YAYA: My Story of Hope
I was one of four children, but my parents were often gone so there was nobody to take care of me, my brothers and sister. When I was quite young, my father passed away suddenly, and as a child, I lacked love and companionship.
When I was 24, I was introduced to a man. At first he and his mother were really nice to me. They treated me so well, and it really touched me. After a while, my boyfriend started beating me whenever he was unhappy. He would beat me and throw me against the wall. Because I didn’t understand love, I thought that he beat me because he loved me and didn’t want me to leave. Even after we had a child together, he still beat me. Eventually I could no longer bear the abuse, so I ran away and never went back. Once I left him, I had no place to go, so somebody introduced me to a massage shop.