HUMAN RIGHTS | Defending human dignity
31 December 2008
Volunteers Make Supporting Human Rights a Personal Endeavor
Three volunteers share their experiences in helping torture survivors
Washington — It took some courage for Clara Van Gerven to become a volunteer with the Advocates for Survivors of Torture and Trauma (ASTT). The Baltimore-based nonprofit organization is dedicated to providing counseling, social welfare and referral services to torture survivors, who, once they reach the United States, may need help with restoring normal, productive lives.
“I was terrified to begin,” Van Gerven told America.gov. “It’s really kind of scary to interact with people who have been through so much.”
But Van Gerven’s interest in helping people and supporting human rights helped her overcome her initial trepidation. More than two years later, she continues to volunteer with ASTT.
Of the survivors she has met, Van Gerven said: “Obviously, people are going through a hard time because not only do they have the psychological effects of torture or witnessing torture to contend with, but they’re also coming into a situation where there’s just not a lot that they can do other than wait it out [for asylum approval]. ... But I never felt that people had a lot of negativity.”
In addition, the full-time employees at ASTT, Van Gerven said, “have such positive attitudes that it is just a pleasure to be there.”
Van Gerven, a Belgium native who had been working in Hungary before coming to the United States with her American husband, said she always wanted to do something that changed people’s lives for the better.
The protection of human rights has become more personal, she said. “It is much easier to be engaged in human rights when you see what the implications of that are, because being in contact with torture survivors gives you a very direct insight into the importance of human rights.”
While Van Gerven has a full-time job in administration, she finds time to volunteer at ASTT each month to help the organization with its office work.
Everyone has skills that can be contributed to human rights causes, she said.
“All you really need is enthusiasm,” Van Gerven said. “All you really need is a willingness to help out.”
A HUMBLING EXPERIENCE
Lauren Goodsmith has been volunteering with ASTT since 2002 and says the experience is humbling.
“It’s very humbling to hear what people have been through and to see that they have survived,” she told America.gov. Like Van Gerven, Goodsmith finds time each month to volunteer in addition to working a full-time job.
Having worked many years in Africa, Goodsmith volunteers as a French interpreter at ASTT. Relaying the stories of the torture survivors to their counselors can be “very difficult,” she acknowledged.
“Sometimes there will be clients who can barely speak about what’s happened to them, who are so weighed down or troubled or tearful or finding it hard to articulate,” she said.
But over the course of the sessions, change takes place. “Something as small as seeing a smile on their face, seeing an expression in their eyes that’s one of hope and happiness or expectation,” Goodsmith said, indicates that the survivors feel they can speak in security.
The reward, Goodsmith said, is to see the survivors “rediscover hope and gain a renewed sense of their potential.”
ALWAYS LOOK AT THE END RESULT
A congenital speech impediment made life difficult for Prisca Okeahialam, but it also motivated her to fight discrimination. As a lawyer in her native Nigeria, she helped protect the rights of prisoners by volunteering her legal services to the Justice Development and Peace Commission, a faith-based nonprofit organization promoting human rights and democracy.
In 2006, she came to the United States to get a graduate degree in social work and now works in Baltimore.
Okeahialam recently volunteered to write background country reports for ASTT therapists when she learned many of their clients are former political prisoners from Africa.
Okeahialam advises potential human rights volunteers not to become overwhelmed by the suffering and need of the people they may encounter.
“I would tell people not to be daunted by what they see,” she said. “I look at where I want to see the person at the end of the day. And that’s what gives me the strength to do what I do.”
See also “Victims, Counselors Reclaim Lives from Torture.”
