The story of Charline is one of nineteen stories collected by Grace Kagoyire and Annemiek Richters. The collection will be published in 2013 in a book under the title “Stories about death and rebirth: Life experiences of Rwandan female genocide survivors”; first in Kinyarwanda for distribution within Rwanda and subsequently in English. The English version will be supplemented by short chapters with analysis of the various themes that feature in the stories. A prepublication of a second story can be found on www.annemiekrichters.nl/rwanda. This website gives more information about the program of sociotherapy that hosted the story project.

Through the 16 Days, we have often commented on the unceasing work of activists, women’s human rights defenders, and community leaders in terms of their bravery and leadership. But what we also would like to emphasize is that these are not the only roles in which women exhibit bravery. The act of coming forward, testifying, providing these stories that we have shared through the last two weeks, and healing – coming forth for rehabilitation and reconnection with others can in fact be the bravest act for women, who often must fight deep personal and social shame as victims of violence, particularly sexual violence.

With that in mind, we would like to share the story of Charline, who was a victim of violence and sexual torture during the genocide in Rwanda. After years of ongoing gender violence and suffering, Charline joined a sociotherapy group, where she felt a change come over her whole self. Read her story of bravery, perseverance and the radical act of healing.

For fifteen years I was tortured by the man who raped me during the genocide, and then forced me to be his wife and continued to violate me. It felt like prison. After I separated from him, my wits came back to me. Before, I was always depressed, living in fear and grief. I always had headaches and nightmares. Now I have peace in my heart.

I am Charline. I was born in 1976 in the Nyarugunga sector in Kicukiro District. My parents were farmers. I lived with them up to April 1994. We were neither rich nor poor. I was born in a family of nine children, four boys and five girls. Five siblings and both my parents died during the genocide. Four of us escaped. I did not get a chance to marry a man I loved, because I was taken by force in 1994 by a neighbour who raped and married me. I live with the three children I conceived with this man.

The genocide mayhem spread everywhere. When it began, my whole family left our house in order to look for a place to hide. My sister-in-law and I went to hide at the home of our Hutu neighbour, who was a member of a Pentecostal church and was known as a reborn Christian. We spent two nights there.

On the third day, we went to a nearby primary school, thinking that it would be a safe place. We spent two days there while the war violence increased. Men who were with us advised us to look for another place to hide because things were getting worse. Since we had nowhere else to go, we took refuge in a nearby swamp where, after four days, a club of Interahamwe (1) found us hiding there.

One of those Interahamwe took me to his parents’ house. He lied to me, saying that he was going to hide me. I spent the night in that house and started to trust him. After two days, however, he began to rape me. He told me that the genocide would continue and that I should become his wife. I refused sexual intercourse with him. I continued begging him to leave me alone, wanting to go back to the swamp. He terrorised me and told me that if I would go back, he would kill me. I was afraid. The situation outside was bad. I stayed with him because I had no choice.

It was very hard to be raped and survive. No one supported me during the genocide. A man who should have helped me violated me instead.

During the fifteen years that I lived with this rapist, he terrorised me. I could not speak with him about the way my family was killed or about the death of my siblings. At each period of commemoration, I went to bed and cried until the end of the period. What was most painful is that when he found me crying he liked to tell me, “It is of no importance that Tutsis were killed.” Throughout my whole life with him I was always afraid. I never felt happiness. Since the day he took me from the swamp, I expected him to kill me. During the memorial period (2) he insulted me, as if I had no right to cry.

It was not only him who discriminated me. Everyone stigmatized me. Survivors could not talk to me. One survivor told me uwawe akuvira utamwikoreye (a dear one bleeds on you even when you are not carrying him/her). This means that my suffering was visible through the sadness on my face and it also was saddening those who observed me. Hutus used to tell my perpetrator that it was his own fault that he lived in poverty, because he married a Tutsi woman who was not able to cultivate.

Even though my sister told me to leave the rapist, I did not do it because I did not want to become a burden to anyone. On the other side, the family of this man also disliked me. As people stigmatised me, I was afraid of attending the survivors meetings because I also stigmatised myself. I felt as though I was in jail.

In 2009, this man started to behave even worse to me because I refused to sell a plot of land that had belonged to my parents. After this he said that because we were very poor, he was going to marry a rich woman. The situation was aggravated by the death of one of our four children. In 2010 the child fell sick and was hospitalised. The man refused to pay the hospital fees. During the week I spent in the hospital, he did not come to visit me. After the death of my child, it was my sister who paid the hospital. Coming home, when it was time to bury the dead body of my son, his father did not want him to be buried in what he considered to be ‘his’ plot of land, while in reality I owned half of it. He wanted to sell the whole plot in order to marry a rich woman. He told me that if I would bury the child in his land, he would kill me just like another man from our neighbourhood who had killed his wife. After I refused to bury the child in the ruins of my parents’ house, I separated from this man. My sister started to rent a house for me.

Throughout this whole period, I suffered from psychological problems. I was living in isolation, always crying. I would say that I was like a brainless person (3). A time came where I felt hate towards myself and towards everything else. I stopped going to church. I was depressed, living in fear and grief. I had always headaches and nightmares. I experienced ihahamuka (4), especially during the commemoration period. My life during this period was just crying. I was always falling ill in April. I could spend three whole days in tears. I was always quiet. I only went to commemorate once, in 2006, when we buried the remains of my brother who I loved so much, and who died at the last minute of the genocide.

Even though I was suffering, I did not go to the hospital. I was always at home. I regained my wits after my separation from that man and after I started to join other women and collaborate with them. I was no longer in that man’s prison. The separation somehow reduced the sadness and other problems I had. I had my rights back, the ones I had been deprived of for 15 years. Before, I was not even allowed to benefit from survivor supports. I was told that I was not a survivor. Now separated, I am supported like other vulnerable survivors. Today I have mutual health insurance from FARG (5), and I am on the list for direct support. I did not benefit from any counselling because I was not informed about which organisations provided counselling.

Through the grace of God, one woman who was my neighbour came to me. This woman, who later became a friend of mine, had completed fifteen weeks of sociotherapy (6). Because she had stayed near me while I was going through difficult times, I became open to her. She would advise me when I had problems. She became like my mother. I told her everything because she listened to me. After speaking about all my sorrows my heart was released. The deep thoughts I had about my life reduced. Before I spoke to her, I was always thinking about the rape I experienced and living in loneliness.

In 2011, I was invited by another female neighbour to join sociotherapy. Even though I accepted her invitation I could not see any interest in going to the meeting place every week. During the first four weeks I was wondering why I would go there all the way just for crying. Once, one of our facilitators explained to us the importance of crying. I learned that when you cry, you feel your heart being released. After understanding the significance of crying, I continued to participate. After four weeks I started to like sociotherapy. Another thing that motivated me was the game we played all together. That game showed us how a person can live in isolation, and how she can get out of it. After this game, which helped me so much, I decided not to miss any sociotherapy session. When my neighbour first invited me, I had expected to be supported through income generating activities. But I was not disappointed after realizing that my expectations were different from the aim of sociotherapy. I realised that the discussions we had within the group were important to me.

Before joining sociotherapy, I was always thinking about myself. I was always angry, and I was full of grudges. I also felt that I wanted to live alone. Surprisingly, while I was following sociotherapy, I felt changes in my whole body. The anger, thinking deeply about myself, all these symptoms disappeared. The loneliness has gone. I am no longer crying whenever as I was doing before. Another problem which has gone is the hate towards Hutus. During the fifteen years that I lived with the rapist, I had built a kind of hatred in my heart because of his wickedness towards me. The discussions we had in sociotherapy changed me. They taught me to live peacefully with others. I learned that if people sinned against me, I have to forgive them. This lesson brought peace in my heart. Being angry and bearing this hatred were gradually killing me while they, the sinners, were sleeping. I felt that I have to forgive my enemy, because forgiving brings peace in a broken heart. Since I graduated from sociotherapy, I committed myself to do whatever I can in order to live peacefully with others in the future. And then, I have a dream of having a house. After getting a house, I will work, and then develop myself further.

Although I am appreciative of sociotherapy, I do not know whether my family’s slaughterers are still alive. They were in prison; but they were released after they confessed. They confessed in prison, and later also in Gacaca (7). That is how we learnt about the death of our mother. They told that they killed my mother when she went to fetch drinking water and then threw stones at her until she died. After they confessed, I did not see them again. I did not testify against the rapist, afraid of being called a mad woman by the public. Because although my heart was full of grief and tears, neighbours knew that I was his wife. Gacaca is almost over by now. Those who looted our properties and those who destroyed our house paid our brother back. But the rapist is still walking around freely. What could I do?

Before I finish my story of change, I would advise other women who have been taken by force by a rapist to leave him if they experienced problems similar to mine. I liked that sociotherapy brought me together with other women and that it allowed me to trust myself and others again. Before I joined, I was like a small animal. When someone tried to do anything bad to me, I was reproducing this bad thing twice in return. I have changed, now, and I love other people. I had forgotten to smile like others, but, I am now a changed person and I am looking towards the future.

1. A Hutu paramilitary organisation
2. Each year in April the genocide is remembered nationwide through a range of events
3. Charline is refering to brainlessness due to a congenital disorder
4. A Kinyarwanda concept for a local form of somatic panic attacks
5. National fund for the assistance of genocide survivors
6. See for information about sociotherapy in Rwanda: http://www.annemiekrichters.nl/rwanda
7. Gacaca refers to community courts that have been the centerpiece of Rwanda’s justice and reconciliation programme