One Love workshops prompt conversations about relationship violence

Student leaders and administrators have been immersed in learning how to recognize unhealthy relationship behaviors and prevent relationship abuse through on-campus workshops facilitated by the One Love Foundation.

Emily Lloyd, engagement manager for the One Love Foundation, said the sessions, which included facilitator trainings, the Escalation workshop and the 10 Signs of a Healthy Relationship workshop, have prompted important conversations.

“I think for a long time, issues of domestic violence, relationship abuse, were these terrible things we wanted to avoid,” Lloyd said during the 10 Things workshop. “one of us really know how to talk about it or what to do because we don’t realize that it’s all connected to relationship behaviors. The behaviors are on the spectrum of healthy to unhealthy to abusive, and we have to talk about the whole spectrum to really understand what we’re facing.”

Brooke Sanchez, a junior from Omaha majoring in marketing and education, came to the 10 Signs workshop Sept. 19 because she wants to go into secondary education prepared, and has seen friends struggle with toxic relationships.

“I want to be able to prevent this in the schools I’m in,” Sanchez said. “It’s important to know how to guide high schoolers through these situations, so that I can be a resource for them.”

Sanchez said she reflected a lot on what Lloyd said about everyone having experience with these behaviors.

“It’s more two-sided than we like to think about,” Sanchez said. “In reality, it can happen in any relationship, no matter the gender and also, if you’re in that situation, you probably are also doing unhealthy things. I thought she made a good point about how doing unhealthy things doesn’t mean you’re an abusive or bad person, but that we should reflect on how we handle those situations.”

The One Love Foundation was founded by the family of Yeardley Love, a University of Virginia student who was murdered by her ex-boyfriend in May 2010. Its mission is to teach young people about healthy and unhealthy relationships, empowering them to identify and avoid abuse, and learn how to love better.

“The 10 Signs workshop is our base training,” Lloyd said. “Every single one of us has experienced one of these behaviors or acted in this way.

“That doesn’t mean we’re inherently bad people. We just want everyone to be aware and ask ourselves ‘how can I respond in a healthier way?’ If we do that, we’ll all build healthy relationships, and if we are in a relationship where these behaviors are happening frequently, there is a good chance that behavior will escalate to abuse.”

One Love sessions conclude Sept. 20 at noon with the 10 Signs of a Healthy Relationship workshop for graduate and professional students, Cather Hall, Red Cloud A. Register here.

Lloyd held a training session for campus facilitators, who can lead additional workshops in the future.

“One Love is really the content creator for these workshops, and we depend on people on each campus and in their community to be the ones leading these conversations,” Lloyd said.