There are moments when she relives the pain of her childhood. On most occasions she tries to shut out the memories of sexual assault, abandonment by her parents, and being forced into sex trafficking.

“It hasn’t been the easiest because of all these traumatic experiences that I’ve gone through. There are times when I would have a flashbacks, and there are times when I would sit and cry because I’m thinking about the family support,” the now 41-year-old woman, whose identity we will not reveal, told the Jamaica Observer.

However, she said her unwavering faith in God and resilience have helped her over the years, and she is now a pastor who aims to guide other victims towards healing and redemption.

The sex trafficking survivor shared that she grew up with her grandmother in rural Jamaica. But she was constantly sexually assaulted by a friend of her grandmother’s. At the time she was eight years old and had no idea that what was being done to her was wrong until she moved to Kingston to attend school. She said she made the horrific discovery of her abuse during a guidance counselling class about safe touches.

“I had a panic attack that day. I had a breakdown that day, because it was like everything, every time I was touched and fondled came back and I have not been the same since,” she told the Sunday Observer.

When she was 15, she was sent to live with her mother, who later put her out of the house due to financial difficulties. Her father refused to take her in because of his wife and she was left homeless.

She said she then turned to prostitution to make a living, and during that time had three children by different men she had met on the streets. With each pregnancy she moved in with the father, but each time she suffered abuse.

When she turned 25 she concluded that she had had enough. However, her attempt to escape that miserable life failed when she sought employment as a masseuse, but fell victim to human trafficking and was separated from her children.

“It was a well-funded, well-run organisation,” she recalled.

“I was held against my will for several months, having people coming down from overseas to pick, choose, and refuse girls to have sex with. I was held at gunpoint for several months in Kingston just being sex trafficked and human trafficked all over,” she told the Sunday Observer.

“It was a really, really hard time because I was away from my kids, and because my family had this thing of ‘Oh, she a bad gyal, she a bad pickney’, nobody was really looking for me,” she said.

The woman said that on the day she went for the job interview, she had left her children with a family member who normally took care of them while she was on the streets hustling.

She said that after she got the job the traffickers would send her pay to her relative to ensure that the children received care.

“While we didn’t get the money in our hands, you would have a book to say okay you slept with Tom, Dick, and Harry last night, and that was 10 hours, and you made $100,000. So you would have a book where they keep your records and at the end of the month, depending on how you behaved, you would get your money,” she explained.

“A nurse would come and give you injections to stop your period, and if you misbehaved and they had to beat you, a doctor would come if you need stitches. Somebody would come so that we could get our clothes, a hairdresser would come in if they had special clients coming down,” she told the Sunday Observer.

During that time she prayed for a way out. Her prayers were eventually answered when the operation was exposed. The traffickers had got word that the police were about to swoop down on them, so they gave the women the option of returning home or leaving with them to the new location. She chose to go home.

But after being freed from the shackles of sex trafficking, she had no income and was forced to go back into prostitution. That drove her to become suicidal.

“I gave the Lord an ultimatum. I told Him that he had 24 hours to prove Himself to be God and to take me away from this,” she said.

“When I told Him I was giving Him 24 hours, He sent someone there, and that person took me from prostitution,” she recalled.

She said she moved in with the man and became his girlfriend. But he later turned her into his personal sex slave, often tying her up and leaving her in the house alone for days. However, while she again found herself in bondage, she said the treatment was better than what she had endured before.

“God delivers us, and sometimes He wants us to be free, but He wants it to be temporary, and we want it to be permanent,” she said. “Even though this guy would do that to me, he, at that point, was the best person that I met. The person who took care of me the most.”

When he hit her for the first time, though, she left him. Shortly after, she said she got a job as a security guard and was able to afford a place to call home. Though it had minimal furniture she was happy to now be in a position where she and her children were safe.

It was at this job that she met her now husband of 10 years, who loved, supported, and cared for her as she tried to turn her life around.

Today, she is a teacher and a caregiver at an infant school. She also has a meal programme for the homeless in her community and ministers as a pastor.

“Not a lot of people on the street got that opportunity. Some of them died, some of them went crazy, some of them were raped. I have to just thank God that I am one of those who made it out and made something of myself,” she said.

The human trafficking survivor urged others with similar experiences to fight, adding that there must be something that they look forward to.

“It is going to be difficult, there are going to be days when you have nobody but yourself, and there are going to be days when even your shadow will leave you. There are going to be days when you think that not even you can help you, but when those times come, you just have to pull on your inner strength, you may not feel like you have it at the time, but trust and believe it is there,” she advised.