Kathlyn Eyitemi was sexually assaulted at the age of four, endured
physical and verbal abuse from her dad and was raped few months to her
wedding. Her mother commited suicide when she was still a child.
She was
engulfed in self denial and condemnation and was silent about it for
years till she got healed.
Today, she is the president of Sisters
Interact Network, an interactive NGO for hurting women, providing
emotional healing to victims of rape and abuse.
She shares her story in
this interview with Women of Rubies!
This is my story!
My story began at age four when I found myself in an abusive
situation while I was living with my grandmother in the village. I
cannot say for sure when the abuse started but by age four I could
identify that my older cousin was having sex with me in my grandmother’s
house.
At age five, I moved on to begin living with my father in port
Harcourt and he turned out to be verbally and physically abusive. I
endured verbal and physical abuse till I was in my mid twenties.
Raped few months to my wedding
While I was a student in the university, a few months to my wedding,
armed robbers burst into my room at night. They yanked part off part of
my hair off my scalp, beat me mercilessly and and two of them raped me.
I momentarily lost my mind and stayed numb for a long time. In the
morning I went to the hospital to get help.My fiance was understanding
when I called him to tell him. He immediately came to pick me from
school.Haunted by the memory and the pain, I lost confidence in myself
and lived in fear for a long time.
Six years later, I found healing in God. And when social media came I
figured I needed to create a platform where women could open up and
talk about their pain and their issues and they could seek help as well.
I also wanted to Provide an opportunity to reach teenagers and make
counseling available to them because as a teenager I was in a lot of
pain and confusion.
Breaking the silence
I decided to break the silence on my rape experience about five years
after the incidence when it dawned on me that several women had been
through the same ordeal but they couldnt talk about it for fear of being
singled out and stigmatised. They were just hurting in secret.
I knew if i spoke out, it would help many of these hurting women
because then, they would know that it happens to other everyday women.
When I founded Sisters Interact Group on Facebook five years ago, I
wanted it to be like a therapeutic space where women could frankly speak
out about their deepest hurts. At the time I was hurting so badly from
all the pain I had been through. I hadn’t gotten over the shock of my
mother commiting suicide when I was just fifteen. I had been verbally
and physically battered in the home where I grew up with my dad and step
mum. I just finally wanted to let out my pain but I wanted it to be
rewarding. I wanted someone to glean something right from it and find
succor from knowing that we could pray for each other and be there for
each other.Quite a number of women began to send me private messages
about their rape episodes. Sometimes I met with these women I would pray
with them and counsel them.Then I noticed that they felt better and
they became more open when I told them that I had been a rape victim
myself. And some of them were even horrified by the circumstances of my
incidence. I figured I would impact more women if I just told them my
story on the group wall so everyone could read. When I did that, the
responses were just amazing. Those who had been rape victims began to
talk and others were just so supportive.
From being a rape victim to being a survivor
It was hard to get over the humiliation and the pain. The feeling of
being violated had lingered for years. Many times I felt dirty and
worthless. there were times I blamed myself for being in the wrong place
at the wrong time. The guilt always surrendered to anger
Because absolution never came. I never felt free of the need to want
some kind of revenge. I felt like I would kill my attackers if I ever
had the opportunity. But God began to do a work in me a few years after
the experience. I listened to a lot of messages on finding freedom and
what it really meant to let go. I got encouraged when I heard Joyce
Meyer’s story about being sexually molested as a child. Paula White’s
story about loosing her mind gave me hope that in spite of the
psychological trauma I was going through, I could find peace and even be
useful to God and humanity too. I listened to a lot of T.D Jakes
messages and read his books. Truly after about two years of word
therapy, I let go of the guilt.
Engulfed by self -condemnation
Stigma? Not quite but the self condemnation i felt was worse than
any label that anyone could have put on me. I hated myself so much. I
felt suicidal. One reason why i didnt take my life was because i kept
telling myself that i didnt want to end up like my mum. I didnt think it
was right for me to take my own life. It just didnt feel right. But i
really didnt feel like i had much to live for. I was by myself a lot.
After I got raped. When the incidence happened, in the morning neighbors
who knew robbers had attacked me came in and they sensed that I had
been violated so they asked me, “did they rape you? I said “no they
didn’t”. I felt so ashamed. And I felt like they were not the people I
could tell stuff like that to. When i went home from school, I spoke to
my sisters about it. But they had no words for me. They just starred at
me in shock. And that made me feel like I ought to shut up about it.
Although my fiance at the time who is my husband now was very
supportive. He just stayed and made me feel like I could pull through
it.
Bishop TD Jakes Impact
The person who has impacted me the most in this my journey is Bishop
T.D Jakes. He has a word for hurting women like no other preacher does
in this time. I feel power flow through my veins just hearing him
articulate the sermons that are crafted by the Holy Spirit for hurting
women.
The Next Generation Project
The inspiration for the Next Generation Project came shortly after I
left secondary school. I was a young adult then. I started thinking to
myself that there are a lot of teenage girls who may have been subjected
to abuse the way I had. Because for me as a teenager in secondary
school, my self esteem was very fragile. One thing that really affected
me was my inability to relate with the fact that I had lost my
virginity. I didn’t know when I lost it, didn’t have the power to make
that choice, someone had ripped that power of choice from me. I often
wondered at the possibility of my being a virgin when someone had
obviously broken my hymen long before I was five years old. So when
girls talked about their virginity and stuff like that, I felt
uncomfortable and confused and tongue tied. The worst part was if they
asked me if I was a virgin. I felt really tormented by the memories from
childhood about the episodes of me being molested. I never told my mum
about it before she died. SoI just really wanted to go back and help
teenage girls who probably had experiences like mine or maybe worse
experiences. When I founded Sisters Interact Network, I used that
platform to float the Next Generation Project
Giving up
Yes. Absolutely. You know every vision will be tested by the firewood
of life and my vision has been tested on many fronts. I deal with
women. My business is women and women are very complex and delicate
people to manage. So there are all kinds of discouragement coming from
them. The same people you set out to help betray you and hurt you so
bad. I think its part of life because in the end they are still human
too and like most humans their weaknesses can become venomous. But in
all, I love these women because inspite of some bad episodes, the
majority of them have been my biggest support and inspiration. Of course
there have also been monetary challenges too because I didn’t start out
with sponsorship, we have funded our programs from our personal pockets
through the years and it can be quite challenging when you see the pile
of bills to pay and you just don’t know how you will pull through. Then
you ask yourself “Abeg who send me this work?”. God has faithfully kept
me steadfast on the vision over the years.
Greatest Reward
My greatest reward is seeing the faces of the girls that we are able
to reach through the Next Generation Project and our Eve Care Programs.
Sometimes women cry in my arms. They spill out all the bottled pain and i
just hold them close and let them cry rivers. Its part of the healing
process for them. When we go for teenage counseling in secondary schools
and higher institutions,hearing their stories of incest, rape and
domestic abuse, I know we did the right thing by embarking on the
project. Apart from providing toiletries and school materials for these
girls, One of the things we do in is to provide medical care for girls
infected with STDs. Because these girls don’t speak out when they get
infected for fear of being stigmatized and being labelled as prostitutes
by their wards and parents. Some of them even find it difficult to open
up to doctors but we tell them its more important to speak up and get
help than grow up in silence and be saddled with infertility issues
because of untreated STDs. You know the girls call me and all the other
volunteer counselors a lot.
The lifeline
The advise I have for rape victims is to first of all, get medical
help, seeking counseling and talking to people who can help you.
Bottling everything up causes more psychological damage. Because the
more the incidence keeps playing out in your mind, the more insane you
become with pain and anger. But talking to someone lets off steam and if
you get professional and godly counseling, you get clarity about what
has happened to you and you are better equipped to deal with it through
therapy. I also think society should be more open and sincere about
dealing with the menace of rape.
Why I am a woman of rubies
I would say I am a woman of rubies because I have been cut out of
difficult circumstances and in the end I have emerged stronger like fine
stone. What the devil meant for evil, God has turned it around for
good and he is using me as a battle axe against the forces of evil
today. My story has become an inspiration to hurting women. So they say,
“If Kathlyn can come out of this mess and be used by God, then I too
can make it”.
Read more inspiring stories on Women of Rubies!