Battered women living in rural areas, like NewBridge's service area, have many of the same experiences as battered women everywhere. But rural battered women have certain experiences and face certain barriers which are unique to rural settings. But, alternatives to living with abuse do exist. NewBridge Family Shelter can provide many supports and services to rural women, such as:   personal support, safety planning, information about available options, transportation, legal information, safe shelter, and referrals to financial assistance, job training, and education options.

One of the most significant barriers for rural battered women is isolation. Battered women everywhere experience some form of isolation as controlled by their partners, but for rural battered women the isolation becomes magnified by geographical isolation. Other rural factors can greatly impact a rural battered woman's isolation and chances of reaching safe shelter. Consider that:

• A rural battered woman may not have phone service.
• Usually no public transportation exists, so if she leaves she must take a family vehicle.
• Police and medical response to a call for help may take a long time.
• Rural areas have fewer resources for women - jobs, childcare, housing and health care, or easy access to them is limited by distance.
• Extreme weather often exaggerates isolation - cold, snow, and mud regularly affect life in rural areas and may extend periods of isolation with an abuser.
• Poor roads thwart transportation.
• Seasonal work may mean months of unemployment on a regular basis and result in women being trapped with an abuser for long periods.
• Hunting weapons are common to rural homes and everyday tools like axes, chains, pitchforks, and mauls are potential weapons.
• Alcohol use, which often increases in winter months when rural people are unemployed and isolated in their homes, usually affects the frequency and severity of abuse.
• Travelling to a "big city" can be intimidating to rural battered women and city attitudes may seem strange and unaccepting.
• A woman's bruises may fade or heal before she sees neighbors, and working with farm tools and equipment can provide an easy explanation for injuries.
• Farm families are often one-income families and a woman frequently has no money of her own to support herself and her children.
• A family's finances are often tied up in land and equipment, so a woman thinking of ending a relationship faces an agonizing reality that she and her partner may lose the family farm or her partner will be left with no means of income.
• Court orders restraining an abuser from having contact with a woman are less viable for rural women because their partners cannot be kept away from the farm if it is their only source of income.
• Rural women frequently have strong emotional ties to the land and to farm animals, and if she has an attachment to her animals she fears they may be neglected or harmed.
• Rural woman are usually an integral part of a family farm business, so if she leaves, the business may fail.