26 Mar 2019

Tshepho Moatshe has finally found courage to speak out after nine years of enduring abuse before and during her marriage. 

She vows to motivate and help other survivors of Gender Based Violence (GBV) to find courage to step out of their experiences and honour the plans God has for their lives.

Ms Moatshe narrates her traumatic experience in an interview with BOPA, a phase she vividly remembers like it happened only yesterday. 

“I was being treated for heart problems and taking sleeping pills to fall asleep. This was when I knew I had to leave before I could face death,” she said.

In 2015, Moatshe said she filed for divorce, a chapter in her life she thought she would never close. She said during this awful experience, she became a born-again Christian and a member of the Assemblies of God church, where she had her phase of self-actualisation and established a greater connection with God.

She wonders what she would have become had she not walked out of the marriage, adding that it was unfortunate that it took a stressful journey to mould her into the confident and strong woman she is now.

The 34-year-old from Sefhophe said she received counseling from parents, district commissioner, psychiatrists and pastors to get through the pain. 

This she said happened when her search for help from the police bore no fruit, as most of the time, the officers believed her husband’s side of the story and not her.

Love is something different, it is not all romance. She said she was only 21; young and ignorant when she started experiencing abuse in her relationship. 

She said there were a lot of beatings, emotional sabotage and cheating, which affected her self-esteem and after tying the knot in 2010, all hell broke loose. Ms Moatshe said she was exposed to emotional and physical abuse for four years in her marriage, in the presence of her children.

Like many other victims, she said she remained submissive to her husband and marriage, enduring the abuse as she thought things would change and together they would have a happy ending story to tell the world.

She explained that what further disheartened her was the fact that when she insisted on reporting him to her parents, the husband would say he does not owe them anything including bogadi.

She said at some point, her mother-in-law informed her that the husband had endured the same experience as his parents also divorced because of the same abuse and his father now lives in Bobonong, while the mother resides in Mathathane.

Ms Moatshe said women are so optimistic and family oriented that often times, they remain hopeful that one day change would come.

“Sometimes as people we spend most of the time praying for change where there is no hope, at the cost of losing many things,” she noted.

She said she was not allowed to attend social events or mingle with friends and family, leading to her being stressed and diagnosed with depression, which made her miss most of her examinations; culminating in her sponsorship being terminated.

Ms Moatshe said she was now a housewife to an abusive partner without a job. “It was horrifying,” she said. She said of the nine years of being with this man, she only remembers a few days she was happy. 

“He would give me P50 and warn me to spend it wisely as the next one will come month end,” she said. She said the children would usually cry when she got the beatings from their father and they knew that whenever she screamed, it meant she was receiving blows.

Ms Moatshe said she still vividly recalls words from her eight-year-old son, who said he loved them both, but he does not know how to help them. “Mama, if there was a way of getting you guys together, I would do it.” meaning reconciling them. 

“It was actually one of the first things he has listed in his wish list,” she added. 

When an opportunity presented itself when she got a job as a temporary sales accountant in Selebi Phikwe, Ms Moatshe said she knew that was her breakthrough. She was able to finalise her divorce and was granted custody of her children. 

She said moving on was not easy, but she was reminded of a verse in the Bible which says; “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord”, [Isaiah 55:8]. Ms Moatshe said there was life after divorce and abuse, adding that when one is faced with such challenges; they should bear in mind what their life vision and future was. 

She said it takes faith in God to reach for the possibilities.

From regarding herself as a failure, Ms Moatshe said she was now living a better and confident life as she is now working and saving for her education, hoping to become a family therapist.

She said that it was important to engage men in the discussions on fighting GBV as this would make them realise the importance of a woman. She said the boy child deserves to be taught how to treat and love a girl child at a young age.

A survivor of GBV, Ms Moatshe is now a direct sales agent at Credit Cell and does marketing for various banks in Francistown. ends