INTRO PROPOSAL

The numbers are chilling. According to the World Health Organization, one in five girls is sexually abused, one in 12 boys. Switzerland has not been spared, even though there are no precise statistics on incest and domestic sexual abuse. In the hope of one day shaking one of our society's greatest taboos, the word continues to be freed. Testifying publicly to overturn the camp of shame is what Nicole and Joséphine have chosen. Beware of the harshness of certain remarks, which may offend sensitivities.

HAT

It is in nature that Nicole finds her peace. For years, an inner evil has been eating away at her. At the age of 48, she finally decided to break the taboo of incest and put words to the abuse she suffered as a child.

"This memory just starts in the shower where I'm in the shower in our house and I must be nine years old. I see every pane of glass and hear my father's voice calling me.

And he calls me. And he asks me to join him in his bed. I don't want to go there and it doesn't feel right. He insists a little, telling me that I must be cold and that I must not stay. I'm naked, I must be cold. And he opens his bed for me, the sleeping bag, the blankets and he tells me that I have to sit right next to him because I must be cold. And at that moment, I feel the touch of his skin against mine. And then it cuts. »

00.01.34 - TITLE

Nicole discovered this past that she knew nothing about only 4 years ago, after 35 years of forgetting. She knows very well that if this famous memory stops abruptly, it is because her memory wants to protect her. However, remembering everything would have helped her a lot to reclaim her experience.

00.02.08 Nicole, 48 years old

"It was very difficult to understand what happened. It was very difficult to be angry at my father, because I was only guilty, ashamed... It took me a very long time to feel legitimate in what I had been through and to understand that, even if I was missing bits and pieces, I still had the right to, it was still something serious, that happened. »

For the past 2 years, Nicole has been followed by a psychologist specialized in supporting victims of sexual abuse.

Today, even if her parents continue to deny the facts, Nicole no longer has any doubts about what she experienced as a child because this past sheds light on her entire history.

"Sometimes I felt like I was going to die because I was so sick and I felt empty. Well, it was a terrible feeling, but I didn't know where it came from and I don't connect it at all with any part of my childhood. »

"But when you connect to what you were saying before I made that choice, now for me, I choose myself. Like this symbolic step. How do you feel when you connect to that? »

Like Nicole, many abused children have their brains shut down at the time of the assault. This survival mechanism kicks in to protect them and propels them into a state of stupefaction. In the jargon, this is called traumatic memory.

03.56 Caroline Durgnat, Psychologist, Espas Association

 "This memory, unlike biographical memory, is not linear with a chronology, but there can be gaps, bits and pieces that are missing. I like to use the image of the bomb going off. And then you end up with this scene where there are a lot of songs, but also things that have been merged. And then the work is going to be to put back together what has been separated or to separate what has been merged in the process actually. »

Coming out of silence and saying the unspeakable is also Josephine's choice.

Leaving France to settle in Geneva about ten years ago, the young thirty-year-old tells her story with words are raw, words that hurt sensibilities but that testify to the horror experienced throughout her childhood.

04.55 Josephine, 35 years old

"I even know where to start. But there's everything, actually. That is to say, he took pictures, he asked my sister and I to do things between us. He put his hands inside my body, he put his penis in my mouth, in my vagina. »

"In fact, with every memory that comes back, there are, there are all the sensations, all the emotions, all the thoughts, the smells, the noises that come back and the pain in fact, that comes back with it. That is to say that the very first memory I have, I taste like my father's in my mouth and I hear him on the right side telling me uh, you can swallow, it can be eaten something like that. And the second big memory I have is just horrible pain. I was bent in half and I was actually screaming. »

Today, thanks to multiple therapies, the young doctor of psychology is finding a certain serenity.

But every time she goes back to the family albums, it's always the same anger and incomprehension.

"That's where it all happened"

"That's me and my mother"

"This is the bathroom where I have most of my memories"

"That's the famous sofa where.......the famous sofa where I have the most painful memory."

"It's not just a small injustice, it's a crime that's unspeakable actually. Until now, I don't understand what's going on in a person's head to make them think, oh, well, this little girl, she's cute. No, well, you don't touch a child, it's as simple as that. »

Josephine's father passed away more than 10 years ago. But she still decided to file a complaint against him and his mother for complicity with the French authorities. The procedure is currently ongoing.

Reading of the proceedings

"All of a sudden it was written, it's square, that's it. That is to say, the words to describe what happened to me, that's it. And so that was really the first big relief. Because, on top of that, all the memories I'd been keeping for years, they were all condensed in, in about ten pages anyway. But all that we know about it, all that and I don't need to hold them back, hold them back, hold them back."

In recent years, public testimonies have multiplied. They encourage more and more victims to dare to break the code of silence and denounce the devastating effects of incest.

In Lausanne, the Espas association, which specialises in supporting victims of sexual abuse, had to expand in 2019 to cope with the increase in consultations. Since then, it has strengthened its teams and offers discussion groups several times a week.

That evening, Félicie and Nathalie are getting ready to welcome a group specifically for teenage girls... A confidential space that allows young people to get out of isolation as soon as possible.

09:25 Félicie Corminboeuf, Psychologist, Espas Association

"When it comes to sexual abuse within the family, we can say that this loneliness is omnipresent. In fact, if we imagine, for example, a child who has been sexually abused within the family, he will be extremely afraid to reveal the facts, for fear of breaking the whole family system, which reduces him enormously to silence, and then puts him in a very significant isolation. »

10:02 Nathalie Mardelle, Psycho-social worker, Association Espas

"The people who participate in the group, the fact that they can have this sharing, they also say that they feel much more understood and legitimate to talk about it. And they also name the fact of being able to come in this style of structure allowed them to abolish the silence that actually inhabits them. »

For years, Nicole has been embroiled in a devastating conflict of loyalty to her family, especially since her parents are past 80 years old.

To finally put an end to their relationship, she chose to write them a letter, a letter she has been preparing for almost four months.

"Maybe it's not a farewell, but in any case a goodbye to a page that is turning for me with, with the certainty that at least for the moment, I can't be in touch with them, with my parents in any case.

I really wanted to be neither angry, nor revengeful, nor in justification, but simply explaining what the facts are.

"Where you would probably like me not to tell anyone about my memories and to go for a coffee together with Dad as you suggested to me when we last met in Lausanne, I need to talk about my story. I need to say that my father sexually abused me and that other inappropriate sexual acts took place in my life and between the ages of about nine and twelve. I need to explain that yes, we can forget when it's too hard and too incomprehensible for a child to realize what's going on. I also need to explain to all the people who are interested in how difficult it is not to be believed by your own parent, by your own mother. »

We would have liked to speak with Nicole's parents, but they never answered our calls.

For her, it is now time to turn the page once and for all.

"Now that I understand why it's been complicated and where it's coming from, it's like I've been given a second chance at life. And I intend to do something with it and now give myself the opportunity to build myself differently on, on a different basis, but with full knowledge of what has been the basis of my life. »

At the Plainpalais community hall, it was also an important moment for Joséphine. The stage that awaits him will allow him to distance himself even more from his past and the France of his childhood.

On that day, she was invited along with 300 other future Swiss citizens to formalize her naturalization.

In front of the Geneva authorities, she is preparing to take the oath of office.

For Josephine, this ceremony is highly symbolic. She will remain forever engraved in her memory, because for her this new nationality is almost a new identity.

"It's not a new chapter, it's a new book and now we're writing the first lines and I'm super happy, plus my partner and my best friend are here, it's incredible"