Yvette feels the Jehovah’s Witness faith made her tough childhood even worse
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Yvette was sexually abused by her father and her boyfriend, both of whom were Jehovah’s Witnesses.
When she told the elders about it, they ordered her to study the bible.
Yvette grew up in the 1970s and 80s in a large Jehovah’s Witness family. Her father sexually abused his daughters and physically abused his sons.
The children were not allowed to have any friends, to listen to music, watch television or have any toys, and she says ‘I cannot remember a single good day as a child’.
The children were forced to sit through long religious assemblies. They were not allowed to speak or go to the toilet, and if they misbehaved, they were beaten.
Yvette says that sometimes she and her siblings told people in the congregation they were being abused, but the family were constantly moving house and no action was ever taken. Yvette also says their mother was aware of the abuse and did nothing to stop it.
When Yvette was 12, her parents were living separately for a while and her mother sent her to stay with her father. During the night, her father touched her vagina and asked her repeatedly if anyone had ever done that before. When she went home, she told her mother what had happened. Her mother spoke to the Jehovah’s Witness elders, and they instructed Yvette to do bible studies.
The following year, Yvette met Roman, who became her boyfriend. She was 12 and Roman was 17. He raped and beat her regularly and she became pregnant in her early teens.
When she gave birth in hospital, no one asked about how she had been made pregnant in her early teens. She remembers one nurse saying ‘You can talk to me if you need to’ but Yvette never could, because her mother or Roman were always with her.
Yvette’s mother told the elders that she would bring the baby up as her own. They ordered Yvette to study the bible again. She recalls the ‘shame, humiliation and the guilt’ that she was made to feel.
In her mid teens, Yvette managed to get away from her family and Roman, and moved into a mother and baby unit.
When she was in her 30s, Yvette was interviewed by four elders about the abuse her father had inflicted on her and her siblings. Her father was in the room next door and Yvette says she found it so traumatic she couldn’t speak.
A few years later, one of her siblings died. This prompted her to experience flashbacks and she decided to go to the police and report her father. After a long delay, the police interviewed both her parents. She is waiting to hear if a prosecution is going ahead.
Yvette feels that the Jehovah’s Witness religion had everything to do with her tough childhood. She says the way children were treated was ‘brain-washing’ and ‘soul-destroying’.
She adds ‘... by the time you get to the age of 11 or 12, you have no identity … you don't know who you are or who you’re supposed to be’.
She does not think that male elders should be allowed to interview lone females about abuse when they have no experience or expertise on how to deal with it.
For a time, Yvette became dependent on alcohol to cope with the trauma she suffered as a child, but she has not drunk for over a decade.