One of the tricky parts of doing accountability work around partner violence is that usually you’re navigating a lot of compounding and overlapping trauma reactions & maladaptive patterns from many directions, sometimes even including your own! It can get real messy real fast.
The more I do this the more I see how crucial it is to establish safety and collaboration, to take time and space to not rush through. Just as in a phase oriented treatment of trauma, phase one is establishing safety, so too is that critical in accountability work for this stuff.
If you don’t have a group that trusts each other & has at least the basics of how trauma manifests & functions down, the work will be at LEAST infinitely harder and at worst continuously damaging & retraumatizing all around.
Also, and I know I say this all the time, if you don’t take the time to discuss how you will address intragroup harm, that shit will bite you in the butt over and over because you’ll be trying to deal with external harms/attacks and also feel harmed/attacked from the inside. 🙃
If you’re doing #transformativejustice for, say, a robbery—that can bring trauma in, totally, but the level of psychological care required to handle it is generally way less. A robbery doesn’t usually require someone chronically messing w/ someone’s mind & leaving them hecked up!
In general it’s critical to jointly establish what your goals are so that can guide the work, its depth, and the group’s investment. But with partner violence, to me, it feels even more critical in a way—survivor support looks different based on the goals & timelines!
And to be clear: this knowledge is both textbook as well as experiential. We don’t move forward without fucking up, trying things out, seeing how things manifest. And every situation is both deeply complex and also sometimes weirdly obvious/patterned.
Anyway. Back to the thread. Prep questions like these are important:
- what are our group values for this process & how do we define them?
- how do we name & handle if/when we feel harmed by each other?
- what supports external to this do we have to process heavy feelings?
- what are our group values for this process & how do we define them?
- how do we name & handle if/when we feel harmed by each other?
- what supports external to this do we have to process heavy feelings?
- what do each of us act/look like when we feel unsafe, confident, triggered, angry, upset, uncertain, happy?
- what pain points do we each bring into the process? what are some things that will likely be hard for us to do/witness?
- what pain points do we each bring into the process? what are some things that will likely be hard for us to do/witness?
- what are our commitments to each other & the process?
- how do we make decisions? who needs to be in the room for what? are we doing, say, consensus, majority votes, etc?
- what does being survivor centered mean to us here? what obstacles might we face in doing that?
- how do we make decisions? who needs to be in the room for what? are we doing, say, consensus, majority votes, etc?
- what does being survivor centered mean to us here? what obstacles might we face in doing that?
- how are we going to communicate with each other? what media do we want to use? how frequently do we expect to be in touch and for what?
- what would cause the group to ask someone to leave the process or take a break? how would we want to address that?
- what would cause the group to ask someone to leave the process or take a break? how would we want to address that?
- how do we want to address manifestations of oppression in the group? (e.g. racism, sexism, ableism, classism, etc)
- what can make it easier for each of us to be compassionate & understanding with each other in moments of stress, disagreement, &/or alarm?
- what can make it easier for each of us to be compassionate & understanding with each other in moments of stress, disagreement, &/or alarm?
- what environmental factors may impact people’s participation & presence in this process? (e.g. unstable housing, dying relative, economic issues, lack of childcare, etc.) how can the group at least be aware of and IDEALLY help address some of these?
And NOTE: it’s very common for some of the answers to these at first be “holy shit I have no idea?!” Because we don’t all have the same access to self examination, resources, & personal insight. So KNOW that your crew will be at different levels with this stuff. That’s okay.
BUT it does mean you have to work to build with & around it. Keep questions like these open & present. If people don’t know answers, they shouldn’t stay at “IDK”—they should turn into “okay let me explore & find out.”
Relatedly here are some tips from another thread that are also relevant to accountability work because they’re about building non-totalist groups: 
