To honor Human Trafficking Awareness Month, we are highlighting a real story of one survivor who found herself in a situation that ultimately led to sex trafficking. Kelsey shares how early vulnerabilities contributed to an unhealthy relationship with an older man that both jeopardized her physical safety and deeply impacted her mental health.

Kelsey also talks about navigating her healing journey, and reclaiming her voice as a survivor. Today, one of her greatest passions is to use her story to raise awareness, reduce stigma, and help prevent future harm, reduce stigma, and to encourage other survivors to find their own inner strength and resilience.

Listener discretion is advised due to sensitive content.

This episode contains audio from our Intersections initiative, a video based curriculum for at risk youth to spur deep and important conversations. This project was sponsored by The Pablo Foundation. If you'd like to learn more about this program visit fiercefreedom.org

In this episode, find out how your coffee buying choices can create a culture of freedom versus exploitation- and how to score a free bag of delicious coffee through the link below!

We sat down with Jenny Barber, Founder and Brand & Impact Manager for Talitha Coffee Roasters, a mission-driven company creating pathways towards freedom for survivors of trafficking and exploitation.

Jenny shares the heart behind Talitha's work and how providing dignified, trauma-informed jobs allows survivors to rebuild confidence, stability, and independence one step at a time.

Jenny also explains how Talitha Coffee is disrupting an unethical coffee harvesting system through transparent, ethical sourcing—ensuring farmers and producers are treated fairly while also supporting survivor employment and empowerment right here at home.

☕ Support the mission: If you'd like to try Talitha Coffee for yourself, you can order through our affiliate link. talitha.com/FierceFreedom and if you sign up for a subscription through this link you will also get a FREE bag of coffee!

A portion of every purchase goes directly back to Fierce Freedom to support our work in prevention, education, and advocacy.

On this episode, we chatted with Jenny McGee, Founder and Executive Director of Starfish Project, a social enterprise helping women escape human trafficking and build independent, empowered lives.

Jenny shares how the organization provides jobs, skills, and opportunities through handcrafted jewelry and goods made by survivors.

Support their mission while you shop for the holidays! Visit starfishproject.com and use promo code fiercefreedom for 15% off your purchase and help women reclaim their freedom, one beautiful piece at a time.

In the conclusion of this two-part story, we talk with "Brian" who will share about his work with Dana Brown, Executive Director of Tandem's Mentorship about the challenging but important work of restorative justice.

Brian's story highlights how cultural norms can influence the perpetration of sexual crimes but finally how accountability, empathy, and community support can bring validation and restoration to survivors while helping prevent future harm.

We hope this story sparks conversations that support survivors, challenge harmful norms, and encourage prevention. Learn more at fiercefreedom.org

In this two-part episode, we talk with "Brian" who will share about his work with Dana Brown, Executive Director of Tandem about the challenging but important work of restorative justice.

Brian's story highlights how cultural norms can influence the perpetration of sexual crimes but finally how accountability, empathy, and community support can bring validation and restoration to survivors while helping prevent future harm.

We hope this story sparks conversations that support survivors, challenge harmful norms, and encourage prevention. Learn more at fiercefreedom.org

We sat down with Lacie Weatherholt, certified recovery coach, facilitator, and advocate, for a preview of her upcoming session at the Empower Freedom Conference on Oct 10th.

Lacie shares some highlights of her talk including the impact of trauma, ego burnout and compassion fatigue, and resources to make safe and compassionate communities.

Tune in for a thoughtful conversation that highlights the importance of authentic connection, supportive listening, and embracing the full spectrum of human experience.

If you'd like to come check out Lacie's conference session, visit: bit.ly/empowerfreedomconference25

Ticket sales close 9/26!

This episode is part of our series highlighting ways to respond to abuse within or around the faith community. To provide greater insight, Amanda Pulley, MSW - Certified Life Coach, Brainspotting Practitioner, and Human Trafficking & Complex Trauma Specialist - shares her courageous story of being trafficked by her church youth leader.

Also joining the conversation is Laura Mulliken, Executive Director of Trafficking Justice in Minnesota. Amanda and Laura offer important reminders for faith leaders on a loving and trauma informed response to survivors, and ways of creating a culture humility that fosters an environment where abuse is easily reported rather than enabled.

If your faith community or church is interested in training or developing policy you can reach out to Amanda: [email protected] and Laura: [email protected]

On this episode we sat down with Dr. Andrew J. Bauman, Co-Founder and Director of the Christian Counseling Center for Sexual Health & Trauma, to discuss his latest book, Safe Church: How to Guard against Sexism and Abuse in Christian Communities.

Andrew shares about his passion to elevate the voices of women in faith spaces and his heart for men to have a healthy confrontation of their own internalized misogyny that has been justified through a harmful misreading of God's word.

Lastly, Andrew shares practical insight for church leaders who are ready to confront the culture of silence and complicity that often surrounds abuse in faith spaces.

If you'd like to learn more about Andrew's work, you can visit www.AndrewJBauman.com & www.ChristianCC.org. To purchase his book Safe Church visit: amazon.com/Safe-Church-against-Christian-Communities/dp/1540903974

Girls On The Run (GOTR) in the Chippewa Valley is cultivating a culture of joy and community, while encouraging self esteem and confidence in young girls.

We invited Rose Dolan Neil, Executive Director and Katie Albin, Coach and Board Member to share more about their passion for empowering this population and how this plants seeds for future resiliency.

Rose and Katie also provide insights as to what GOTR programming entails, including their annual celebratory 5K run and ongoing participation in an eight-week after-school program that teaches lessons on goal-setting, friendship, and emotional and physical health.

To learn more about how you can get involved as a volunteer, participant, or if you wanna support this awesome org, visit https://www.gotrchippewavalley.org/

With the rise of all things AI, what effect is this having on trafficking and exploitation?

To share more about this we invited Nancy Irizarry, Social Services Director for the Wisconsin Dept. of Health Services and Co-Chair for the Wisconsin Anti-Trafficking Consortium.

Nancy provides an insightful analysis on what she believes are positives to AI utilization when it comes to identification and prevention of trafficking but also shares some of the chief ways it aids recruitment using deception and coercion for traffickers and abusers.

She also shares about how crucial it is to bring survivors to the table and to be mindful about the unintended consequences ai can have on existing survivors' privacy and safety.

If you'd like to have Nancy train your group on this topic - you can reach out to her via email: [email protected]