A Tiny Ray of Hope

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....few months back, a girl whom I've known since my childhood talked to me about her life. She was so silent and reserved back then, but now-a-days she started being so naughty, feeling happy for small things and playing little pranks like all the innocent kids do in their childhood. When I asked her about this change, she said me, "I've lost all my childhood, and I miss it". I got curious and asked her the meaning of her statement. As they say that "only the people who lost something will know its value", she lost all her childhood innocence and all those beautiful immature things that we do in our childhood. She misses that, so she tries to be like a child and finds happiness in little things now.

Later she said that due to the experience of physical and sexual abuse twice in her childhood, she was damaged. She never spoke about it to anyone until last month, because she felt scared that no one believes her and felt that everyone blames her. She was afraid that her parents won't send her out that they will become protective and she loses her freedom, because she loves travelling and hates to be in one place. And she felt guilty, thinking that she has done something wrong and it was her mistake. She felt impure and she hated her body and also her self. She never spoke about this with her mother as she thought that it would hurt her mother. So she kept quiet all these years feeling all those darkest emotions...

She felt scared for no reason. She lived all her life in FEAR, not knowing of what. She constantly fought a battle with the enemy who doesn't even exist. She hated all the men. She never felt safe anywhere, not even in her own house, as that one of that childhood experience took place in her own house itself. She felt the anger and rage growing inside her on those people who abused her. But she did not know on whom to express it and she tried to suppress it. But she got irritated and more arrogant day by day. Everyone around her scolded for being arrogant, but no one ever asked her the reason behind her arrogance and irritability. All these pent up anger, rage, irritability, insecurities, feeling of unsafe, rejection, inferiority and more over FEAR made her try to end her life one day. But somehow she survived and after that her life changed. She became so strong that those experiences won't break her anymore. She got one thought in her mind that "no one is going to help me, I should get over it myself", and that thought made her face all those fear.

Then the main challenge she should face was to trust others. But then she got a friend in her life. He made her feel so comfortable, cared her and she felt so safe and felt like home with him. She didn't even let her father or brother to get so close with her before, she used to escape from everyone. She is thankful to her friend for igniting "A TINY RAY OF HOPE" in her life when she felt that her life is hopeless. All she was ever craving for was love, care, feeling of wanted and someone to listen to her. And she got all these from that best and special friend.

She had experienced colour discrimination and also gender discrimination in her home, so she felt rejected by her father and also by this society. All those prejudices and stereotypes about how a girl should be and the criteria of being beautiful made by our society damages many people. Everyone is beautiful in their own way. So it is we, who should make others feel alright. It is in our hands.

All our parents say that we should not trust strangers that we should be careful when we are out. Yeah I agree that they are being protective, but on the other hand they are filling our mind with fear, this is impacting on us negatively. We are afraid to trust anyone in our surrounding, not even in the place we spend most of our times. So my question to all is that what about this girl? What mistake has she done, that she had that brutal experience in her childhood? She was a sweet little innocent girl who knew nothing about the cruel intentions of people. She just trusted the person around her and they did this to her. From that day she lost trust on everyone. Even now it takes a lot of time for her to trust a person with whom she is with for many days. That FEAR persists in her till today. She experience shivering and trembling from that memory. As the quote says, "what is done cannot be undone", no one can change her past, and she learnt to live with it. But the memory of it still persists as there is no death to a memory.

Living in fear everyday and also not knowing what she is fearing of. This feels like a living hell. She had many dreams and all those dreams were crushed by those cruel people. But still she struggled alone, overcame all those fears and she didn't even show others what she went through. She always hid all those feelings behind a beautiful smile, so no one got to know about her suffering. She never spoke about this with anyone and kept quiet all these years, until she met that one person who gave her hope. She said all about her experiences to him. And now she is confident that it is not her mistake for what had happened to her. She stopped feeling guilty. So she talked to me about it so bravely when I asked her to.

But.....what if she had lost her life on that day? Who is to blame? I’ve seen many people saying that the people you go for suicide are all “cowards”. But when there is no hope in one's life, they will not find any meaning to live their life. So whose responsibility is it to give hope to these? There are numerous girls who is going through this kind of experience all around us. How do we, the society get to know that a girl who is with us all day is suffering? Many psychological disorders can be diagnosed or recognised by its signs and symptoms. But what about these people, they won't show any signs, symptoms and they won't even speak about this with anyone as they are scared of being cheated, misused or abandoned. They just go on suffering silently. Many a time when they lose hope in their life, they will end their life. And we, as a society give our own reasons for their deaths and judge them. It is a sad thing to say that this is the kind of society that we are living in. From this girl's story we can say that the trustworthy nature, caring for others and the good behaviour of one person can change the lives of many people. It gives hope to their life. We can be that one person in many of the lives around us. And these silently suffering people are all over the world.......

Chethana R Acharya

III BA ( PSE)

Kateel  Ashok Pai Memorial Institute, Shivamogga