Home. 

Not simply a roof over your head. A home is where you are safe, you are warm, you are loved. It’s a safe space to grow and flourish. Unfortunately, for many, home isn’t always that safety, security and love. For many, they resort to shelters like Nisa Homes to find that “home”.

But what is Nisa Homes? To put it simply, Nisa Homes is the first and largest group of transitional shelters for Muslim women and children in Canada. However, the assistance and services provided at Nisa Homes go far beyond just providing shelter.

At Nisa Homes, we create the opportunity of ‘home’ for domestic violence survivors across Canada. We envision a flourishing Muslim community in which help is available, shelter is attainable, and healing is possible. 

While a safe house is the starting point of a transitional shelter, there are so many factors that go into making that house a home.

Healing 

Healing is arguably the most important building block in starting over. All the residents are provided with a safe space to heal physically, mentally, and emotionally. At Nisa Homes, with the help of our certified supportive counsellors, we provide women that come to us for help with the counselling they need, whether it is in the Home or with a referral to a therapist.

Along with that, we have programs within the Homes, such as art therapy and self-care sessions, to slowly help the women to develop confidence in themselves while learning to trust the people around them.

As they start to heal, they gain the confidence to become independent. Not only is counselling available for the women, but we also help children who were victims of abuse or had witnessed abuse, to heal.

Safety

Many women and children come from situations in which their safety is at risk. To protect the women and children escaping domestic violence, each home is in a safe and undisclosed location, only known to the staff. If a family member or friend wants to visit with one of the residents, a neutral location is decided beforehand for them to meet up. Each home is also equipped with a state-of-the-art security system, to ensure their safety from outside and from within.

Transparency

Transparency is of utmost importance for us at Nisa Homes. It is our duty to our supporters to be completely transparent about how the funds are spent, the services that are provided, and how many women and children benefit from your support.

We are also transparent with the women and children that we serve at Nisa Homes. They are involved from the intake through each step in their journey at Nisa Homes.

Intersectional 

The women who come to Nisa Homes are escaping domestic violence, experiencing homelessness, poverty, or are refugees in Canada. However, more often than not, these women are experiencing an intersection of these issues if not all of them at once, along with mental health issues, Islamophobia, and additional unique challenges. Understanding how these, or a combination of these issues can provide unique challenges for our clients to overcome, is key to our service. We do our best to provide culturally responsive assistance, focusing on trauma informed care and strengths-based approaches to help them on their road to healing and independence.

Community Leadership

Nisa Homes works hard to lead the conversation in bringing to the forefront the issues, such as domestic violence and homelessness, that exist within our communities. Whether by collaborating with other organizations, speaking at community events or holding our own events, we work towards making sure that these issues are not simply swept under the rug.

Child-friendly

Children make up 50% of Nisa Homes residents at any given time. In order to provide them with the best and safe environment, we have a designated Childcare Worker at each Home and a children’s play area for them to learn and play.

Our Childcare workers provide the kids with empathetic, consistent, and reliable supportive adult-figures they need in their lives, making it more likely for them to learn how to self-soothe, self-regulate in stressful situations. By helping children understand and manage their feelings and behaviours, we can support their development, healing and resilience.

Builds Resilience

Nisa Homes builds independence and self-sufficiency in the women who turn to us for help. Many women who come to Nisa Homes do not speak English, know how to navigate the system to receive government support, or even know how to conduct day to day tasks – like going to the bank, applying for schools, taking public transit or even shopping for groceries.

Our caseworkers assist these women in learning these skills so that they can independently participate in society and learn to help themselves and their children.

Prevention 

The work we do at Nisa Homes is reactive, but our aim is prevention. One of our biggest goals is spreading awareness so that we can prevent gender-based violence in the Muslim community and beyond. We want to provide knowledge that educates boys, girls, men and women, creating a conversation around domestic violence, abuse and trauma.

Home

And finally, Nisa Homes is a home to many of the women and children who come to seek refuge, especially those who are alone in a new country with no friends or family to turn to. It is a place where they can find the help they need in the language they speak, not worry about having their cultural and religious needs met and find comfort in the presence of caseworkers and other residents who are experiencing the same hardships as themselves.

“Nisa Homes is a home away from home. The people and staff are amazing and very knowledgeable. They listen to you patiently and help you with whatever they can. I made some new best friends and will remember the team for a long time. I pray I can help in some way or other in the future In Sha Allah.”  – Fatimah, a former Nisa Homes Resident.

Muslim women across the country face hardships like this on a daily basis. Our goal at Nisa Homes is to be of service to those with nowhere else to go. Sheltering those in need is a just a small part of what we do. Our hope is that every woman that crosses the threshold of our homes has the same opportunity to flourish. With your support, we can make this hope a reality.  

Donate today and become the foundation for their success!