Latest / The Trauma Therapist / I Didn’t Know Who I Was with Francesca Raoelison
Transcript
- 0:00Speaker 1: Welcome to the Trauma River's podcast. My name is Guymiferson,
- 0:03Speaker 1: and I interview incredible people who share the story of
- 0:07Speaker 1: how trauma has shaped their lives. And a big thank
- 0:10Speaker 1: you for sponsoring today's episode goes to my guest and
- 0:13Speaker 1: our sponsors. So five, four, three, two and one, our folks,
- 0:24Speaker 1: welcome back to the podcast. Very excited to have as
- 0:26Speaker 1: my guest today. Francisca Ravel Listen. Francesca welcome.
- 0:31Speaker 2: Thank you so much, Guy, you are welcome.
- 0:34Speaker 1: Francisca has spoken at Brown University, Harvard Princeton, UNISEF, the
- 0:38Speaker 1: Preventing Child Abuse in America Conference, and the Clinton Global
- 0:42Speaker 1: Initiative addressing the global crisis of emotional trauma among youth.
- 0:48Speaker 1: She is a founder of AMINA, survivor led movement dedicated
- 0:51Speaker 1: to educating and mobilizing young people to identify an end
- 0:55Speaker 1: emotional abuse. Active in thirteen countries with three hundred fifteen
- 1:00Speaker 1: educators and ambassadors, OMINA has reached more than one point
- 1:04Speaker 1: five million people through online campaigns. As Malagasci Survivor herself,
- 1:08Speaker 1: Francesca brings a powerful perspective on breaking cycles. A venture
- 1:12Speaker 1: generational trauma, beginning in her home country of Madagascar.
- 1:18Speaker 2: Damn girl, I didn't know you had that intro with you.
- 1:22Speaker 1: I was like you kind of going on, Francisca before
- 1:28Speaker 1: we could go in here, share with the listeners where
- 1:29Speaker 1: you're from originally, where you are currently.
- 1:32Speaker 2: Yes, well, thank you again for having me. It's a pleasure.
- 1:36Speaker 2: So I'm Francesca, I'm original for Medagascar and I'm currently
- 1:40Speaker 2: in Providence, Rhode Island, USA.
- 1:44Speaker 1: Okay, how does this start for you? How does all
- 1:47Speaker 1: this start for you?
- 1:49Speaker 2: Well, it starts in my home country, Medagascar. That's where
- 1:52Speaker 2: I grew up all my life and I came to
- 1:56Speaker 2: the US almost ten years ago now to study psychology.
- 1:59Speaker 2: But it started in Madagascar. And in terms of wanting
- 2:05Speaker 2: to do something about what I experienced, which was verbal,
- 2:09Speaker 2: emotional and psychological violence, I didn't know what it was
- 2:13Speaker 2: back then, and it was yes, it was within the
- 2:18Speaker 2: it's not just within It started within the family, but
- 2:21Speaker 2: because it's a psycho, I experienced it in my friendship,
- 2:24Speaker 2: in my romantic relationships. But back then I didn't realize
- 2:29Speaker 2: that at all, because I didn't have the language to
- 2:31Speaker 2: even recognize what verbal emotional and psychological violence looked like.
- 2:36Speaker 2: The only forms of violence and abuse that I could
- 2:39Speaker 2: recognize were physical and sexual. And of course, how.
- 2:44Speaker 1: Old are we talking started how old are you talking.
- 2:47Speaker 2: In terms of experiencing it or what you mean? Yes,
- 2:51Speaker 2: I experienced in it very young. It's also just as
- 2:57Speaker 2: a context back in Medagascards, it's very normal to see
- 3:03Speaker 2: parents yelling at their children or couples fighting if you
- 3:07Speaker 2: walk down the street, and for me, experiencing that personally,
- 3:13Speaker 2: but also seeing that in the community led me to
- 3:17Speaker 2: believe that it was normal. So you feel it feels
- 3:20Speaker 2: uncomfortable when you see that, but you don't know that
- 3:23Speaker 2: it's wrong until I learned. I was trained as a
- 3:27Speaker 2: sexual assault period cater later on, I was already in
- 3:31Speaker 2: my twenties and I was trained about all the forms
- 3:35Speaker 2: of violence, and that's where I could finally see the
- 3:38Speaker 2: signs and all of the different forms. And that's where
- 3:41Speaker 2: I was like, oh, my gosh, this is something that
- 3:43Speaker 2: I experienced growing up, but I didn't have the words
- 3:45Speaker 2: for it, and I was not the only one. So
- 3:48Speaker 2: what happened is that I went through that the training
- 3:51Speaker 2: that opened my eyes.
- 3:53Speaker 1: Interrupt for the Yes, how do you get from yeah,
- 3:58Speaker 1: being a kid going through this experience and saying to yourself.
- 4:03Speaker 1: I want to become a pair support.
- 4:09Speaker 2: So I grew up not knowing what it was. I
- 4:12Speaker 2: thought that I was a problem. I you know, when
- 4:15Speaker 2: you are repeatedly humiliated or insulted or put down, when
- 4:21Speaker 2: you're told who you are not and who you are,
- 4:24Speaker 2: you definitely don't know who you are. So I grew
- 4:27Speaker 2: up as a kid who who didn't know who I was.
- 4:33Speaker 2: And I grew up with a lot of mental health
- 4:36Speaker 2: struggles from anxiety and depression at times. And yeah, growing
- 4:44Speaker 2: up in that type of trauma that you don't know
- 4:46Speaker 2: is trauma actually, and having the wake up call after
- 4:51Speaker 2: going through training that basically opened your eyes and helped
- 4:55Speaker 2: you put names on things that you thought were normal
- 4:58Speaker 2: and that you expect and stand a daily basis. So
- 5:02Speaker 2: here trying I'm not trying to blame. I'm really showing
- 5:06Speaker 2: the how you say that, the fact that in countries
- 5:09Speaker 2: like mine, this type of violence is normalized. And I
- 5:13Speaker 2: say this because after I shared my story later on,
- 5:17Speaker 2: after maybe I shared how the entire organization started. But
- 5:22Speaker 2: I shared my story later on, after I went through
- 5:25Speaker 2: the training and the video where I share about me
- 5:29Speaker 2: experiencing this type of trauma caused by verbal emotional and
- 5:33Speaker 2: psychological violence, and also about the vision of breaking the
- 5:38Speaker 2: cycle because I started learning more. My background is in psychology,
- 5:42Speaker 2: so I finally could put all the puzzles together that
- 5:46Speaker 2: it didn't start with me, that it didn't even start
- 5:49Speaker 2: with my dad, who I experienced this with directly, but
- 5:52Speaker 2: he also experienced that with his own parents. And for me,
- 5:56Speaker 2: it was fascinating because I wanted to know why it
- 6:00Speaker 2: was a norm. So it started with that video. I
- 6:04Speaker 2: shared it on social media. It was shared massively, not
- 6:07Speaker 2: only in my country, but in thirteen countries as well,
- 6:11Speaker 2: and people from Madagascar started reaching out and they said,
- 6:15Speaker 2: this is not just a thank you for first of
- 6:17Speaker 2: all putting a name on something that I also experienced,
- 6:20Speaker 2: but also people from other countries saying, this is not
- 6:23Speaker 2: just happening in Medagascar, this is not just in the household.
- 6:26Speaker 2: And later on I finally found the data from UNICEF
- 6:31Speaker 2: that says that eighty four percent of children in Medagascar
- 6:35Speaker 2: are growing up in verbal, emotional and psychological violence. And
- 6:40Speaker 2: it's so it's so normalized that you know, we don't
- 6:43Speaker 2: know that it's wrong, but it's one.
- 6:45Speaker 1: Of the wow saying a lot of stuff here it
- 6:50Speaker 1: is that is I just want to I want to
- 6:52Speaker 1: touch base on man. Francisca. Thank you for sharing this
- 6:58Speaker 1: and you are so inspiring. How old were you? But
- 7:04Speaker 1: I want to get back to another question here. When
- 7:07Speaker 1: you said yourself, all right, I'm going to go what
- 7:12Speaker 1: become a sexual survivor peer support person? When you said that,
- 7:17Speaker 1: was that a conscious decision because what you had gone
- 7:20Speaker 1: through or you just said it wasn't.
- 7:24Speaker 2: So when I was back in Madagascar before I moved
- 7:29Speaker 2: to the US, I did an internship at this place
- 7:35Speaker 2: that that was taking care of women victims of sexual violence.
- 7:41Speaker 2: So I thought because I had the experience. When I
- 7:44Speaker 2: came to the US, I was an international student, I
- 7:48Speaker 2: needed to find a job and I saw that announcement
- 7:51Speaker 2: and I was like, I think this is a good
- 7:53Speaker 2: fit because I have some knowledge about sexual violence. And
- 7:57Speaker 2: then I went into that opportunity and went through another
- 8:01Speaker 2: training that addressed all of the forms of violence. So
- 8:04Speaker 2: for me, it was by necessity, but also because I
- 8:07Speaker 2: thought that, oh, I know what we're going to talk
- 8:10Speaker 2: about at least in this and I think I'm a
- 8:12Speaker 2: good fit. Yeah.
- 8:14Speaker 1: I think when you made this video I was twenty.
- 8:20Speaker 2: Twenty. It was six years ago, twenty.
- 8:24Speaker 1: What platform did you put it on?
- 8:26Speaker 2: I put it on Facebook and then on Instagram. But
- 8:31Speaker 2: it was basically I went through an incubator at Brown University.
- 8:37Speaker 2: Long short story, short time. I went in a community
- 8:40Speaker 2: college in Virginia where I learned about what this form
- 8:44Speaker 2: of violence was, and then I got a scholarship to
- 8:47Speaker 2: go to Brown and that's where I was like, I
- 8:49Speaker 2: get finally, I have the time and the energy and
- 8:53Speaker 2: I don't have to think about, you know, financial needs.
- 8:55Speaker 2: So I'm going to focus on how to solve this problem.
- 8:58Speaker 2: So I went through an incubator, which is basically a
- 9:02Speaker 2: place where we learned about a specific problem. What are
- 9:06Speaker 2: the causes that the understanding the root cause of a
- 9:11Speaker 2: problem before addressing it, then providing the solutions to to
- 9:15Speaker 2: a certain problem. So I made the video after that incubator.
- 9:19Speaker 2: It was a six month incubator and they made that
- 9:22Speaker 2: video that I shared on my personal social media.
- 9:26Speaker 1: Okay, let's talk about Yes, how did that come about?
- 9:34Speaker 1: What is it? Yes?
- 9:36Speaker 2: So Umena came about during that incubator. It came from
- 9:44Speaker 2: the realization that verbal, emotional, and psychological violence are are
- 9:53Speaker 2: not normal. First of all, that before even escalating into
- 9:58Speaker 2: physical and sexual viol Usually it starts like that. So
- 10:02Speaker 2: for me, the eye opener for my personal experience and
- 10:07Speaker 2: also with my family experience, I would say it started
- 10:10Speaker 2: with that. And as I was going through the healing
- 10:15Speaker 2: process for myself, for my family with my dad, I
- 10:18Speaker 2: realized that I was not the only one going through that.
- 10:22Speaker 2: And once I went through the incubator, I shared the
- 10:25Speaker 2: video on social media. I saw this momentum, but also
- 10:29Speaker 2: this energy from other people wanting to do something about
- 10:33Speaker 2: the problem, experiencing the same thing. I realized that it
- 10:37Speaker 2: was the time. I didn't plan to make it happen
- 10:41Speaker 2: that during that moment, but it was really the All
- 10:45Speaker 2: of the other people reached out and said that they
- 10:48Speaker 2: also experienced this. That led to the creation of the organization.
- 10:54Speaker 2: And umena is it's a Malagasie word. It's a play
- 10:58Speaker 2: on word in my native language. The entire word means give, provide,
- 11:04Speaker 2: and the second part mena means red. So I don't
- 11:09Speaker 2: have the logo with me, but it's a it's a
- 11:12Speaker 2: hand holding a red card. Though, oh, it's a hand
- 11:15Speaker 2: holding a red card. So it's basically our mission. It's
- 11:18Speaker 2: providing youth and children with the tools so that they
- 11:21Speaker 2: can stand up for themselves and say no to violence.
- 11:26Speaker 2: So it's providing those tools, social emotional learning tools to
- 11:31Speaker 2: help people spot and stand up for themselves and break
- 11:34Speaker 2: the cycle starting with them.
- 11:37Speaker 1: When you said sexual emotional violence isn't.
- 11:43Speaker 2: Normal, you mean verbal emotional Yeah, sexual is not normal
- 11:51Speaker 2: that we would acknowledge that that It's not okay?
- 11:55Speaker 1: When you say normal, what do you mean because it's
- 12:00Speaker 1: certainly prevalent, and it's certainly prevalent in Madagascar. Yeah, right,
- 12:04Speaker 1: So when you say normal, do you mean it's not acceptable?
- 12:07Speaker 1: It's not right. It's what did you mean by normal?
- 12:11Speaker 2: Normal? To me meant that even if it happens in
- 12:14Speaker 2: front of you, nobody's going to say anything. It's normalized.
- 12:18Speaker 2: People are not going to say that, oh, don't talk
- 12:21Speaker 2: to him like that, or it's just a way of
- 12:25Speaker 2: life there. And I know this is prevalent in a
- 12:28Speaker 2: lot of different countries. It exists here in the US,
- 12:30Speaker 2: but it's less normalized, or it's less accepted. That's the word. Yeah, accepted.
- 12:37Speaker 1: How did you We've talked a lot about kind of
- 12:42Speaker 1: what you've the actions you took to help other people.
- 12:47Speaker 1: How did you start to get help. How did you
- 12:50Speaker 1: start to realize where? When did you realize I need
- 12:54Speaker 1: some help?
- 12:58Speaker 2: I think my want to study psychology was my first
- 13:06Speaker 2: I would say realization that I need needed some help
- 13:11Speaker 2: because I knew me being very shy me going through
- 13:17Speaker 2: I didn't even know that it was called depression back then.
- 13:20Speaker 2: I just knew that I was sad, I had a
- 13:22Speaker 2: low self esteem, and I wanted to understand myself better.
- 13:26Speaker 2: So I think I found the type of refuge in
- 13:29Speaker 2: the books that I was reading on emotional intelligence or
- 13:34Speaker 2: on psychology in itself and understanding that that I could heal.
- 13:41Speaker 2: I think those were very blurry at the time, but
- 13:46Speaker 2: it was, like I said, like a puzzle. It was
- 13:48Speaker 2: a puzzle that I started putting together when I went
- 13:51Speaker 2: through that training, And that training helped me understand what
- 13:58Speaker 2: forboll emotional and psychological it looks like, why it exists
- 14:02Speaker 2: and the consequences on people's sense of identity, dignity, self esteem,
- 14:06Speaker 2: and mental health. And I think that was for me
- 14:09Speaker 2: that my first eye opener. And I remember one time
- 14:14Speaker 2: I knew that it had an impact on me because
- 14:18Speaker 2: I saw my self esteem, I saw my mental health deteriorate,
- 14:22Speaker 2: because of that type of event and the cycle. Understanding
- 14:26Speaker 2: what the cycle of violence meant made me realize that, Okay,
- 14:32Speaker 2: it really didn't start with me, but it was confirmed
- 14:34Speaker 2: when I went to my dad one day and I
- 14:37Speaker 2: shared a similar video around what for all emotional and
- 14:41Speaker 2: psychological violence looked like. And he looked at it and
- 14:46Speaker 2: I was like, what do you think about this? Dad?
- 14:48Speaker 2: And he looked at it and he's like, this is wrong,
- 14:50Speaker 2: and I'm like, you know, you're doing this to us
- 14:53Speaker 2: and he lashed out. He's like, what you're talking about?
- 14:55Speaker 2: I won't do that. I ended the conversation there, but
- 14:58Speaker 2: a month later I think he talked to my mom,
- 15:01Speaker 2: but it came back to my brothers, my mom, and
- 15:03Speaker 2: I and he apologized and said, you're right, I do
- 15:07Speaker 2: this and my dad did the same thing. And everything
- 15:11Speaker 2: I read about, you know, intergenerational trauma, about cycles of trauma,
- 15:15Speaker 2: it just made sense. And I was like, oh my gosh,
- 15:18Speaker 2: is healing process started there. It allowed our dynamic at
- 15:23Speaker 2: home to get better, but it allowed a lot of
- 15:26Speaker 2: clarity as well, and that's where I was like, oh
- 15:28Speaker 2: my gosh, we need to do something about it. At
- 15:31Speaker 2: the time, I was still learning more about therapy, about
- 15:34Speaker 2: social emotional learning, about nonviolent communication, about compassionate inquiry or
- 15:40Speaker 2: somatic breathing. So we put all of that together and
- 15:45Speaker 2: practiced that every week with my family. So I would
- 15:49Speaker 2: say for three years we did that until I started
- 15:52Speaker 2: the organization. Yeah.
- 15:54Speaker 1: Wow, so you were like healing with your family.
- 15:58Speaker 2: Yes, yes, it's still happening right now because it's very
- 16:04Speaker 2: hard to change, but at least now we can keep
- 16:07Speaker 2: each other accountable. We can say that, hey, what's happening.
- 16:12Speaker 1: Now.
- 16:12Speaker 2: Let's say, if one of us start to raise their voices,
- 16:15Speaker 2: we're like, hey, dad, what's happening? Are you mad? Are
- 16:18Speaker 2: you sad? Are you angry? And we start to corregulate,
- 16:22Speaker 2: and we have the language now to help each other
- 16:27Speaker 2: have those hard conversations that we didn't know needed to happen,
- 16:31Speaker 2: or help each other navigate those big emotions, because at
- 16:35Speaker 2: the end of the day, a lot of why verbal, emotional,
- 16:38Speaker 2: and psychological abuse happens is because we don't know what's happening.
- 16:42Speaker 2: We are projecting our own frustrations or things that we
- 16:46Speaker 2: don't even know what's happening. And we help each other.
- 16:49Speaker 2: First of all, we learn to regulate ourselves but sometimes
- 16:51Speaker 2: it's hard, so we corregulate. So that's what we have
- 16:54Speaker 2: been trying to practice for the past three years and
- 16:58Speaker 2: which allowed me, my brother, and my family to have
- 17:02Speaker 2: I would say healthier relationships. Of course, things are still
- 17:06Speaker 2: happening and things are exploding sometimes, but I would say
- 17:10Speaker 2: compared to fifteen years ago, it's way way better.
- 17:14Speaker 1: So is how exactly does Ameina.
- 17:19Speaker 2: Workh So we have a model that was intentionally created
- 17:30Speaker 2: mirroring the experience that I had, meaning that I was
- 17:33Speaker 2: a peer educator. When I was a peer educator, I
- 17:37Speaker 2: would share in the schools what was the link between
- 17:42Speaker 2: sexual violence and alcohol consumption, for example? And then as
- 17:47Speaker 2: I was talking about those very sensitive topics, I could
- 17:50Speaker 2: see how open the people that I was talking to
- 17:54Speaker 2: in the schools were, versus if it was a professor
- 17:57Speaker 2: with the students. So the model that we have is
- 18:01Speaker 2: a peer to peer kind of model. So we recruit
- 18:05Speaker 2: and we trained young adults. So the first young adults
- 18:09Speaker 2: that I trained were those people who reached out after
- 18:13Speaker 2: the video was shared and we had the cohort of
- 18:15Speaker 2: fifty people. They were eager to learn, they wanted to
- 18:19Speaker 2: also make a difference, and they were all surviving. We
- 18:22Speaker 2: were all survivors and we co created a training that
- 18:28Speaker 2: was that was already existing. It was based on social
- 18:31Speaker 2: emotional learning and nonviolent communications, somatic breathing, compassionate inquiry, but
- 18:40Speaker 2: we adapted it in the sense that we translated it,
- 18:43Speaker 2: we made it culturally appropriate, we piloted it, we made
- 18:47Speaker 2: some changes altogether, and that became the training that we have.
- 18:52Speaker 2: And then those young adults they go through themselves. They
- 18:56Speaker 2: go through the training, and then they go through what
- 18:58Speaker 2: we call community of practice for six months. It's basically
- 19:01Speaker 2: putting any practice like Okay, we have a wheel of
- 19:05Speaker 2: emotions in front of us. We try to put the emotions,
- 19:08Speaker 2: what are the need behind those emotions? If we have
- 19:12Speaker 2: some triggers, what is triggering us? How do we set boundaries,
- 19:16Speaker 2: how do we have hard conversations, how do we regulate
- 19:18Speaker 2: and corregulate. So for six months we go through that
- 19:21Speaker 2: individually so that we can heal ourselves and as a group.
- 19:24Speaker 2: It was like a self help group but also a
- 19:26Speaker 2: therapy peutic group. And then we graduate. They graduate as
- 19:31Speaker 2: community educators and then for a year they serve as
- 19:35Speaker 2: community educators. They go out there and they raise awareness
- 19:39Speaker 2: around what verbal emotional and psychological violence is because we
- 19:43Speaker 2: cannot address a problem before we can put a name
- 19:48Speaker 2: on it. So the first part is helping people realize
- 19:52Speaker 2: that this is a problem. And then another portion of
- 19:55Speaker 2: the community, educators are teaching children in schools what social
- 20:03Speaker 2: emotional learning is. So we're trying to change the culture
- 20:06Speaker 2: and promote empathy at the very early age so we
- 20:10Speaker 2: can have a better understanding of what healthy love looks like.
- 20:15Speaker 2: And we work with the Ministry of Education in Madatascar
- 20:18Speaker 2: to introduce that curriculum. So it's mainly training. We train educators,
- 20:24Speaker 2: we train parents, teachers, and then we give that social
- 20:28Speaker 2: emotional learning curriculum to the children. You started this, yes
- 20:36Speaker 2: I did. Sometimes I forget, but yes I did.
- 20:42Speaker 1: Francesca, You're amazing, thank you and inspiring. My God. Is
- 20:47Speaker 1: your goal to target a particular community or particular countries
- 20:54Speaker 1: or just global.
- 20:58Speaker 2: I always wanted to dominance it was. It came really
- 21:02Speaker 2: from that, you know, people reaching out then feeling that
- 21:06Speaker 2: this is really a global issue to address, and that
- 21:10Speaker 2: was that is still the vision. However, when we started
- 21:13Speaker 2: it five years ago, even addressing the issue in Madagascar
- 21:18Speaker 2: itself took us five years to even have the different
- 21:23Speaker 2: model iterated. So it's going to take some time. We
- 21:27Speaker 2: started it already and now we have thirteen ambassadors in
- 21:31Speaker 2: different countries right now, certain different countries, and we believe
- 21:35Speaker 2: that as long as we can put a name on it,
- 21:38Speaker 2: like advocacy and helping people realize that this is a
- 21:42Speaker 2: real issue we need to address. Because the thing that
- 21:44Speaker 2: I didn't address was imagine myself as one of the
- 21:49Speaker 2: eighty four percent of children going through this, having a
- 21:52Speaker 2: very low self esteem, not being active in the community,
- 21:56Speaker 2: and not really reaching my full potential. Imaginating four percent
- 22:00Speaker 2: of the population growing up like that, I was an
- 22:03Speaker 2: an outlier because I'm the one trying to make a change,
- 22:06Speaker 2: but not everybody's going to do that. So if you
- 22:09Speaker 2: imagine how eighty four percent of the children are going
- 22:13Speaker 2: to grow up as adult perpetuating this type of violence
- 22:16Speaker 2: and not reaching their full potential, how can a country develop?
- 22:19Speaker 2: So it's also in that sense, and also this type
- 22:24Speaker 2: of violence exists because of systems of oppressions like colonialism,
- 22:27Speaker 2: patriarchy and in countries like mine, those have destroyed countries
- 22:33Speaker 2: like mine. So I want to break this cycle through
- 22:35Speaker 2: this organization to help us reach our full potential and
- 22:38Speaker 2: other countries I know need that as well, and we
- 22:42Speaker 2: are happy to share what worked for us and see
- 22:45Speaker 2: how the model is going to evolve and change depending
- 22:49Speaker 2: on the culture and the countries as well.
- 22:52Speaker 1: Why do you think you were an outlier and how
- 22:59Speaker 1: did you become an outlier?
- 23:01Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm still wondering because at some point I was like,
- 23:08Speaker 2: what if I just decided not to do something about it.
- 23:11Speaker 2: I think it's a lot of what happened throughout the journey.
- 23:17Speaker 2: I feel very fortunate and privileged to have had the
- 23:22Speaker 2: type of support that I had to allow me to
- 23:25Speaker 2: turn the this vision into something real because I shared
- 23:29Speaker 2: earlier that I got a scholarship to go to Brown,
- 23:31Speaker 2: But before that, I experienced this already and I knew
- 23:34Speaker 2: that it was a problem, but because I was balancing responsibility, financial,
- 23:40Speaker 2: you know, issues, or I didn't think I was able
- 23:45Speaker 2: to do more because of all the things that I
- 23:49Speaker 2: was caring already. But as soon as I had that
- 23:53Speaker 2: privilege to go to Brown to have a full ride,
- 23:57Speaker 2: I say it like this because it's a privilege I
- 24:00Speaker 2: I didn't need to think about my my my tuition
- 24:04Speaker 2: or like food to Yes, four years undergrad Yes, I actually,
- 24:13Speaker 2: and I think that not a lot of people get
- 24:15Speaker 2: to have that. And I felt that I was so
- 24:20Speaker 2: privileged that I needed to I wanted to to do
- 24:24Speaker 2: something about it. Then I had that space and that
- 24:28Speaker 2: support too to have this realized and also along the way.
- 24:33Speaker 1: Second second, how do you go from like being a
- 24:41Speaker 1: kid or a young woman experiencing all this, having all
- 24:46Speaker 1: these experiences, traumatic experiences, how do you go help me
- 24:54Speaker 1: connect the dots from there to that community college to
- 24:58Speaker 1: Brown you even thinking that is is a possibility.
- 25:06Speaker 2: Yeah, So I'm the oldest of at home, so I
- 25:12Speaker 2: think that responsibility as well was in my head that
- 25:15Speaker 2: I needed to The story in my head was that
- 25:18Speaker 2: I needed to pave the way for my brothers and
- 25:21Speaker 2: you know, help make a yeah, have a better future
- 25:27Speaker 2: for the family. So I was when I came to
- 25:31Speaker 2: the US, I had that mission in mind. I need
- 25:35Speaker 2: to work hard, I need to study hard. I need
- 25:37Speaker 2: And also maybe because of my experience growing up in
- 25:41Speaker 2: that type of environment, I decided, like I shared with you,
- 25:45Speaker 2: how some people are outliers and some people become more passive.
- 25:49Speaker 2: So in my case, I think that because I didn't
- 25:52Speaker 2: want my dad to criticize me, that much. I tried
- 25:56Speaker 2: to become a perfectionist, So everything that I would do,
- 25:59Speaker 2: I would tried to make it so good that it
- 26:01Speaker 2: couldn't see anything. However, as a result, my brothers were
- 26:05Speaker 2: compared to me, and because they were compared to me, like,
- 26:09Speaker 2: no matter what we're gonna do, we're always going to
- 26:11Speaker 2: be compared, So they became more passive. And I think
- 26:14Speaker 2: I brought that with me as my coping mechanism to
- 26:18Speaker 2: and I learned that in therapy that it's really one
- 26:20Speaker 2: of the parts that led me to where I am
- 26:22Speaker 2: today in terms of wanting to always become an overachiever,
- 26:27Speaker 2: making things very perfect. But as I was healing, like
- 26:30Speaker 2: that is less you know, over that would say. But
- 26:36Speaker 2: in the past, it was that I would I would
- 26:39Speaker 2: be always on one of the top of the class,
- 26:42Speaker 2: or just because I wanted to protect myself from you know,
- 26:46Speaker 2: not being criticized or yelled at, or it's like that's
- 26:50Speaker 2: so maybe that's one of the factors that allowed me
- 26:54Speaker 2: to get those opportunities and get that privilege.
- 27:00Speaker 1: All right, uh, Brancisca, as we wind down here, how
- 27:04Speaker 1: do people learn more about you? And Amina?
- 27:07Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, you went by so quickly. Well, thank
- 27:11Speaker 2: you first of all for helping us amplify our cause,
- 27:14Speaker 2: because I believe that platforms like this allow us to
- 27:18Speaker 2: shed light more on this type of cause. So if
- 27:23Speaker 2: you would like to collaborate with us or learn more
- 27:26Speaker 2: about us, feel free to go on our website. It's
- 27:29Speaker 2: a womena Movement dot org on all social media, it's
- 27:34Speaker 2: end all womena Movement. And yeah, thank you so much.
- 27:38Speaker 1: And that is O M E N A Movement dot org.
- 27:42Speaker 1: We'll have that link up here at the show notes
- 27:44Speaker 1: page at the Trauma Therapist podcast dot com. Francesca, come
- 27:48Speaker 1: on freaking amazing and inspiring. Really appreciate you. Appreciate this
- 27:53Speaker 1: is why I love doing this. I mean, I get
- 27:56Speaker 1: to talk to people like you, and when I learned
- 27:59Speaker 1: about what you were doing, was like, come on, incredible, really,
- 28:04Speaker 1: thank you, love it, love it and appreciate you. Thank
- 28:07Speaker 1: you so much.
- 28:07Speaker 2: Thank you. It was a pleasure. And thank you everyone
- 28:10Speaker 2: for having me. Take care, take care,