(It takes a brave woman to stand up and share her life story that she was once a victim of abuse/exploitation and worst, HUMAN TRAFFICKING, by her own mother ! Here is an article written by Maria Carmela Pullantes, now a professional Social Worker of the DSWD Field Office VIII.)

“ I want to tell you the story of a woman whose life began with a very dark and complicated childhood, being a victim of child abuse, child trafficking, and is now a survivor, an empowered woman, a licensed Social Worker, a single parent to her 3 siblings, and is now on her way to achieving more of her dreams that she once thought were so elusive. That woman is me. And this is my story.
My name is Maria Carmela Pullantes. I am 23 years old. I am a professional social worker and I work at the Department of Social Welfare and Development Region 8 at present. I have 3 siblings and I raise them alone. We have no parents or any other relatives. My mother is in jail, and we don’t have a father or even a father figure since I was a kid. Despite that, I graduated at the Leyte Normal University with the degree of Bachelor of Science in Social Work. I am now taking up my Master’s Degree in Public Management at the University of the Philippines Visayas Tacloban College. I am planning to pursue a Law Degree after that. You see, I was once a victim of child trafficking. And I am now a survivor. I am now a woman who multi-task, and a woman who is never contented with her present situation. I am now a woman who makes things happen all by herself. I am now empowered.
Let me take you back when I was a little girl. I came from a dysfunctional family. My mother has no permanent job and she raised us alone. I am the eldest of her four children and we have different fathers and we don’t know who and where they are. We haven’t seen them even their pictures. We don’t even know their names.
I learned the language of abuse early. I was physically and psychologically abused for as long as I can remember, and I felt rejected by my mother. I was abused and mistreated by my own mother from the age of 5. I have no idea why she hates me so much. Hurting me physically eventually became her hobby especially when she doesn’t have money. She did all that to me even when I did nothing wrong.
Let me tell you the worsest things she did to me. My face was mercilessly mopped on the floor. Nagbiyak sya ng alkansya sa ulo ko. Pinukpok ng 3-inch high heeled shoes ang ulo. Hinulog sa hagdan from 2nd floor, the reason why I have dextroscoliosis now. Sinakal ako nga maraming beses kapag inaatake ako ng asthma. Ayaw nyang maingay ako sa gabi. Konting ingay ko pag inu-ubo ako, pupuntahan niya ako sa kwarto at sasakalin ako and so on na hindi ko na kayang inarrate. (She broke the traditional Filipino alkansya, usually a dried coconut shell or a bamboo tube, on my head. She also hammered a three – inch high heel shoes on my head; was pushed from the second floor; and strangled whenever I was struck with asthma, and so on which I could not afford to narrate. I just wore long sleeves on the hottest days to cover my bruises. I missed a lot of school to hide bruises and injuries that couldn’t be covered with clothing.
Home was not a safe haven. When your loved ones abuse you, where do you go? In my case, school was my escape from all the unpleasant realities that is happening in our home. I love studying so much. I was very competent at school. I graduated Valedictorian in Elementary, with my toga covering my bruises I just got the night before. When I was on stage receiving my diploma, my mother kissed me on my forehead, I can tell it was fake, but nevertheless, warm, because I was craving for it. After that kiss, I made the first promise to myself. I am going to finish my studies by all means. This is the only way to improve our lives and perhaps, change my mother.
When I was in high school, I started to observe and realize the huge amount of money my mother is making, despite of having no permanent job. I asked her and was told me that my father was sending money for my studies. I was so happy, hoping that I would meet my father soon. But then a lot of mothers in the neighborhood visit our house and whenever they did, my mother won’t let us listen to what they’re talking about. Then one by one, their daughters, even some of my friends, went to Manila for work.
Then one morning, a barangay official went to our house confronting my mother about forcing minors to work as prostitutes in Manila. My mother denied and so all the mothers in the neighbourhood. I could not believe what I heard , so I tried to forget about it.
But then one night, few nights before our flight to Manila to meet my father, my younger sister accidentally read exchanges of email between my mother and a foreigner. We realized that it was not my father whom we will meet, but a pedophile who gets Filipino minors from my mother. This time, kami na daw ang ibebenta ni mama (it’s our turn to be sold).
We were scared and hurt about what we found out. We told our relatives about it. Our relatives reported it to our school. And I think our school reported it to the Plan International. The Plan International then partnered with the DSWD Region 8. And with the help of the Tacloban City Government and Local Police, we were rescued on December 13, 2008, the day we were about to go to Manila to meet the foreigner. My mother was arrested and my siblings and I were admitted at the DSWD Home for Girls. The foreigner and my mother pleaded guilty the following year.
I was a dropped out in high school; I only finished 2nd year. So I took the A&E examination of DEPED-ALS in 2010, passed and went straight to college. I took up Bachelor of Science in Social Work, graduated on 2014, and passed the board exam on the same year. Then I got the custody of my siblings. We are now a happy family, even without parents. My younger sister will graduate college this March, the other one in Senior High, and the youngest in the 5th grade.
All of this happened because I sought help. And they listened and took action for it. They cared because they felt responsible. All of us are responsible for others.
Human trafficking or sexual slavery can happen anywhere, in any neighbourhood, and most people don’t even even notice.
Women are human beings, not commodities to be bought and sold.
We found it disburbing because we really couldn’t believe that one human being could actually commit such heinous act on another. It almost made you ashamed of your specie, the capability of your specie to be so evil. What kind of a person buys and sells human? What kind of person beats them into submission, kidnaps them and rapes them continuously in order to break their spirits? What kind of a person makes a monastery prophet of this? It’s one of the most disturbing things I have had to come across in my life. And I don’t regret losing my mother.
Any individual or group who wishes to prey upon the vulnerabilities of any man, woman or child and force them into a life of sex or labor trafficking should be prosecuted to full extent of the law.
As a victim, survivor, and now, community member, I want to end the story of my human trafficking experience with a message for you.
You – woman, man, girl or boy, victim or survivor, whoever you are – never mind what the world may say about you. We hold our worth within ourselves and no one is worth more or less.
Whatever your traffickers may be forcing you to do now, or whatever you may have done in the past, does not diminish your value as a person. Our present and past do not define our future. When we go to sleep at night, there’s no guarantee that we will wake up the next morning. However, getting up each day is also a decision we have to make for ourselves.
I survived sex trafficking, and now I feel the responsibility to help others who are still living in that hell and think there’s no way out.
As a victim, survivor, and a community member, I’m here to tell you that we can all join in the fight against human trafficking if we do not stay silent. Let’s learn to recognize the signs and speak out. Let’s break our chains.
Lets’s say it together: No more sexual slavery. No more human trafficking.
There is hope.” #