Mereja.Forum

I was only 8 years old, when my father sent my older sister to the bush to collect firewood, and gave money to my younger sister to go buy some candies, leaving only me and my father at home, both alone. Then he locked the door and molested me. I tried fighting back, but my 8 year old body was no match to his. In order to keep me quiet, he threatened to kill me if I told my mother about what he did to me.

My father repeatedly raped me for the next 3 years.

I was in second grade when my mother died from HIV Aids. At this point I mustered the courage to escape and sought refuge at my older brother's home, who noticed that I was ill and offered to take me seek medical attention. But I was too afraid to tell my brother about what our father did to me, so I refused to go to the Hospital.

But as my condition worsened, I asked my brother to take me see a doctor right away.

At the Hospital, I tested positive for the HIV Aids virus, and I decided to tell my brother that our father had been molesting me for 3 long years. My own mother died after contracting the HIV aids virus from my father, and I realized that my fate was going to be the same as well.

It gets worse.

While I was staying with my older brother, one day he brought home a neighborhood boy with HIV aids and ordered me to sleep with him so I can give him children.

When both of my parents died, my aunt took me to her home in a rural village to raise me. At a very young age, I was helping my aunt with collecting firewood and doing household chores.

One day, her son (my cousin) returned home from working in Saudi Arabia and asked my aunt if he can take me with him to Mekelle to work at a bar he was planning to open.

In the back of the bar there was another room that had a single bed. My cousin warned me not to refuse customers that offer to buy me a drink, or take me to the backroom to sleep with them, saying that it was "good for his business."

Up until that point I didn't know my own cousin brought me to Mekelle to work as a prostitute. And since I was very young I kept refusing the customers' sexual advances and decided to escape by going back to my aunt's village.

It was during my daring escape attempt that two of my cousin's customers kidnapped me, took me to a wooded area and gang raped me. I was bleeding and lost consciousness as they left me for dead. Hours later, a passerby who saw me laying in a pool of blood alerted the police and they took me to the nearest clinic where I received medical care.

The whole experience has left me traumatized for life, and I don't know if I could ever trust anyone again.