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Trigger warning: Female genital cutting/mutilation
Nisa (pseudonym) shares the hurt she feels over her parents’ negiligence about how and what happened with her sunat procedure. For those of us who were left alone, we can’t help but ask “Why?” “Why did you?” “How…?”
Many of us may not be able to carry a conversation about sunat with our parents, and we hold this hurt close to our hearts. Nisa reminds us all that we aren’t alone, and that if our parents can’t give us that closure, we have each other and our solidarity.
Let’s choose us.
I suppose then that we are left with the breaking of cycles and unwarranted traditions. And I'm down for that. Because the older I get, the more I can't shake off the feeling of being robbed.
The first time I talked to my mother about sunat, I learned that my sisters weren't cut. When I asked why, my mother said something like 'It didn't seem necessary anymore.' That was it. I knew then that as conscious as that decision was not to have my sisters cut, it was one made with little initiative to learn.
Just like how they decided to have me cut. It was because… baby girls were supposed to be cut. Everyone cut their daughters. It was normal.
To cut or not, my parents paid little care to learn the why's, how's, and what's. My mother answered "I don't know" to every question I had about my procedure. She wasn't in the room with me. She didn't know what was cut or what was used, and she didn't ask. She doesn't remember how many months old I was.
My parents had me cut because they believed it was so important religiously, and yet they know absolutely nothing about my procedure, except for who performed it (a late relative). Was my procedure then… just ritualistic? Done in the name of tradition?
I have grown to be less upset that I was cut because, to some degree, I get it: parents face(d) socio-religious and cultural pressures. I sympathise with that. These don't excuse a parent's complete and conscious negligence about the procedure, though.
We can acknowledge both the pressures and the fact that our parents should've overcome them.It was us against a tradition they didn't even seek to understand. They should've chosen us.