spent years protecting siblings, managing perpetrators’ moods, or acting as the “buffer” during violent/abusive episodes. In refuge, they often downplay their own needs, and overstretched services can unintentionally reinforce this by focusing support on the parent–child relationship rather than the teenager’s experience.
The title of my chapter, “Because apparently you’re a child?”, came from a young person describing the sudden shift from being treated like an adult at home to being categorised as a child in the refuge. Teenagers want to be heard, not managed; given choice, not surveillance; met with trust, not suspicion. Yet frontline workers often feel unsure how to support them: too old for play‑based work, too young for adult services.
Refuges also have well‑intended rules - curfews, visitor bans, shared spaces. But for teenagers used to coercive or tightly controlled environments, these can feel like a continuation of the restrictions they’ve fled, especially alongside losses such as school, friendships, pets and routine. Without clear explanation and trust‑building, rules risk reinforcing the message that their voice still doesn’t matter. Therefore, it is essential that all professionals (i.e. police, social workers, education staff, domestic abuse practitioners) listen closely to young people and understand their lived experience.
Final thoughts
Across my research, the most impactful support for teenagers has three consistent features:
Treating teenagers as experts in their own experience
Relationship‑based practice (a consistent, safe adult)
Flexible spaces (physical and emotional)
When practitioners had the time, freedom, and training to work relationally, teenagers reported far better outcomes. When constrained by bureaucracy, rigid risk protocols, or simplistic safeguarding narratives, young people withdrew. Their experiences of abuse were intensified.
Returning to the Domestic Abuse Act then, teenagers living in refuges are not peripheral victims. They are survivors in their own right. This must be recognised in policy and practice. If we continue to design services that cannot meet their needs, we will continue to create disengagement and mistrust. We already know how to do better - we just need to listen.
Dr Kelly Bracewell is a Senior Research Fellow at the University of Lancashire. She advises for the Connect Centre for International Research on New Approaches to Prevent Violence and Harm
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