The study involved face-to-face interviews with 10 women involved in 7 well-known New Zealand gangs. Less extensive interviews were conducted with other female gang associates and male former and current gang members. The information in this article is a combination of the data obtained from the interviews and from the published gang literature available in New Zealand. For half of the women interviewed, violence, often extreme, was a significant component of their early lives. Parental alcohol abuse was an ongoing feature for 6 of the 10 women. Half had experienced childhood sexual abuse. Out of a need for protection, nine of the women sought out powerful men they believed could protect them, which made the women candidates for gang-type associations. In addition to protection, gangs offered the women a surrogate family. Over time in the gangs, however, the women found that their relationships often became abusive, and they were denied status or even membership in the gang. As long as women stayed in the gang, there were no outside sources of help sought in community-service or law-enforcement institutions, so they tended to become subservient and compliant within gang interactions in order to avoid abuse from the male gang members. Some of the women believed they deserved the abuse they suffered and that the degradation was a true reflection of their worth. Overall, the impact of gang life on women was to further isolate them from nurturing and positive relationships until the barriers to leaving the gang became difficult to surmount. 61 references