10/23/2025
October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month and each year Choctaw Nation hosts the Flowers on the Pond vigil to honor victims and survivors experiencing domestic violence. Members of our office attended the event where Anna Marcy, Choctaw Nation Family Violence Director, gave a moving address. Below is an except from her speech that expresses the same passion and hope shared by our office. Let's work together for a better tomorrow.
"This year’s national theme is simple, but powerful: Everyone Knows Someone. Everyone knows someone affected by domestic violence - a friend, a neighbor, a coworker, a relative. Sometimes, we just don’t realize it. When we say, 'Everyone knows someone,' we are not just raising awareness, we are raising responsibility. Because if everyone knows someone, then everyone can do something. You can listen. You can believe. You can speak up when something doesn’t feel right. You can learn the warning signs. You can be a safe place for someone who’s afraid. Change begins in these small, human moments - and those moments, multiplied across a community, become movements.
As we release our flowers onto the water today, let them carry our love, our grief, and our promise. A promise to the ones we’ve lost, that they will not be forgotten. A promise to the survivors, that we will keep fighting for your safety and your healing. A promise to one another, that we will not stop until every home is a safe one. Let these flowers remind us that our actions, like ripples on this pond, reach farther than we can see. Every act of courage, every voice raised, every life touched, matters. So today, as the flowers drift across the water, may we honor the past, hold one another in the present, and keep working toward a future where violence has no place in our homes, in our communities, or in our hearts."
