From Survivor to Leader: Building Safe Homes with Sabrina Oso

What makes a home truly safe? In this powerful episode, Nikki speaks with Sabrina Oso, founder of Oso Safe, about turning personal trauma into a mission for change. Discover how Oso Safe Certification redefines safety in homes by embedding respect, education, and therapy into real estate practices. Sabrina shares her journey as a survivor, the flaws in court systems, and how we can empower both children and adults to speak out.

👉 Learn more at: https://www.ososafe.com

⚠️ Trigger Warning: This conversation includes mentions of abuse, suicide, and pornography. Please listen with care.

Sabrina
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[00:00:00] Hi guys, this is Editor Nikki, so I have just gotten done editing

the podcast with, Sabrina Ozo, and while she has taken a step in a direction to help people feel safer in their homes, I do believe that there are pieces missing and our conversation is very heavy. This has got, abuse and pornography and other stuff in it.

So that is my trigger warning to you. If you don't want to watch this one, I have plenty of others on my YouTube for you to check out. And I'll see you next time.

Hello, my name is Sabrina Oso from Oso Safe. Feel Safe where you live, learn, work, and play. I am a TEDx speaker, a children's book author, and a real estate agent [00:01:00] on creating and maintaining respect in homes, workplaces, and schools.

And we're so happy to be here with you, Nikki, a great opportunity. And we're so grateful for the, chance to speak to you, speak to your listeners. Yeah. So thank you so much. Thank you for being here. I think this is gonna be interesting. Yes. Because I'm big on feeling safe. I'm huge on feeling safe.

Great. Great. Yes, yes. Very important. So we'll just get into it. I'll just get into it. I thought long and hard about my company, how I wanted to structure it, how I wanted it to look like, both for myself and others looking in and our customer, so to speak. I am a survivor of violence.

My father beat my mother on a regular basis. My mother beat me, and I'm comfortable enough to say that. I mean, you and I just met [00:02:00] so years of therapy it took because I was silent for so long, I had nobody. Nobody came to my rescue. Nobody even hinted, Hey, I wanna talk to you. I know what's going on.

Nothing, nothing, nothing. Not family, not friends, not neighbors. We are big proponents of therapy, mental health, if you will. So, but we could talk about that a little bit later. And I'm a dancer. I could not talk about dance. I could not even mention dance in my house. When you live in that type of environment, your life becomes stolen.

So you have to kind of survive, not kind of, you're trying to survive as best as you can until you move out. So I didn't move out until I was 21. And, but my therapist, I started therapy at 19 years old, and it was [00:03:00] thanks to a friend who encouraged me to get therapy, even though I was very resistant at the beginning.

But she saw how much I was suffering, how much pain I was in, and she knew I would've killed myself if I didn't get help. She knew that. And I was suicidal from 16 to 19 years old. So my therapist said to me, Sabrina, you're a dancer. Go dance. I. Go dance. So I moved out and that's when I kind of started my life.

I was dancing. Luckily, I lived close proximity to the city, so I was able to take dance classes. I was taking 12 classes a week. I was, performing. I was auditioning like crazy. I was training, I was hopping between three dance studios, steps Avenue and Broadway Dance Center. So, I was getting gigs, but I started writing my [00:04:00] one woman show called Home Suite.

Home, question mark. I did a lot of research for the show. I play different women being abused. She goes to her good place. That's where the dancing comes in. Then she's pulled back into the terror of violence. The show ends really strong, really empowering. But as I said, I did a lot of research for the show, and Nikki, I could not believe the statistics that I was finding.

I said, wow. I need to make this into a business, a bonafide business with products and services that could really help people. So that's how Oso Safe was born out of this one woman show that I wrote, choreographed, and performed. And at the time I was teaching dance and I even performed it with my dance students at the time, which looking back was pretty cool, that was really awesome, you know?

And it was very healing. I felt [00:05:00] like I was healing and releasing. I. And that's how Oso Safe was born. And, so I created something that, I said to myself, the charities and the nonprofits are great. We're not a charity or a nonprofit. So they do their job in, in doing what they do, but it's never going to get resolved.

This enormous problem of violence in the home and everything starts in the home. Everything starts in the home. So I said to myself, if we make home safe, then everything else will fall into place. There won't be school shootings. You could feel safe in a movie theater. You could feel safe in the workplace.

You could feel safe, at home. You can feel safe at the shopping mall or whatever it is. But everything starts in the home, and I can tell you. Just to throw some [00:06:00] statistics, one out of three women will be beaten or raped in a lifetime. One out of five adolescent girls is abused by her boyfriend. One out of three young people will be in an abusive relationship.

One out of seven men is abused. 15 million children witness violence in their own homes each and every year. That's just in the us just the ones that we know about. About 324,000 pregnant women go into the emergency room not for pregnant related issues. Before abuse related injuries, five children a day are killed in the United States alone at the hands of an abusive parent, an abusive stepparent, and usually under the watch of a child protective service agency.

The rulings of judges. So this needs to be resolved. So, and this will never be resolved so long as we treat this as a [00:07:00] charity, as a nonprofit, we said at Oso Safe, this needs to be a paid service. So that way it actually gets resolved and it's in real estate. The focus at our company and my company is real estate.

Let's resolve it right in real estate. What makes a safe home? What, you know, I thought long and hard about this. What makes a safe home? Yes, you could have the air conditioning working and the heat, hot water, electricity, everything up to code, making sure that you have window guards, window guards on the window sills.

If you have a child that's below, I believe, 10 years old, I live on the East coast, whatever the laws are, but the one main ingredient to making a home safe. Is respect, creating respect, maintaining respect, practicing respect. And that means no verbal, physical, sexual abuse, [00:08:00] no violence, abuse, chaos, dysfunction of any kind.

Now, we're not saying it also safe, Sabrina, what are you talking about? So you're never going to fight with your significant other. You're never going to, get into conflict with your boyfriend, your girlfriend, your ex, your children, your husband, wife. Of course not. That's not realistic. But there's a way to fight.

There's a way to. Argue and you never crossed that line of abuse. Not verbal, not physically, not sexually, not verbally, physically or sexually. So it's about respect not being verbally, disparaging, not saying, not throwing things, not punching anyone, hitting anyone, not none of that. But you could disagree.

I say it's blue, you say it's red. And we teach at Oso Safe. Let's make respect a required standard in [00:09:00] all homes. And this our main product, our core product, it the, is the Oso safe certification for properties. So we're. We want this to propagate over all residency, every, whether you live in a townhouse, a co-op, a condo, a single family home, a multi-family dwelling, a two-family home, a villa, a mansion, a mobile home, a dormitory, a senior community.

It's not gonna matter. Let's get that property. Oso Safe certified. What does that mean? Right now, we are marketing or focusing on the landlord tenant portion of the real estate industry because that's the path of lease resistance. And we're saying, Mr. And Miss Landlord, get your property Oso safe, certified hire us.

What does that mean? They purchase for $125 for each unit that they have. They also save home [00:10:00] suite, home package, and it consists of a policy, a seminar, an app. And therapists assigned to the property. So just to give a brief description of all of those components. The policy basically states, and mind you, all of these components are copywritten, trademarked, so on and so forth.

So the policy basically states, I, as a landlord, I promise to provide you a safe space for you to live. You in turn as my resident, as my tenant, you promise to not act in any way, shape, or form abusively. Otherwise you, the abuser only gets immediately evicted, expelled from the premises and we go into full knowledge knowing that would be the consequences.

So there's no surprise. So that kind of changes the game. We're flipping the script, so to speak. We're saying you act like a beast. Like a barbarian, like a savage. You have to go, you know, and the rest of the [00:11:00] family can stay provided that they could still pay the rent or the mortgage.

So that's the policy. The seminar, everybody gets educated, Nikki, adults and children alike on facts, statistics, warning signs, definitions of abuse, the difference between abuse and discipline. What constitutes a good relationship? What are the warning signs of a bad relationship? So that way there's no surprise again, oh, I didn't know that if I pulled my partner's hair, that constitutes abuse.

Now, you know, and we want to add to that with the policy and the seminar that children, I can't stress this enough, children have a voice and choice in an oso safe certified property. We do not wait until the child is 18 years of age for them to have agency over their lives. We teach them with our children's book, the Home Safe Home for You and Me Children's Book.

It's a staple in [00:12:00] every single oso safe, certified property. And in the book I go over, I introduce this idea of respect and disrespect, safety and being unsafe, abuse and non-use. So that way, and we read this to the kids of all ages, and we're saying to them. Right now in this moment, you are safe right here, right now.

Know that for the moment, which means right now you are safe just to plant that seed. Because I know as a kid that was being abused, that was witnessing abuse, like that would've helped me. Like, don't think about the past. Don't think about the future. Just stay right here, right now in the present. And that would've helped me growing up.

You know, and also the other thing that we introduced in the book is, and this is I feel pretty [00:13:00] big, it's Theso Safe Kids Chair. And it goes like this. I wanna live where I am safe and I am also safe with, and they get to fill in the blank now, and I say it in the book. Think about who you feel safe with.

It could be mom, dad, stepmom, stepdad, but what if it isn't? What if dad is attacking you? What if mom is attacking you? What if stepmom and stepdad is abusing you? Think about who you feel safe with. Is it an aunt, an uncle, a grandparent, a close family friend? Speak out kids. And we know it's scary. We know, but we know at also safe, Nikki, that abusers can only keep their poker face on for so long before those abusive true colors come out.

They could hide it for a month, a week, a couple of days, but sure enough, [00:14:00] those abusive, true colors will come out. So in the seminar of the certification, we educate kids. Use your voice. You have choice in an noso safe certified property. So we educate them on that, that we don't wait until they are 18 years of age because quite frankly, it's too late.

Kids will resort to drugs, alcohol, gang related activity. They will get involved with the wrong friends, boyfriends, girlfriends, they will self harm and ultimately they could commit suicide. Why? When you can nip it in the bud, get that kid to safety with a safe, you know, whoever they feel safe with, whoever respects them with an aunt and uncle or grandparent, a close family friend.

So that's the, seminar. The third component is the app. I hired a software company to, according to our [00:15:00] specifications, to detect violent like movements and captures them in real time issuing alerts to the landlord. Let's say you have 10 units. Whoa, I just saw you beat the crap out of her in my unit two, and you just beat the crap out of him in my unit.

10. Well, this is grounds for eviction. You knew that this was going to happen. We don't, tolerate this in an noso safe, certified property. I have to protect all of my other tenants. You have to go. So this maintains property reputation, it mitigates liability and everybody feels safe. The rest of the residents in the unit in the property.

And then the fourth and final component are therapists assigned to the property. So we have therapists that are also safe certified and they, you are required to check in with your therapist once a month. Is everything okay? Do you feel like anything is looming? And just to give an example, well Mr.

And miss [00:16:00] therapist actually are kid came home with bad grades. We're not going to beat 'em up. We're not going to verbally disparage 'em. We know better in Anso safe certified property, we're held to a higher regard, a higher standard. But help us through this. We really don't know how to handle this so.

Therapy becomes like a lifestyle. It's part of your residency. This is a much better approach, Nikki, than waiting versus waiting for an episode of violence to occur. Bad news travels fast. The police come, and then before you know it, your respectful, safe tenants leave, and then you're stuck with the abusive family.

Why we're flipping all of that? So we're making respect a required standard. Our logo gets placed outside of the property. After everybody signs the policy, everybody goes through the [00:17:00] education. So that way any vehicle or pedestrian traffic, wow, I know what that logo means. I would rather raise my kids in Anso safe certified property versus one that isn't.

Because they have the mechanisms and systems in place. If and when violence happens, this is a much better approach. My kids will feel safe, I will feel safe, my partner will feel safe. So we are introducing this and marketing this to the real estate industry as much as possible. I wish I had this growing up and I know if I did, my mother and father especially my father would not have gotten away with half the things they got away with in an, you know, if I had this in my own house, you know?

Hey everyone. Thanks for sticking with us. Before we dive into our next topic, I just wanna take a quick moment to remind you two who like this video, subscribe to our [00:18:00] channel and hit that notification bell. That way you'll always be the first to know when a new episode drops, and we want to hear from you.

What topics are you most excited about? Drop your thoughts in. The comments below. Your feedback helps us create content that you love. We've got some exciting stuff coming your way, so don't miss out. Now let's switch gears and jump into our next discussion.

This becomes part of your, life, your residency. You know, why wait for something to happen, like a devastation, oh my gosh, a member of the family committed suicide, or, wow, I have an illness, I have cancer, or, I just broke up with my boyfriend or my girlfriend, or I'm going through a divorce and then get therapy.

No, you have it in place already from the beginning. It's part of your residency. It's part of your tenancy if you will, in an also safe certified property. I know I [00:19:00] talked a lot, so if you have questions for me, please ask. But, we're marketing this in a big way and we're spearheading the real estate industry in this direction because quite frankly, chil and I should know, children suffer the most in these situations when there is verbal, physical, sexual abuse, or any combination of the three.

We really feel for kids, and we feel that this will help them in a big way. And the more we gain momentum, the more kids will, be less victimized. And the goal is to have no victimization. You know, it should be the norm, should be that you're safe in your house, respect. Is ongoing 24 7.

The norm should not be when you put that key in your lock. [00:20:00] What's gonna happen today? Am I gonna get beat up? Am I going to get raped by my dad? Am I going to get attacked by my mother? That should not be the norm. The norm should be the exact opposite that I can breathe here. I feel at home. I'm respected.

We have respect in the household on an ongoing basis that needs to be the norm. And that's what we're, that's the goal. I'm apparently choking. Sorry. It's okay. But, so I hit a couple of those statistics myself. My home life was not the best. So I know that you're not doing, it's not a nonprofit or anything like that, but do you have plans for foster homes?

Oh, this is inclusive. Absolutely. Yeah, and I feel like with [00:21:00] our approach, everybody will benefit, you know, no matter where you live or how you're living, because we're kind of, establishing respect as a foundation across the board, like from the guts, you know? So definitely with foster homes, like the damage has been done, right?

That's why you're in a foster home. And now it's about repairing and healing and, so we feel that this is going to help. Anyone in any situation of their home life. So foster homes are definitely included in the formula. Definitely. I hope I answered the question. Yeah. Yeah, I was in a foster home at one point because my mom was an idiot, and, it was worse than home.

I'm so sorry. So, that's all, that's why I would ask, oh, the foster home that you were in was worse than home. Horrible. Oh, I'm so sorry. Yeah. And yeah, so Perfect. Yes. I'm glad you brought [00:22:00] that up, because with oso safe certifications, like, we're not going to say, oh, you're a foster home, or you're a, we're not going to shut anyone out of this.

This applies to any home. So this would've helped. A lot because your foster parents or whatever the situation was, would've been out and you would've been to, you would've been somewhere where you were safe, you know, respected. And you get that choice as the child, you know, 'cause children know who make them feel safe.

They know who respects them. Even if they can't talk. They know who makes them feel safe. And we need to believe them. We need to hear them, and we need to, satisfy that requirement where we listen to them and carry that out. Mm-hmm. [00:23:00] Yeah. So I'm glad you brought that up. You're in New York, I'm guessing?

Yeah, east coast, New Jersey. Oh, okay. That's close. I know your rivals, but it's right there. Yes. I lived in Syracuse, New York, for some year. It's where my, some of my relatives live and stuff, so I do know that area. The snow was wild, but, how are you, only in New York at the moment, do you have plans to get bigger or are you already bigger?

No, we're in the tri-state area right now, and, so we definitely will go anywhere in the country, anywhere in the country, anywhere in the world. In fact, I've done podcasts, Malaysia, England, Australia, Philippines. And they're telling us, we need you here. We need you here.

So definitely the long-term goal is global, but the [00:24:00] short term to, short to long term is definitely expanding across the United States and abroad because, enough is enough. You know, there's too many of us. Our common thread is all of this suffering as children and for what, and I have to say, I.

The courts are horrific, and I'm sure you know this, Nikki, the courts, child protective services, they do more harm than good. And with our products and services, you won't need the courts. You won't need the courts. Everything gets resolved right in residency. And that's where it happens, right?

You get attacked, verbal, physical, sexual abuse, right? At home. There are kids being trafficked right at home by their parents. This is not, I'm not lying, I'm not exaggerating. This is what's happening across the globe in the United States. This [00:25:00] is unconscionable and there's no excuse for it. You know, sometimes I feel like we're not advancing, we're going backwards.

But what's advancing is the technology, but. It's like we're going backwards and there's no excuse for that. But yeah. I'm glad you asked that. So, yeah. Okay. The other question I have is your therapists, where are you finding them? Like, how is that part working? Because I work with two therapists who are lovely ladies, and, they help me a ton.

And yes, I said to, I am nuts. It's a thing, that's good. That's good. But, I have worked with bad therapists before who have ignored situations happening, who have enabled the situation to get worse because they were like, oh, nothing's happening. You're fine. You're over exaggerating what happened?

That kind of thing. And [00:26:00] I've had people dismiss it, you know, you've just been through so much trauma. I'm so glad you're saying this. Yes. Yeah. And there are bad therapists out there where they make it worse. And I'm so glad that you're saying this. So, like we say, at also safe, there's no shame in getting help.

There's shame in not getting help, but I find that like everybody can contribute to the problem. Schools, therapists, certainly the courts, certainly child protective services, certainly the judges, and they're horrible rulings. So we vet them and we work with them and make sure that they're also safe certified.

So we kind of recruit therapists and we see how they, things are progressing. So if anything. Like if the situation with, let's say a unit gets worse, well, we nip that right in the bud and we say, [00:27:00] look, we have to sever because you're not doing, you're not doing the oso safe certification properly, or you're, you're doing the opposite.

So we have to sever the relationship because we want therapists that work with our clients, our residents, to help them not to go backwards. We need to go forward. So, yeah, so it's how progression wise, we just keep a watch on how things are moving along. And if they're not, then we nip it in the bud, and we don't give too many chances, oh, okay.

We'll just kind of brush it under the carpet. No, because the, these are people's livelihoods. These are people's mental health. These are people's, quite frankly, your mental health is, it is just as important as your physical health. In fact, your mental health [00:28:00] controls your physical health.

There's scientific proof of that. So if you are not okay, mentally, your body is going to suffer. And what, there's nothing in my opinion, that breaks a body down more than abuse. In fact, there's scientific research that the Alzheimer's, the dementia, the cancer. It stems from abuse in some capacity as a child, and then it manifests itself as you go about your life as what I mentioned.

So it's in our best interest to make mental health part of your livelihood, part of your lifestyle. I hope I answer the question as far as, we don't let it get worse. You don't let it fe um, with, uh, I'm sorry. You don't let it fester. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah, because otherwise, what's the point of that?

You [00:29:00] know? Um, and, and, and it's just once a month that the residents are required. And you know what, it could be a phone conversation, it could be, video chat, it could be a text, it could be as long as we, I. Do the maintaining, and we do that with our therapists as well, because, you know, it's kind of like your teeth.

If you let your teeth go, you're gonna lose your teeth. You're gonna have cavities, you're gonna have gum disease. But if you maintain it as you go along, then you'll have your teeth and you'll be able to take care of them and you'll have your teeth for longer period of time. Versus just letting it go and then it's too big to manage and then it's like, oh, I wish I did something years ago.

A little bit at a time. So that's our approach at So safe with creating and maintaining respect in homes, workplaces. Workplaces in schools. But the focus [00:30:00] is in homes. So one of the thoughts that I have had recently is that I will never know the person I could have been because the abuse, verbal and otherwise ha started a very young age, that foster home was when I was four.

And the physical abuse there was awful. But it didn't stop there either. It continued. And so I will never know what I would've been like if none of that happened, because it all happened before I could recognize who I was as a person. You can't, you don't recognize yourself as a person at three, four years old, right?

And then you have something that violent happen, and then all of a sudden you're no longer sleeping. I still, I'm on sleeping pills because I can't sleep at night like. That 3-year-old, that 2-year-old, whatever, they could probably sleep at least a little bit. [00:31:00] Right? So I am, really big on people being safe.

I know that I am now in a situation where I am safe, but I haven't always been. I have, like I said, I hit more than one of your statistics. And, I had some things happen in my past where, things beyond my control happened and I didn't know the situation was happening. If I'd have known, I could have reacted in a way, right?

But because I didn't know, I didn't react, how everybody says is appropriate. And so the situation got out of hand very quickly. I never wanted anybody in my house to feel unsafe, but I knew I was unsafe. I was trying to leave. That was not a situation I could do, um, as the, so sorry people involved, but, so, [00:32:00] sorry.

I'm trying not to overshare while I'm talking at the same time, so That's okay. That's okay. This is healing actually for both of us. I feel so, but for me, the biggest part of feeling safe is having, like the people I live with. Now, if Kim, my friend that I live with, if she ever yelled at me, I am quite certain I would turn into dust, but she doesn't, I.

Yell. She kind of gets frustrated at me sometimes because I'm not doing X, Y, or Z, but she doesn't yell at me. It's a brand new concept in my world. Right. The first time she was like, I'm kind of mad at you. And I was like, wait a minute. You said that awful calmly. Right, right, right. It's almost like foreign, right?

'cause you're so used to bad, you're so used to the poison. You're so used to the violence and the [00:33:00] abuse that anything good that happens to you, anything, that's non confrontational feels like. I don't know what to do with that. I have no idea what to do with that. It's like you just threw me for a loop and, yeah.

For a long time I did the same thing. Like I, I would go out with guys that treated me well and I would push them away because I didn't know what to do with that. I had no idea what to do with that. And I know that sounds weird, but my therapist said one of the, one of the main things that will always stick with me is you're, you gravitate towards what you're used to.

Mm-hmm. Whether that's good or bad. So, and it takes training and reprogramming to allow any good [00:34:00] in your life. So I'm so glad that you're allowing it. Nikki and I, I'm sure it's a struggle. I'm sure it's like wait a minute, I don't have to fight her or him. I don't have to, like you said, no yelling.

I mean, yelling was like talking in my house. It was just normal. It was just, there was no discussion and let's sit down and communicate and let's hash this out. Hell no. There it was either yelling and more yelling and even further than that. So I totally understand what you're saying and I'm so glad that you said,

I'm trying not to cry.

It kind of goes back to what I said before. You have to uns steal what was stolen from you. You're never gonna know what that little girl was supposed to [00:35:00] be. But I feel like you did catch up on a lot that was stolen because you allowed yourself to heal. And the fact that you have two therapists, I think that's fantastic.

As long as they're good for you and they're, they add to your life and make it better, and you're improving. As long as you're going forward, why not? And you could afford it and why not? I feel like, people need to not be ashamed of that at all because we all need help. There is no way that we can do this alone.

Even if you come from a good home. A stable home, a respectful home, and also safe home therapy is there to keep you maintained. What's the worst that can happen? You'll have a session where you have nothing to say. Everything is great, everything is good and [00:36:00] great. Then talk about all the good stuff, you know.

But yeah, I'm sorry, I think I interrupted you. So, the reason why I have two is I've moved, I move a lot. I have lived in or been to every state in the US except for Alaska and Hawaii. I'm a military brat. And then I turned 18 and started moving myself. So, it's a lot of moving, but during a couple of my last couple of moves, my friend's, sister who was a therapist, started talking to me to make sure that I was gap covered.

And then we just kept it up because some of the therapists, the therapist I had in Texas was pretty bad. Every time I like went to her with a problem, it was, you've just been through so much trauma, I see why you're doing this. And I'm like, that's not helpful. Why would you say that? You need meat to the, you need meat.

What are you gonna do with that? It's good that it was [00:37:00] acknowledged, but, it sounds a bit, especially in the tone, maybe like dismissing. Mm-hmm. I like to say, you know, dismiss, undermine, belittle. What happened? And that's just criminal to do that to someone criminal, you know?

And you're not using it as an excuse, you know, the abuse, like they'll say the abuse excuse. It's one thing to say, well, yeah, the reason why I'm beating you up, little Sally, little me, let's say my child. The reason why I am beating you up is because, well, that's how my mom and dad did it.

And it's because I love you. That's why I do this. Oh, no, no, you are one job as a victim or as a survivor, I should say, is to not continue the cycle. You can acknowledge I was abused, I was verbally, physically sexually abused, but okay, but what are you [00:38:00] doing now? To make it better, to not repeat the cycle, because otherwise those abusers that abused you win.

And you don't want them to continue winning. You don't want them to have a hold on your life. And this is what we teach at Oso Safe, and it's about the repetition of it in our seminars, workshops, in the certification. It's a practice. It's not just okay, one and done. It's a practice every day. And it's the work, but it's okay.

My big thing with therapy, everybody says, oh, if you go to a therapist that says so much about you, I'm like, no, not going to a therapist when it's obvious that you need one. Or going to a therapist that is just, you know, letting you be in an echo chamber. Echo chamber and bel, you know. Oh yeah, no, that's, you know, you have anxiety.

Of course. That means you don't [00:39:00] go out in public anymore. No, you have to work on yourself. You have to get better because if you stay in the same place that you're at, no matter where that place is, I mean, even for me, I am a lot better than I used to be, but I'm not standing still. I am still trying to get better, to be better to, to that kind of thing.

And if you're standing in one place going, but if I go to Walmart, there's people and I'll be scared. Well, yeah. So you have to do it anyway. I. Exactly. Yeah. And I'm glad you're saying that. Yes. Because otherwise, you're just, I like that actually. I like that. I have to write that down.

Echo chamber. Yeah. 'cause then it's just like, kind of one sided, the therapy and you need guidance. You need help, you need to move on to the next phase of your life. Or where you can be in a group with people and not feel freaked out, or, oh my gosh, I'm gonna have a panic attack, I'm gonna have an anxiety [00:40:00] attack.

I'm going to, and believe me, living in my house. Oh my gosh. It's like everything was war. Mm-hmm. Everything. If you got good grades, if you got bad grades, if you're sick, if you're, well, if you fell, it's your fault. You're stupid. I'm Italian. So my parents would curse me out in Italian, in English, mainly in Italian.

I could still hear the horrible things that they would say. And I was a child, you know, and I'm not using it as an excuse, but I think, well, that's why I was suicidal from 16 to 19, all those years of hearing your mother and your father saying to you, you're a piece of garbage and you're, an Italian or, something that my mother would say.

And when I think about it now, I cringe and she would say it in Italian, but at the English translation is, I [00:41:00] curse you in the day you were born. Over and over again, over and over again. And it was said in Italian, and I said to myself,

I, I could never say that to a child, even fathom it. And in Italy, like they discipline, like I don't like it when pe and this is something that we teach, oh well it's culture. That's just how they raise kids, right? They hit you, they'll take a shoe and hit you or throw something at you.

It's Italian, it's Pakistani, it's Brazilian, it's Spanish, it's. No, it's American. It's southern. It's, I'm sorry, but that's wrong. That's abuse. That's what that is. Because kids will listen to you. Kids will listen to you just by a look. [00:42:00] Or if you explain to children, look, we're gonna go in the store. I can't afford to buy you five things.

I can only afford to buy you one thing and this is why, and let's role play. You be the mommy or the daddy and I'll be the kid. I assure you that kids understand if you explain it to them, they're not stupid and they won't have a tantrum and they'll understand, okay, mommy and daddy can only buy me one thing if you explain it to them.

I feel like we just don't give children. Enough credit at all. And then they get beaten. They get humiliated, they get trashed, and it's just wrong all around. And culture, you know, people will say, oh, it's culture. That's an excuse. It's an excuse. You know, and we have to stop that because they'll say, or we get the time.

Like, oh, well that's how it was [00:43:00] done back then. Well, what's the excuse now? It's still going on. We're 2025. If it was done in the seventies, the eighties, the nineties, but it's still going on. It's an excuse. Don't give me, don't give me, don't give us that excuse of, well, you know, that's how it was back then.

It's still going on. One caveat to that, that I did, that I used to do, um, with, if I was wa, if I was walking with somebody who had a kid, like, if you're not willing to buy your kid a toy, why are you in the toy aisle? If you came in here to go grocery shopping and you're in the toy aisle telling your kid, no, we can't buy you any toys, why did you go to the opposite end of the store to do that?

Right. Right. That's just right. That's asking for trouble. It's Right, right. Yeah. And, and I hate to say it, um,[00:44:00] 

bad parents, you know, abusive parents, they're sadistic. Mm-hmm. And they will, and I know this sounds weird, but it's not, I'm not talking out of the ordinary here. They like to see their kids suffer. And almost create that to you, made me hit you in the store. Like smack 'em or hit them or humiliate them and, you know, that's not parenting.

We say it also say, discipline, and this is, and educate a big educational point in child rearing, discipline instills education, abuse, instills fear. So that's a big difference right there. You know, disciplining is one thing and you have to discipline your kid, but abuse, well then you want fear.

My father loved it when he had me as an audience and my mother for [00:45:00] that matter, when they were screaming and yelling. It wasn't about, we can't talk about this right now. Sabrina's here. They loved it when I was there to instill fear to the me monster, right? Like, look, look at me ruling, look at, you know, and abusive parents will do that.

They'll take their kid whether by accident or on purpose, you know, the kid runs and the kid heads for the toy section and before you know it, they're there and, then take the kid aside or we need to go breathe, or, we talked about this. Or buy them the cheapest thing, then the cheapest thing there.

A little, they'll be happy with that, the little, thing, but yeah, I agree with you. Yeah. Back to your point. I agree with you. parents need to be educated. You become a parent. Like one of our goals at Oso safe in the long term also is, you [00:46:00] know, and this is for both the mother and the father or whatever your family environment is, to women, to men, whatever it is.

Before you're taking this kid home, you just gave birth, you just what, whatever it is you're going to get. Also safe certified because what's the point of releasing a child to you if you're gonna beat the crap out of that kid or humiliate that kid, or you're gonna get also safe certified at the hospital before we release this child to you.

I think that would diminish and prevent a lot of child abuse from the hospital. And people don't know what they don't know. Some people go into parenting having never touched a kid in their life before that. And so having that help is a good thing. You know, having some kind of a support system in place for people like kids, you know, graduating out of foster care, now they're having a kid, [00:47:00] they don't have grandparents for this kid to be able to go see or, or maybe siblings to babysit or whatever.

So, you know, being educated and having that time to be like, this is how you don't do it. Don't do this Right to that. Right. I think that's important. Yes. Thank you. Thank you for echoing that. In fact, in our policy we have something called the. Home Suite, home Code of Living. So we have kind of like do's and don'ts, verbal, physical, sexual abuse, like do's and don't, I mean, obviously no abuse, but like some tips, some things that, some tools that you could reach out for right away and practice, put into practice right away.

You know, read a book to your child or, if you're scared to talk about, certain subjects with your child, here's a guideline, you know, and you're not going to do it [00:48:00] perfect. But don't say to the kid, we can't talk about that. Or, smack 'em if they're throw things or.

No, these are do's and don'ts, and put them into practice. Start with anything. Anything is better than nothing. And maybe tweak it for your household. See, try a few things, you know. A big one for us at oso Safe that we teach is

when children, yelling, screaming, the tantrums or whatever. You stay quiet as the parent. You stay quiet. Explain to the kid when you're ready. I'm going to be right here. You have it out, scream, yell, have it out, and don't beat the kid. We're not gonna allow that, first of all, because you're gonna be evicted.

You're not going to beat 'em up or hurt. You're not going to [00:49:00] do any of that. Let them have it. Let them have it out with themselves. And then say, throughout. Say I'm here for you. And ask them, do you want me to be here? Do you want me to leave? Do you want me to stay? Do you wanna write on post-its and see if they say yes?

No, if they continue screaming, you'll be surprised that kids will communicate with you if you just. If you just allow it, you know, if you just allow it in any capacity, versus beating them up, shut up. I'm the boss. I'm your parent. You don't act that way. You're making me yell at you. You're making me beat you.

Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. Because. They don't know how to communicate, what they're feeling yet. Their brains are not all developed. So they could be hungry, but throw a tantrum. But maybe [00:50:00] they want something to eat, but they just don't know how to communicate it. Or they had a bad day at school.

Maybe somebody bullied them and they don't know how to communicate that to you. Or maybe they were inappropriately touched by somebody and they're having a tantrum because they're embarrassed or they don't know how to talk to you, and they, so you have to kind of fish and dig deeper and maybe draw a picture on a post-it on or on some paper.

Is this what happened? Don't be scared. I'm, I'm here to help you and I'm not gonna fault you. I'm not gonna blame you. Ha, say that over and over again. That way your kid will feel safe to talk to you about the. The major things. And I wanna say, Nikki, this is very, I mean, I think everything that we talked about is important, but, pornography is a big driver of violence.

[00:51:00] Huge. And, I've been making it a point to say this on every single podcast out that I do speaking engagement. But kids are exposed to pornography at a young age, unfortunately. And, so I. It's very important that we educate our kids on, and I know this is gonna sound weird, but you want your kids to come to you and for you to educate your kids that pornography is a no-no.

I'm not talking about erotica. Erotica is something different. Erotica is about sexual freedom. You wanna have mind blowing orgasms with someone, that's your prerogative. That's great. But pornography is about manipulation, domination, control, possession, no sexual freedom whatsoever. No freedom whatsoever.

And a [00:52:00] category of pornography that I think a lot of people don't know is that, yes, a lot of the perpetrators are men, but there are women perpetrators out there, and they're called BDS ERs. Financial Domine Tricks is the glamorous title, but the actual acronym, BDSM, that stands for Bondage, domination, sadism and Masochism.

These are women doing the sex abusing and they're on camera doing this work at home, doing these videos, doing convulsing, revolting, disturbing things on and off camera, and they pre on submissive men. To rope them in, get into relationships with them. These men could have children of their own, or they have kids, and it is a recipe for disaster in the home where they'll, those kids are [00:53:00] being groomed to be a, b, D Smer, just like the women.

And these women could be your neighbor across the street in the PTA, the Parent Teacher Association. They could be in the apartment above below. And these women are dangerous. They will stop at nothing to get what they want. They are poison, they are dangerous. And I'm making it a point to educate the public on this because nobody suspects women as being the sex abuser.

They fly under the radar. Meanwhile. What they do is legal, and it needs to be illegal because they are the sex traffickers of our societies, communities, neighborhoods, because they are women. A woman can't be a sex abuser. I am here to tell you they're out [00:54:00] there and they are in all neighborhoods. I don't care how rich you are, what type of neighborhood you live, like where it's white, American, rich, middle class, medium income, poor, they're everywhere and they traffic.

Right in their home. The kids that are in their home, they're grooming to be like them. And mind you, pornography a photographer of for Playboy, she no longer does it because she saw how in the eyes of those girls, the abuse that they go through. And they went through, she told me a photographer, I spoke to her personally.

She doesn't, she's an advocate for anti porn and she makes it a point to educate the public on kind on [00:55:00] what I'm talking about. But even more, because she said that 99% of the people in the porn industry were sexually abused. So you are talking about a whole field where it's fundamentally rooted in sex abuse.

So we really need to think about this, about pornography and, the comments of, well, you're infringing on people's sexual freedom. Again, I'm not talking about erotica, that's different, but pornography is about, I mean, look at what the acronym is about bondage, domination, sadism, masochism, what adult needs to be around that, let alone a child.

And these courts need to wake up and face that fact that they allow this, they almost encourage it. Like, oh, like what you were saying. What's the problem? What's the [00:56:00] problem with what you went through? What the problem is that you are perpetuating, magnifying, solidifying the verbal, physical, sexual abuse of children in the courts.

You judges need to pay those consequences for allowing that for when, you know, these cases come before you, they're before you and you're allowing these kids to continue in that environment. You need to step down, you need to step down. Judges, child Protective Services, so thank you for allowing me to say that because it's a very big component of what we do at Oso Safe in terms of diminishing and preventing sex abuse, especially of children.

So is there, I know you wanted, you said you wanted to keep it at an hour, so is there anything else you would like [00:57:00] to say before we end things? Sure. You have the right to be safe in your own home. All of us have the right to be in a good relationship, and if you're not, we're working as fast as we can to get every home safe where you are in a good relationship, where you see the warning signs in you, and that you allow yourself to be in a good relationship just because you are a parent.

It doesn't give you the right to abuse your child. And to all kids on your podcast of all ages, listeners, but your audience members speak out, speak out, speak up as best as you can. We care about you so much, and you are at the core of what we do. Kids of all ages from teeny tiny through high school,.

Yeah. And I could say the social media platforms that we're on, or the website now or later, but, I'll put that, I won't [00:58:00] say, okay, great. Great. Yes. Yes. And we have two channels directly for kids, our YouTube channel and our, TikTok. It's strictly for kids of all ages. We talk about abuse, we talk about what constitutes a good relationship, what are the warning signs we speak to them, that we tell them that you're not alone, it's not your fault.

And, to give them tips and encouragement and empowerment. Okay. I think that, what you're doing is important. Is there a way in any of the links that you gave me for somebody who maybe doesn't live in the tri-state to be able to contact you about getting something somewhere else in the US or.

Elsewhere. Absolutely. Absolutely. Yes. We got the website, oso safe.com. We're on all the major social media platforms, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, and yes, absolutely. We don't deter anyone as [00:59:00] far as, for our products and services, getting their property also safe certified. I hope I answered the question.

Okay. That's great. So, thank you for coming and, thank you for sharing this. I think it's an important thing. I know that since I have felt safer, I have been able to work on my mental health more, so that has been very important for me and I appreciate what you're doing. Thank you, Nikki.