Reclaiming Self-Worth: How one Colombian girl realized her trauma wasn’t a life sentence
Picture yourself at 22 years old. Health and youth are at their prime. The world is your oyster.
At 22, Ivana* felt the opposite. She limped through an uninspiring job each day. She had no friends. She felt out of touch with what she enjoyed, but it didn’t seem she cared.
Life is just full of difficulties and lots of pain, she would say.
How did it get this way?
At age 6, Ivana experienced a broken sense of home and connection. Her parents were abusive and ultimately separated from her and her four siblings. Overnight, Ivana entered Colombia’s child welfare system.
Experiencing abuse at such a young age is traumatic enough. But new traumas kept piling up.
That’s because living in Colombia’s under-resourced welfare system brought new challenges. Ivana was:
Torn from her other siblings. Ivana and her older brother decided they’d rather stay in Colombia, and near their mother, than be adopted. Causing them to age out of the system while their two younger brothers were adopted into another family.
Never in one institution for long. Ivana lived in four different places throughout the rest of her childhood. Few adults took the time to hear her story meaningfully.
Plagued by a nagging guilt. Ivana held onto a heavy sense of responsibility for the wellbeing of her mother, even though she’d never live with her again. This guilt is quite common for Colombian children in the welfare system.
Nearly her entire life, Ivana never knew a sense of home. Let that sink in.
More than 70,000 children in Colombia’s welfare system also struggle with a sense of home.
Like Ivana, about two out of three children in Colombian institutions are over the age of 12 and have no viable path to permanency. That means that they do not have access to their family and are not allowed to live with relatives.
Ivana became so weary of institutions. They didn’t always have her best in mind.
Ivana had also lost sight of what her ‘best’ actually was.
In her 22 years, she hadn’t been given much of a chance to explore her own identity or the heart of her story. Ivana’s psychologist was responsible not just for her, but for more than 50 children at once. And once she moved to a new place, she had to re-open her story with another professional.
This left Ivana totally stuck in her past pain.
What she needed: trauma-informed caretakers who stayed committed to showing up for her until she felt seen, valued, and supported. She needed people around her who believed that trauma is not a life sentence.
The AGCI & Tim Tebow Foundation House of Hope in Colombia exists for young women exactly like Ivana who ‘aged out’ of the welfare system. Staff here believed her story could still brim over with life and love.
Ivana could be a 22-year-old woman who still thrives.
During her stay at the House of Hope, Ivana got a chance to express herself freely and be heard without judgement. I don’t want to be in relationships because they’ll always hurt me, she confided. But as she developed healthy bonds with others at the House of Hope, she started to wonder… maybe she was worth getting to know.
After initial apathy, Ivana took up school again and completed her technical studies!
“I feel happy today,” she shared. “The House of Hope made me a brave, confident woman. A fighter. I am leaving grateful for the unconditional support given to me each day leading up to now.”
Her new career path launched her into a passion area (wait for it): childhood and mental health. She found a new job as an educator for girls in a psychosocial institution. It’s a role she wants to wake up for every day.
Ivana discovered her worth, and now she’s a healed person healing others.
And the little girls she works with? They adore her.
Ivana’s life changed forever because of trauma disruptors. What if you could disrupt trauma, too?
You’ve joined the heal, and it’s an amazing path. Thanks for being part of the Trauma Disruptor Coalition. Stay in touch!
*Name changed to protect privacy.