Thistle Farms

For nearly 30 years, Thistle Farms has worked to change the way people see, understand, and support the systems that exploit women, including addiction, incarceration, poverty, and trafficking. They are a nonprofit social justice enterprise dedicated to helping women survivors recover and heal from prostitution, trafficking, and addiction. Support includes a 2-year residential program that gives women survivors a safe place to live, food and clothing, healthcare, counseling, therapeutic groups, and job training, all at no cost to the participant. Their survivor- led network houses over 500 women in healing sanctuaries across the country. Five years after graduation, 75% of the graduates are living healthy, financially independent lives. At Thistle Farms, 86% of the leadership are women and 34% of those leaders are program graduates.

Meet Christy

Christy once lived in a refrigerator box under a bridge. She traded herself for drugs and spent many years in jail, always feeling like an outsider. In jail and in treatment, Christy met women who filled a place in her life that had always been empty. Beautiful, caring women, like her, who introduced her to Thistle Farms.Christy is now a graduate of their two-year residential program that provides women a safe place to live, food and clothing, healthcare, counseling, therapeutic groups, and job training, all at no cost to the participant. Today, Christy’s life is full of more good things than she ever thought possible. She has meaningful employment, drug-free living, and freedom, all while being surrounded by women who empower her.