Walking through the ancient alleys of Lalitpur, you notice the calm first. It is a city that knows how to present a beautiful face to the world. Temples stand tall in Patan Durbar Square. Steam rises from morning tea shops, and children in crisp school uniforms rush past to catch their buses. Families gather in laughter, offering puja to the deities at dawn. To an outsider—or even to those of us living comfortably within it—everything looks normal. It looks peaceful.
But during my years as an advisor to Antardristi Nepal, I learned the hard way that “normal” is often just a cover—a thin sheet draped over a much darker story. Beneath the pleasantries of our society lies the reality of Nepal’s girl children, particularly those who have survived the devastation of sexual abuse, rape and incest. In a country where seven women are raped daily, Antardristi Nepal provides a rare and vital sanctuary for the youngest and most vulnerable among them.
When newspapers report these cases, we speak of the “crime.” We focus on police reports, dates and perpetrators. But sitting in the rooms of Antardristi Nepal, I realised that for these girls, the crime is only the beginning. The physical act marks the start; the real struggle unfolds in the aftershocks, in the silence that follows.
It begins with a betrayal almost impossible to describe. Imagine being seven years old. At that age, your world is small. Your parents, your uncles, your home—these are meant to be your safety net. But for the girls who came to Antardristi Nepal, that net was gone. The people meant to protect them were the ones harming them. It was not a stranger in a dark alley, but the uncle who brought sweets, the cousin who lived upstairs, the trusted neighbour—or even a beloved father.
And the hardest part—the part that broke my heart the most—was that often, their mothers could not help them.
I saw mothers trapped by the same system and the same fear. In a patriarchal structure where a woman’s survival often depends on her husband or in-laws, speaking up can feel like stepping off a cliff. Some mothers knew or suspected the truth but were paralysed. This betrayal cuts deeper than the abuse itself—the realisation that the one person who should have fought for you remained silent.
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In our culture, izzat (honour) is everything. It is heavier than stone. Even a little girl understands this. She breathes it in with the air around her. She sees fear in her mother’s eyes—not fear for her pain, but fear of the gau-samaj, the community. And so, the girl stays quiet. She swallows the secret. She draws the only conclusion a child can make when adults fail her: “I must be bad. This is my fault.”
That silence rots from the inside. As these children grow, internalised shame transforms into something far more volatile. I often tell people that these survivors are fighting a war—but it is a war with no front lines.
In a conventional battle, a soldier knows where the enemy is. For a survivor of childhood sexual abuse, the threat feels omnipresent. Their nervous system remains locked in a permanent state of high alert—a biological fight-or-flight response that never switches off.
To the outside world, a classroom or family dinner appears safe. To the survivor, these spaces are minefields. A loud noise, a familiar smell or a particular tone of voice can trigger panic, sending the body back to the moment of abuse. They live in occupied territory—but that territory is their own body.
The tragedy of this war is that it is fought in silence. There are no medals for surviving the night, and no parades for getting out of bed when shame pins you down. It is a lonely, exhausting battle fought behind a smile.
When this internal war collides with adolescence, the result is a storm. While other children worry about homework or favourite actors, survivors fight invisible battles in their minds. Many develop a “mask”—a carefully constructed persona that assures the world everything is fine. Some become perfect students or obedient daughters, hiding deep fractures beneath polished surfaces.
Inside the “Guiding Light” homes, those masks fell away. We saw raw pain, anger with nowhere to go, and self-harm—not as an attempt at suicide, but as a desperate way to feel something other than numbness. The outside world called it rebellion. Teachers labelled them difficult. But we knew better. It was survival in a body that no longer felt like home.
This is why Antardristi Nepal was founded in 2003. It emerged from the recognition that existing systems were failing. You cannot stitch a physical wound and expect the spirit to heal. Medicine alone is not enough. A doctor can mend broken bones, but not broken trust. What these girls needed was sanctuary.
During my visits to the Guiding Light homes, the air felt different. It did not feel institutional; it felt like a home. Healing was approached holistically, grounded in the understanding that trauma lives in the body. You cannot simply talk it away. It resides in breath, in tightened muscles, in the reflexive fear when a door slams. Healing is slow—an agonising thaw. These homes offered space to scream, cry or sit in silence, always with the assurance of safety and belonging.
But growing up does not erase the past. As these girls became adults, many struggled with Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (C-PTSD). Unlike a single traumatic event, their trauma was cumulative, slowly reshaping how they saw the world.
I witnessed this in their adult lives. They longed for closeness yet feared trust. How do you trust when your first experience of intimacy was a violation? Many became perfectionists or controlling in their environments. To others, they seemed difficult. To me, it made sense. When your body and boundaries are stolen in childhood, control becomes survival—not a flaw.
Even now, years later, I think of those women. Healing is messy and nonlinear. There is no straight path from “victim” to “survivor.” Yet I saw them rebuild—brick by brick.
Reintegration proved powerful. It was not only therapy, but independence. Education and skills training enabled them to earn, to stand on their own. In a society ready to discard them, they forced themselves into visibility.
True healing is not about forgetting. You never forget. It is about unlearning the lies told at seven years old. It is the moment a woman can look in the mirror and say, “I am not bad. I am not dirt. I survived. And now, I decide what happens to my body and my life.”
I no longer sit in those rooms. But the strength of those young women stays with me. They transformed pain that could have crushed most people into art, advocacy and life. They saved themselves. And in doing so, they reminded us all that even after the longest, darkest night, the sun still rises over Nepal.
(The author is an educator and children’s book writer. She has written on parenting and children’s issues for Republica for over a decade and previously served on the advisory board of Antardristi Nepal.)
