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"