Almost two years since they have been sweeping across the four corners of France. In lecture halls of large schools, administrative premises, municipal halls… Every month, during public meetings organized by the Independent Commission on Incest and Sexual Violence Against Children (Ciivise), the words of those attacked or abused resonate. raped during their childhood, and their loved ones. After a summer break, it was in Grenoble that the 25th was organizede meeting of this type, Thursday September 14.
In the packed room of the World Trade Center Grenoble, there was once again talk of ” depression “of“suicidal urges”of “dissociation”. The immense difficulty in recovering from the sexual violence suffered by 5.5 million French people during childhood, according to figures from the National Institute of Health and Medical Research. Of the injustice felt in the face of the prescription of the facts. From this common pain of living, formulated differently by each: “I am 57 years old and I have been living with this “something” in my head and in my body for fifty years”, “I still feel at fault, I still can’t not feel guilty”, “I had throat cancer, I told my GP even before the diagnosis: “it’s cancer, that’s all I couldn’t say””.
In a ritual unchanged since the launch of this Tour de France in September 2021, the microphone circulates between the ranks. Facing the room, the co-presidents of the Ciivise, Nathalie Mathieu, former general director of the Doctors Bru Association and its reception structure for young girls victims of incest, and Edouard Durand, magistrate, as well as the general secretary of the commission, Benoît Legrand. At their side this time stands Eva Thomas, who was one of the first to reveal incest openly, in 1986, in the television show “Les Dossiers de l’screen”.
High intensity speeches
For two hours, memories of the past mix with concerns about the present. Chloé, 31, a victim of incest at the hands of her grandfather, “a very strong desire to be a mother”but has “very scared too”. “I am very afraid of finding myself near a naked child, even though I know that I will not harm him”, she says. An hour later, a 37-year-old man, sexually assaulted by his uncle when he was 7 to 10 years old, echoed him. “I have a 1-year-old little boy and, regularly, I find myself controlling my behavior”he confides in a sob.
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