"I wish I had a megaphone and could scream!" - On not being heard as a survivor
domestic violence, gender-based violence, intimate partner violence, racism
Jana [2] has been living in Germany for six years now. Over that time, the relationship she moved here for has turned into a nightmare—“a prison,” as she calls it. Her husband is abusive. “I already wanted to leave him at the beginning of my pregnancy, five years ago. That’s when the problems started. The first time he physically hurt me, I was seven months pregnant. That was the beginning of my personal hell.” Beyond the physical violence, her husband also controls and isolates her. He constructs the narrative of a woman he “rescued”:
“I was never the poor girl, the victim who got saved by a European man, as my husband likes to present it. It was my decision to come to Germany, to make this relationship work. I’ve always stood up for myself and fought for my own life.”
Jana often emphasizes how important independence is to her. She believes in a fair division of household responsibilities and has always wanted to work and earn her own money. She’s well-informed about financial support systems and knows her rights. Still, she has to fight—just to be heard, to access the support and resources she is entitled to, and to find a safe place to live for herself and her child.
The first time her husband physically assaulted her, Jana immediately tried to seek help. But at the local police station, she wasn’t taken seriously – partly due to a language barrier. Jana actually has a talent for languages and enjoys learning new ones. She speaks fluent English and conversational German at a B1 level. But in that moment, it didn’t help her.
“Especially when I’m nervous or unwell, I speak English better, since I’ve been speaking it longer than German. But at the police station, no one could communicate with me in English. They made me wait for hours. I was heavily pregnant, overwhelmed, and feeling terrible. When someone finally came who could speak English with me, they just told me I’d get a phone call later. That call never came.”
Later, during an interrogation, Jana says she was questioned in front of her husband—which made it impossible for her to speak openly. She describes multiple encounters with the police in which she felt unsafe, unsupported, and deeply overwhelmed. Even after our conversation, she once again calls the police after an argument, fearing further violence when her husband returns. Her child is asleep in the next room. Once again, she is told that the police can’t help and if she’s afraid, she should leave the house. But Jana has nowhere to go. She has no support network nearby, and she refuses to leave her sleeping child behind.
Jana felt especially isolated during the pandemic. Because of a chronic illness, she rarely left the house with her baby. This was especially difficult for her, as she’s actually an active and independent person someone who enjoys using her e-bike to run errands and who, despite her husband’s control, has always tried to carve out small moments of freedom. Only after getting vaccinated did she feel safe enough to actively seek support again. But since her partner works from home most of the time and controls when and why she leaves the house, she constantly has to come up with excuses—often relying on walks with her child to secretly contact helplines and support services. Doing so while caring for a newborn is incredibly difficult. The search for help begins to feel like an endless cycle: she calls domestic violence hotlines, has to recount her story from the beginning each time, gets referred to local counseling centers, who then refer her to the nearest women’s shelter—which is only suitable if they can accommodate children. But there’s never any space for her. Jana feels trapped:
“We can’t go too far away because I’m afraid my child will lose access to kindergarden, and then I won’t be able to work. If I can’t work, I can’t support us.”
She’s frustrated: “All I get are phone numbers. I call, tell my whole story, and then they just give me the next number. But in the end, that hasn’t helped me enough. I’m in a foreign country, with foreign laws. I don’t understand the support system, the divorce process, or custody laws. I need concrete help with these things to protect myself and my child.” Jana has some supportive people with expertise in her life, but still can’t overcome the endless barriers. She tells us about many other experiences she’s had with institutions over the years—of being mocked, mistreated, or dismissed. One person who was supposed to help her laughed at her for mispronouncing the word „Rache“ which means “revenge” in German and which is really hard to pronounce for non-native speakers. Another yelled at her on the phone for asking a question. She often feels humiliated:
“It’s like I don’t exist. I’m not heard. I’m not seen. I’m ignored. By now, I feel stripped of my identity and dignity—like no one truly listens or sees me anymore.”
Still, Jana doesn’t give up. She continues researching support options on her own. When she couldn’t work due to childcare responsibilities, she tried to apply for housing benefits („Wohngeld“) to look for her own apartment—since women’s shelters had no space. But the Jobcenter repeatedly sent her away with different forms.
“The forms are in German, and even for native speakers they can be hard to understand,” Jana says. “I wasn’t given English forms, and I never met anyone who could clearly explain them to me in English. So I had to sit down with a dictionary and try to fill them out myself, which took a long time. But at every follow-up appointment, there was a new caseworker who told me I had the wrong form again or hadn’t filled it out properly. It became very clear to me: this system isn’t made for people like me.”
Eventually, Jana gave up on the Jobcenter. For the years until her child could attend daycare, she simply tried to survive. Jana endured three years of hardship, living a life she says she never wanted: “Before all this, I was always able to take care of myself. I always wanted to work and earn my own money. I never wanted to just be a housewife. I told my husband from the beginning that I wanted to be independent and financially self-sufficient. But with a newborn, that wasn’t possible.” Her husband took advantage of that. At first, he didn’t allow her any access to the bank account. But despite the ongoing oppression, Jana continues to create small moments of agency—pushing back, reclaiming space, and slowly building paths toward autonomy.
“I couldn’t just go buy food or necessities for myself or my child. And my husband didn’t take care of it either. My child and I went hungry many times. I had to borrow money from my mother-in-law to buy essentials. It was absurd.” Then she did some research and discovered that economic control is also a form of domestic violence. “I told my husband I’d report him if he didn’t give me access to the account. After a lot of back and forth, he finally agreed to open a joint account. That was a small victory for me.” “At first, I didn’t feel comfortable calling it violence. But that’s exactly what it was—he controlled me financially, and I know how damaging that was.”
Today, in addition to caregiving, Jana is also in paid employment and finally has her own bank account. “My plan was to work, save some money, and then find an apartment for me and my child.” But housing remains out of reach blocked by all-too-familiar problems: scarcity, skyrocketing rents, cutthroat competition, and, above all, racist and sexist discrimination.
“The prices are absurd. In my region, many people earn very well, and entire families often make several times what I do. But that’s not even the biggest issue: It doesn’t matter that I now earn enough to pay rent. If a ‘German’ white [3] family—where both parents earn four times what I make—applies for the same apartment, it’s over. I know I won’t be chosen. I’ve applied to every single apartment listing I could find online, and only five of them even let me view the place. I’ve heard the most absurd excuses about why I wasn’t selected. I know it’s because I’m a woman, potentially a single mother, and I’m seen as a ‘foreigner’ [4]. That’s all they see an excuse not to help, because of their prejudice.”
There are still many dangerous myths and stereotypes surrounding domestic and gender-based violence—especially in intimate relationships. Survivors are often blamed for the abuse they experience or are seen as partly responsible. Some believe those affected must have provoked the situation, or that the violence was mutual. But research and experience from the support sector show a very different reality: in most cases, abuse is about power—a reflection of structural inequalities between genders. These patterns are reinforced by societal narratives that portray women as overly emotional or irrational. Jana’s story is not an exception. In fact, there’s an entire support system meant to exist for cases like hers—because intimate partner violence is not a “normal” situation. And yet, navigating that system is often incredibly difficult. Many survivors need tailored, long-term, hands-on support. But the existing structures are often overwhelmed and underfunded, still lacking consistent national funding across Germany.
Still, Jana doesn’t give up. She continues to seek support, even in her personal surroundings.
“I don’t have any close relatives here in Germany. My entire family is back in my home country. There, I could just pack my things and go to my mother’s house. But here? The people I know are mostly relatives or friends of my husband—or they ignore me after I try to confide in them.”
She talks about her employer, who has excluded her from permanent job opportunities ever since she shared her situation. “Since I told him what’s going on, he’s been ignoring me,” Jana says. She talks about a neighbor who had an apartment available but rented it to someone else instead.
“Everyone knows. But no one wants to get involved. As soon as I share what’s happening, I become invisible. I lost friends. Colleagues stopped speaking to me. It’s like I no longer exist—because they feel burdened by what I shared. Nobody wants to deal with it, so I have to swallow everything.”
Many survivors experience this kind of social isolation. Their circles often don’t know how to help—or expect them to leave the relationship immediately. But that’s rarely simple. When shared housing or children are involved, separation can be a long and exhausting process. Survivors need concrete support: protection, housing, childcare, resources—things that make leaving even possible. Jana is someone with a large network back home. She’s warm, open, and passionate about supporting other women. And yet, in Germany, she’s left mostly on her own. Jana’s conclusion after our conversation, is both painful and brutally accurate:
“I can feel that people judge me—for being a woman. For not being German. For being a ‘foreigner.’ [...] For not speaking the language well enough. For being a mother who wants to leave a violent relationship. Is a woman not allowed to leave a relationship? Then it’s: ‘A single mother—oh my God, she doesn’t have a man!’ It’s a taboo. Everything is a taboo here.”
As a society, we still have deep-rooted ideas about how women are “supposed” to act in relationships and families — especially in the context of intimate partner violence. Misogynistic myths persist: that women are naturally nurturing, that they must protect the family at all costs, that it’s their responsibility to “maintain harmony” and fix abusive behavior behind closed doors. Or worse—that they should tolerate violent behavior, because “boys will be boys.” We’re still shaped by deeply gendered narratives: that men are inherently more aggressive, rational, and dominant—while women are emotional, fragile, and submissive. These narratives are often justified through biology or hormones, ignoring the social and political dimensions of violence and inequality [5]. Such stories depoliticize gender-based violence and allow power structures to go unquestioned. And as Jana’s story shows, survivors are often—subtly or openly—blamed for their own abuse. This is known as victim blaming, or the reversal of perpetrator and victim. Instead of asking: “What do you need?” the questions become: “Did she provoke him?” or “Why doesn’t she just leave?” But only the perpetrator can be held responsible for the violence. There are countless reasons why someone might not be able to leave. Jana’s story makes them visible: unequal division of labor at home, no access to joint finances, a broken housing market, a fragmented support system, and institutions that refuse to take responsibility—even when someone fights, again and again, for themselves and their child. There are many reasons why a survivor may not be able to leave. Jana’s story makes this painfully clear: the unequal division of domestic labor, her long-term lack of access to shared finances, an overheated housing market, a support system stretched beyond capacity, and institutions that refuse to take responsibility. Her story also shows how people can be failed by these very institutions—despite their persistence, despite fighting for themselves and their children, and despite actively seeking help.
A few weeks after our conversation, Jana writes these words:
“As a foreign woman who has been living for years in a relationship marked by physical and psychological violence, I have nothing to protect me—no one who hears me, no one who defends my basic rights. But every person has the right to live in dignity.”
To keep pushing back against societal expectations while enduring ongoing abuse—trying, again and again, to live a life on one’s own terms—requires immense courage, endurance, and strength. And yet, for many, that path is made nearly impossible by structural and institutionalized violence. Jana’s story reflects all of this. And it is far from an isolated case.
[1] At the outset, we as interviewers would like to make our own social positions transparent—including any potential biases rooted in our subjective and limited experiences. Neither of us has personally experienced racism, as we are both socially positioned as white and are therefore privileged in this regard. We have also never faced discrimination based on our residency status or native language. We acknowledge that our perspectives are shaped by our own experiences and privileges, and we are aware that the realities of people affected by racism and other forms of discrimination can differ significantly from our own. While we have never personally experienced domestic violence, we—like all women and queer people in Germany—are affected by gender-based violence. We understand violence against women and queer people as a continuum: beginning with everyday sexist and misogynistic discrimination and narratives, and extending to sexualized, physical violence and femi(ni)cide.
[2] To protect the individual's safety, we have changed and anonymized identifying details such as names, dates, and time frames. These edits were made with care to preserve the integrity and truth of the narrative.
[3] In this text, "white" does not refer to skin color, but to social positions within historically grown and structurally anchored unequal power relations. We italicize "white" to highlight the social construction and the invisibility of white dominance.
[4] The terms "foreigner" or "foreign" are not neutral but reflect a national perspective in which the "own" (e.g., "German") is set as the norm, and the "other" is marked as "foreign." This dichotomy can contribute to the social construction of the "other" and reinforce exclusionary mechanisms. Critically considered, these terms are not merely descriptive but potentially stigmatizing, as they fix belonging and non-belonging along national lines – often regardless of the actual lived reality or self-identification of those affected. In the original, Jana uses the English words "foreigner" or "foreign," which we believe translate most closely to the German equivalents "Ausländerin" or "ausländisch." To highlight the issue with these terms, we write them in italics and quotation marks.
[5] Underlying these myths are powerful biologist narratives as well as binary gender stereotypes and cis-heteronormative role models. Gender is fluid, and there are more than the two gender categories "cis man" and "cis woman." Cis here means that individuals identify with the category assigned to them at birth based on external characteristics. Biologist in this context means that violence, for example, is justified by different hormonal balances or other binarily constructed arguments. Thus, the actual problem of gender-based violence is not only depoliticized and social power relations are ignored, but also a dangerous biologism is reproduced. That is, the ideological belief that human behavior, social roles, or societal differences are primarily or exclusively explainable by biological factors such as genes, hormones, or gender.