Life after trauma: helping women to rebuild their lives in the DRC

Ruth’s story* is not an easy one to listen to. She was in the bush to look for food for her family when she was approached by a soldier – a very young man – who asked her for food. She told him she could only offer him a little because her children hadn’t eaten for two days. The soldier’s response was to lead her to a place where his four friends were waiting. They made her take off her dress and lie on the floor. They then took turns to rape her.

“I couldn’t cry because I was afraid I would be killed,” she told me. Four hours after they left her, she was still bleeding heavily and didn’t have the strength to walk, but cried out for help until eventually people heard her and took her to a village where she could get treatment. As a result of the rape, Ruth became pregnant and has since had her baby, but hasn’t been able to talk to her community about what happened for fear of being judged.

What happened to Ruth is not unique. In the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), the civil war that began in 1998 and which still rages in the eastern part of the country, has been characterised by groups of militias that kill, rape, steal and torture. One 2011 study estimated that nearly two million women and girls in DRC have experienced rape; the victims range from tiny children to old women. The physical consequences include HIV infection, obstetric fistula (where a tear between the vagina and rectum or bladder can leave a woman incontinent) and pregnancy.

In 2011, I set up a charity, Hope and Health Vision, with two friends who had backgrounds in clinical and social psychology. We now have 15 employees, all of whom, like us, provide their services for free. The charity, which operates in both DRC and neighbouring Burundi, supports women and children traumatised by war. Our work with children includes providing a safe environment for orphaned and homeless children, offering them food, education, therapy and help with substance abuse. My own focus as a social worker has been helping women in the South Kivu province to cope with the aftermath of rape.

Women who have been raped don’t only suffer physical damage. Some victims, like Ruth, become pregnant and find it difficult to bond with the child, who is a constant reminder of the terrible thing that was done to them. We have seen some mothers treat children harshly, with devastating psychological consequences – some children are abandoned and forced into prostitution. Sometimes the children themselves are infected with HIV.

Many rape victims are shunned by their communities or abandoned by their husbands. One woman I saw, Grace, was at home one evening with her husband and three children, when two young men armed with guns broke into the house, tied up Grace’s husband and raped Grace in front of her family. A few weeks later, her husband threw her out. Grace went to a doctor, who told her she needed hospital treatment for her injuries, but she was afraid to go because she didn’t want her community to find out that she has been raped and stigmatise her.

Offering support to women who have been traumatised by rape isn’t easy – it takes a while to build up trust. When I studied for my degree in social work, I received some training in supporting victims of violence, but women suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder find it understandably hard to trust a man, because it can trigger memories of the rape.

Hope and Health Vision collaborates with a Catholic mission run by nuns, which provides shelter for rape victims. Before I start counselling a woman, the convent sisters talk to her to explain who I am and what the charity does. I can then begin to offer her support. Initially, women find it difficult to tell me what happened to them, but they gradually become more trusting after three or four sessions.

Most of what I offer is practical guidance – finding sources of funding to pay school fees for their children, helping them resolve some of their everyday problems, connecting them with community resources and referring them for medical treatment. As a charity, we can also provide financial help with food, medicine and clothing.

I also work closely with hospitals in the region, where Hope and Health Vision psychologists have trained nurses to provide individual and family therapy to rape victims. Where the woman has children, I intervene to help make sure they receive an education, particularly in basic literacy. Their school fees are paid for by donations from supporters of our charity.

It’s not an easy job. I walk or cycle miles, often through dangerous territory, to visit people who need help, and often spend a week or two weeks in a village, visiting different families and listening to their problems. But by working with other organisations, we are able to offer some women and children the hope of rebuilding their lives.

* Names have been changed

Lucio Kikuni qualified as a social worker from Hope Africa University in Burundi before co-founding the charity Hope and Health Vision.

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