Bearing witness online: Gender-based violence and the unseen toll on frontline advocates

Silence was no longer possible. Not after what she endured. Not after what the work did to me.

I have spent years in human rights, with a focus on gender-based violence. It’s not work you leave at the office. You take it home. You absorb it. And eventually, if you’re not careful, it rewires you.

The case that changed me came through a community health centre. A 14-year-old girl. Pregnant. The father of her child was her father. Her mother refused to believe her and called her seductive.

At our third session, she said, “I just left my body. I stopped being a girl. I became nothing.”

I documented her story. I followed protocol. I ensured psychological support. But her words stayed. They followed me into sleep, into silence, into everyday tasks. I began to lose focus. I couldn’t eat. I couldn’t concentrate. I thought I was tired.

I wasn’t tired. I was drowning.

While preparing her legal referral, I read her handwritten statement. One line stayed with me: “I used to pretend I was asleep. It made it hurt less.”

That sentence broke me. I rushed to the bathroom. I sobbed. Uncontrollably.

That night, I admitted I was not okay. I told a colleague the truth. That the trauma had entered my body and stayed. She responded: Your mental health matters too.

The next morning, I handed over the case. It felt like failure. But I had nothing left to give.

In the following weeks, I began therapy. I stopped performing strength. I wrote. I slept. I asked for help. I accepted that this work can devour you if you let it.

When I returned, I changed the structure of how we worked. Wellness check-ins. Debrief sessions. Clear boundaries. Space to feel. I implemented what didn’t exist before protection for those doing the protecting.

Then I went online.

The shift into the digital space

The digital space became my tool for visibility. I started telling the stories no one wanted to face; stories about incest, rape, child abuse, and the emotional collapse of frontline responders.

I used my platforms to dismantle myths and spread survivor-centered knowledge. I didn’t post for attention. I posted to educate. I posted to breathe.

My digital campaigns created new conversations. Not abstract discussions, but real connections: survivors reaching out, advocates finding language for their fatigue, social workers admitting they needed rest.

I used social media threads, blog posts, and targeted campaigns to explain what trauma does to a girl, to her advocate, to systems that pretend everything is under control.

The online space made it possible to build what physical rooms often refused to host: truth.

Technology gave the work scale. I wasn’t limited to private sessions or closed-door meetings. I could inform and challenge a wider public. I could speak directly to bystanders, professionals, and survivors.

I posted resources. I created a shareable language. I highlighted how untreated trauma among GBV responders leads to poor outcomes for survivors.

The internet is a tool. I used it with intention.

For advocates on the frontlines

If you’re in this work and you’re unraveling, stop pretending. Take the break. Ask for help. Collapse is not failure. Silence about your pain does not make you stronger. The people we serve deserve truth. That truth includes what this work does to us.

To the girl who changed me

I don’t know where she is today. I hope she is safe. I hope someone listens to her now. I hope she laughs again.

She may never know what she gave me. But because of her, I will never again stay silent about what this work costs.

What comes next

This article is a documentation. I will keep using the digital space to speak, to connect, to pressure systems that fail survivors and those who serve them.

Justice does not stop at policy. It must reach the bodies that carry its weight.