Diana, victim of sexist violence: “The best way to help battered women is not to judge”

She recently left the Center for the Care, Recovery and Reintegration of Battered Women where she has been for a year and a half. Diana is Colombian and has lived in Spain since 2019 with her almost six-year-old daughter Dana. In her country she suffered psychological and physical violence from her couple but was not aware that he mistreated her Neither Diana nor her almost six-year-old daughter Dana already live in La Casa. Now they can go out to dinner when they want, stay up later and enjoy their freedom. But without La Casa, as they call the Center for Attention, Recovery and Reintegration of Battered Women where they have lived, that freedom would not exist, because that is where Diana learned to love herself and understand that no one has the right to beat her physically or emotionally. The story that this 33-year-old Colombian tells hurts. Listening to her, you understand that many other women are going through the same thing she went through and may not even know at first that they are being mistreated. In her case, Diana dares to explain it because she feels strong, her abuser is far away and, thanks to her support, she has learned to live and love herself again, but not all of them succeed. On the same day that Diana tells us her story, three women have died victims of sexist violence. There are already 1,161 women killed for this cause since 2003. So far in 2022, 31 have been murdered. “Now I feel good, I feel that when I entered the center I did the best for my daughter. At first I did not want to but it It was the best thing that could have happened to us, thanks to them I have obtained custody of Dana and now I have her parental authority,” she says proudly. For a year and a half, mother and daughter have lived in La Casa together with 24 other women victims of abuse. She there she has received psychological assistance and legal support. And what is just as important, she has learned to face her story without shame. Thus, she can tell us that she was able to escape the surrounding circle of abuse thanks to some small-time extortionists. They were the ones who gave her the push she needed to leave Colombia. She overwhelmed because they asked her for money in exchange for not destroying her small “nail salon” and fled to Spain. And thanks to that flight, she also escaped from her daughter’s father and from his psychological and physical abuse. “It seemed normal to me that my partner told me that I was worth nothing, that he insulted me, despised me or hit me. I deserved it for not doing things right, he says. According to the Government Delegation for Gender Violence , those contempt and intrusive gestures that Diana recounts, such as “he controlled her mobile, that he humiliated her in front of others or that he ridiculed her”, are the first sign of sexist violence. As happens to many of the battered women, the problem of Diana came from the roots. She grew up seeing her mother’s face full of bruises, hearing screams at home and thinking that men have the right to hit. “My mom was not only hit by my dad, but also by another partner he had,” she says. A situation that reduced his ability to and reaction. “I was brought up saying that you have to put up with it, that love can do anything, that you have to be a good woman and not complain, that you couldn’t face your man because that was provoking him,” she says. That is why she was not aware of what was happening to her until a beating almost made her lose her baby. First psychological abuse, then physical “He hit me because of some coins. I had helped him pay some debts and there was a little left over that I kept. Then he hit me. He threw me to the ground and kicked me,” she says. As a result of those blows, she suffered a herniated disc, several bruises and for the first time she began to feel fear, the beating occurred while she was pregnant and Diana feared losing the baby. “I had been suffering psychological violence for a long time, but one does not see that. It seemed normal to me that he did not take me anywhere because he said that he was ashamed to be seen with him, that he told me that my ass was down, that I was very short. I normalized that he despised me. That didn’t seem like abuse to me, but when he hit me when I was pregnant, it did. So I left the apartment. What happened is that he started looking for me, he made me believe that everything was going well and I went back to him, until again everything started. She was dependent, she couldn’t leave him, it was like a carousel”, she explains. Luckily for her, extortion from her business came and, the fear of being beaten by criminals, pushed her to leave her country, just before the pandemic started. “When I arrived in Spain at the end of 2019, I thought that I was not worthy of anyone, that I was worthless. I kept in touch with him by phone, I called my daughter who was two and a half years old at the time, they talked by video call. But The coronavirus pandemic arrived and I could not return. Trying to fix my papers, a lawyer made me understand that I had a history of abuse behind me, “he says. In this way she entered the Center for Attention, Recovery and Reintegration of Battered Women (CARRMM) and the veil that prevented her from seeing her situation fell. She did not understand what the others were complaining about”At the beginning in the group therapy sessions It seemed to me that they all told stories that were not violence. If someone said that a liter bottle had been thrown at their feet with force, it seemed silly to me. I did not understand what they were complaining about, “he says. But then one of the girls left the center early and her partner almost killed her, that’s when Diana began to understand the importance of physical and psychological abuse. And her recovery began. “Telling about it is already a big step. At first you don’t see it or you’re ashamed. The psychologist has helped me a lot. It’s important that they listen to you and explain what’s happening to you”, that’s why Diana is clear that there is What to do to help other women victims of gender violence: “The best way to help an abused woman is not to judge her but to be there, tell her that you believe her and accompany her, so that if one day she decides she dares to call you”, concludes. They knew how to accompany her in the process and that may have saved her life.