September 30, 2011
And the week gets worse. Early this morning I heard two of my teachers talking outside my window. When I heard the name of one of our students and the word hospital I decided to get up and join the gossip. Someone in the village behind the school had told my neighbor this morning that Maureen, a 4th grade student was in town at the prayer house. Some students also said that they saw Maureen headed to town with her aunty and she could barely walk. And then my neighbor started telling the story she heard last night. Maureen had been raped by her father and a 16 year old boy in the community. No one had taken her to the hospital but she was taken to the woman who prays over people. I just about lost my mind. As soon as the headmaster arrived I told him I was going to find her and take her to the hospital. The 4th grade teacher and I jumped on a truck and headed to town. We found her at the prayer house lying on a mat with her aunty. As we began talking to her we discovered that this all started last year. When she was in 3rd grade her father started sexually abusing her and threatened to stab her with a knife if she told anyone. Now her body couldn’t take it anymore and her aunty and grandma called the police and filed a report. Unfortunately her father ran away before the police caught him. Maureen is now completely terrified that he will find her. She was taken to the hospital that day. When I saw how helpless she was and how scared she was to talk about it I started crying. A ten year old abused by her own father and his friend…and other family member just letting it happen for over a year……