Despite the challenges, Sandra found the strength to speak about her experiences, emphasizing the importance of communication in overcoming trauma. Her testimony serves as a call to give a voice to those who cannot speak for themselves.

“Hello, my name is Sandra, and I am here to testify about the traumas of my childhood. I want to give a voice to those who cannot or do not manage to speak. I have always been a person who is very open about communication, and I have always felt that there is no taboo, that it is not our fault, and that we need to talk about it. I come from a family of Spanish immigrants who came to Belgium in 1963, after Franco’s Spanish Civil War. We were always accustomed to our parents being silent, and there was that taboo of ‘we remain silent, we say nothing.’ But I have always chosen the side of ‘I will not be silent, and I will talk about it.’”

Sandra continues by describing her difficult childhood, marked by her mother’s absence and care by social services. “From my birth until my third year, I was placed in a nursery, often an annex of the maternity hospital. I lived in a group with other children. At the age of three, the authorities decided that I could move back in with the rest of my siblings.”

Sandra, survivor of multiple childhood traumas

She speaks about the complexity of family relationships after this early separation. “We don’t really have that sibling bond; we just share a common name. I am now a mother of two children, and I see that the relationship is completely different. As a child, I had a sibling bond, but we were and still are strangers to each other.”

Sandra explains that her childhood memories are tinged with feelings of abandonment and distrust. “I have always had that sense of abandonment, the feeling of not being wanted. The first three years of life are crucial for a child. I did not have that bond with my parents. It made me distrustful of adults, and I have always struggled to trust others.”

She recounts how these traumas have affected her adult relationships, particularly her romantic relationships. “I was so afraid of being abandoned that I sometimes accepted toxic relationships. I was someone who appeared strong and very tough, but that was just a shield.”

Finally, Sandra emphasizes the importance of talking about her experiences to avoid being consumed by them internally. “We keep all those feelings inside, and they eat us up. I was lucky to be able to write and draw to express myself, which helped me survive.” This thought is reflected in the design of the beads that will form the artwork inaugurated on October 10: each bead expresses a story and feelings…