The Wildflower Way
The Wildflower Way supports professionals and leaders in human services with tools to integrate services for older women who have experienced gender-based violence (GBV) into broader equity efforts through relational, trauma -and violence- informed policy and practice.
The change process is likened to growing wildflowers in concrete or rigid environments, working always within existing constraints. Wildflowers are resilient; they find the smallest spaces to bloom. Over time, they can transform the landscape. Older women who have survived a lifetime of trauma and violence are similarly resilient. They embody the potential for growth and transformation even in the harshest conditions.
The Wildflower Way is both a narrative strategy and a practical guide for nurturing this growth, offering a path toward sustainability, healing, and genuine systemic change in human services.
The Wildflower guide provides context and strategy to support implementation of the tools:
At the heart of what women told us, there are common ideas: listen, take time with me, show respect for my story and choices, be present, be kind.
CNPEA builds awareness, support and capacity for a coordinated pan-Canadian approach to the prevention of elder abuse and neglect. We promote the rights of older adults through knowledge mobilization, collaboration, policy reform and education.
The Wildflower Project is a 5-year initiative led by CNPEA and informed by a diverse group of partners across many sectors including shelters, interval and transition housing, violence against women, elder abuse, and community support services for older adults.
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