Raise something difficult in Safe Space

Safe Space is for the conversations a household keeps not having. It is not a chat — it has a deliberate shape, because the shape is what stops it going the way these usually go.

Raising something

1. More → Safe Space, under Wellbeing, then New safe space.
2. Under What would you like to talk about?, write what is actually bothering you — or tap the microphone and say it (see below). Just the gist is fine.
3. Under Share it with, choose the grown-up you want to talk to.
4. If you like, switch on Let them know I want to talk calmly, and set a Conversation timer.
5. Tap Create safe space. It is saved as a draft that only you can see, with a few gentle talking points ready.
6. When you are ready, open it and tap Share with and their name. They get a notification that you would like to talk. It gives your first name and never the topic, so nothing sensitive shows on a lock screen.

Say it instead of typing

Some things are easier said than written. Tap the microphone and talk, for up to five minutes: your words appear as you speak and become the note’s topic, and the recording is kept with the note. A note is either written or spoken — a recording replaces anything you had typed.

• Before you share it, only you can play the recording. Once it is shared, the grown-up you chose can play it too. No one else can, and children never can.
• Remove voice note deletes the recording and keeps the note. Deleting the note deletes the recording with it.
• Both of you need the latest version of the app. An older version shows a spoken note with a blank title and no player.

Your phone’s own speech recogniser turns what you say into words. The recording is uploaded and stored with the note on our servers — see your data and privacy for what that means.

Talking points

Equal House suggests a few gentle ways into the conversation, based on what you wrote or said. To write them, the topic is sent to Amazon Bedrock, our AI provider, which processes it in the UK and the EU; the recording never is. If a spoken note has no words the phone could make out, you get a standard set instead.

The conversation timer

Optional, and any length up to an hour. It is for the conversation itself: open the note when you sit down together and tap the timer to start, so the talk stays gentle and does not sprawl into the evening. When the time is up it buzzes and chimes — that one is for the conversation, not a celebration. On Android, its chime no longer stops your music, and it stays quiet while your phone is on Silent or Do Not Disturb, or on a call, which the timer tells you before you start. On Vibrate it still chimes, at your media volume. On Silent there’s no buzz on Android either, so you’ll only see that the time is up on the screen. With a screen reader on, your phone says “Time’s up”.

Afterwards

Mark as talked about once you have had the conversation, and Move to archive to file it away — either of you can do both. The archive matters more than it sounds: a household that can see it raised the same thing four times in six months is looking at a pattern rather than an incident.

Only the person who wrote a note can delete it for good. That removes the topic, its talking points and any recording, and it cannot be undone.

Who can see it

Only you, and the grown-up you shared it with once you have shared it. Other adults in the household do not see it, and children never see Safe Space — it does not appear in Kid Zone at all.

Nothing celebrates in here

No buzz, no sound, no Bric and no confetti while you are in Safe Space — not even for a task that finishes saving as you arrive, which shows only its plain Undo bar. Notifications that come in meanwhile arrive silently, and leaving never sets off a celebration. The conversation timer is the one exception, above. See quiet places.

What it is not

It is not mediation, and it is not a therapist. It is a way of getting something said, at a moment when saying it is possible.