At the age of 10, while still in the third grade, I received news from my mother and stepfather that we would travel to Helmand province for my brother’s wedding. Little did I know, it was to be my own wedding, as my family had arranged my marriage to my cousin and sold me for 40,000 Afghanis [£500], without my knowledge or consent.
That night, after the wedding, I went to sleep beside my mother and little brother, only to wake up next to my cousin. Trembling from confusion and fear, I fled the room in tears and screams. But my mother and her sister coerced me back into that room. It was then that I was told I had been married to my cousin.
It was the beginning of an agonising nightmare that shattered my childhood and adult life.
Two years later in 2007, aged 12, I became a mother for the first time, but my child was born premature and disabled. She soon passed away. The next year, I gave birth to and lost another daughter. My husband’s family had refused to take her to the doctor when she was unwell because she was a girl, and not the boy that they had wanted so much.
In 2010, when I was still only 14, my third daughter was born. She was also sick and below average weight. She got weaker day by day and her skin was getting increasingly yellow.
Relentless abuse from my husband for the misfortune I kept bringing to the family left me exhausted, but the fear of losing my child gave me the strength to flee to my mother’s home in Kabul. After months of treatment at a public hospital, my daughter recovered from jaundice.
After leaving the hospital, I knew I did not want to return to Helmand. Eventually, a compromise was reached and my husband was convinced to live with us in Kabul and we rented a humble room on the outskirts of west Kabul. I gave birth to a son in 2019.
I thought moving away from his family, who had encouraged him to mistreat me, might put an end to the physical and mental abuse but it continued nonstop. The fear of losing my children kept me from leaving or seeking a divorce.
Kabul presented a fresh start and better opportunities, especially for my daughter, Zahra, who began attending school. From then on, my primary focus shifted to her education. I would study alongside her, reading her lessons before teaching them to her every evening.
Today, at 14, she excels in English and has a great talent for drawing. When she was younger – and before the Taliban takeover in 2021 – she was invited to participate on television programmes and often talked about the hardships I and many women like me endure in Afghanistan. I relived my childhood and dreams by bringing up such a strong and smart child as Zahra.
At this time, I also took tailoring and beauty courses that led to me gaining work at a nearby salon. Starting with basic tasks such as eyebrow trimming, I eventually established my own beauty parlour in Kabul. Unfortunately, my only source of income and hope was closed by the Taliban after they regained power in 2021.
During this period, the abuse from my husband worsened. As I educated myself about my rights as a woman through the media and reading books, I tried several times to request a divorce. Every time, my family and my husband would threaten me for bringing disgrace to the tribe, saying they would take away my children and kill me.
“If you breathe, you belong to me; otherwise, you belong to the earth,” he told me.