I forgave my mother for my FGM – but I want to stop the practice

When Hibo Wardere was six, she was “cut”. She had been cruelly bullied at school in Somalia by her peers, who called her “dirty” for not having had the procedure. So, she asked her mother if she could be cut in order to fit in. She had no idea that “cutting” was, in fact, female genital mutilation (FGM).

Now 48, and living in Walthamstow, east London, the mother of seven is the author of Cut: One Woman’s Fight Against FGM in Britain Today and an ambassador for SafeHands for Mothers, a charity that raises awareness of issues such as FGM, child marriage, and sexual and reproductive health and rights. Hibo’s Story premiered this week in a moving film I had to walk away from – twice. The most traumatic part of it all? Hibo’s mother’s role.

Here’s what she had to say about mothers, daughters and FGM.

When she said, “Lift the dress”, I started to whimper. Mum standing there; no eye-contact anymore. She tells my auntie and the other helper “I need you to pull her legs apart”. I screamed so much. The first cut, I thought I was dying. And I remember literally saying ‘Mum!’ There was another cut and another cut. I could see my blood all over.

I was looking at my mum and my screams were getting louder and louder and nobody was listening. It was being butchered by the people you love the most that was the most hurtful thing. I said, “Please God, take me. I can’t take this pain anymore.” I didn’t think my Mum was there anymore. Whoever was standing there was not my mother.

Where we were, at that moment, in Somalia, it was considered to be part of a beautiful thing. It’s considered to be part of the heritage, tradition, culture. If a girl’s not cut she is actually worth nothing at all. If a girl’s not cut she’s deemed to be not a virgin, not clean. But if a girl is cut, she is, economically, worth a lot. And it’s an honour thing. You’re bringing your family an honour of being a girl who’s cut. It comes with a lot of social status – being mutilated.

After becoming a mother myself, I understood the why from her point of view. Until then I had been a very angry human being. “Why did you do it?” I didn’t understand fully until I looked from her perspective – and understood that if she hadn’t cut me there would have been a social death on her.

She did have a conflict about cutting me. First of all she was heartbroken because I wouldn’t be the way I was with her before. She was my whole world; I was literally glued to her. Every chance I had was with her. But then I was a loner. I didn’t want to go near my mum. I couldn’t look her in the eye. What happened became a huge wall between us.

She asked me for forgiveness on her deathbed. It was only then that I truly knew how it had affected her. I was cleaning her face and putting kohl on her, which she loved, when she said: “I need to tell you something. I want you to forgive me.”

Hibo Wadere has become a campaigner against FGM. Here, a man wears a t-shirt advocating against the practice

I just looked at her and I brought my face to her face, and I said: “What am I forgiving you for, Mum?” And she said: “When I cut you. I know how it affected you.” For her to say that, it hit me so hard. I looked at her face and said: “I forgave you a long time ago.” She asked why I didn’t
tell her before, and I said: “I just felt I did it for myself.”

I forgave her when I was pregnant. I saw the scan, the heartbeat, everything – and my whole thought was to be a different mother. Knowing I was carrying a child, I didn’t know if I was having a boy or a girl, I just thought I can’t have this baby with all these things in my head: the anger, the betrayal. I didn’t want to carry that anymore so I forgave her. But I deemed it a private forgiveness.

As we spoke, my daughter waltzed in and was checking herself out in front of the mirror, and I told my Mum: “I’m not going to cut her.” She was very, very disappointed. After that I was never angry. I felt sorry for her. This must be in her heart so deeply that she wanted forgiveness, but for her the social stigma was still so strong she felt that I would experience what she would have if she hadn’t cut me.

The minute they butchered me I thought, “No way is a child of mine ever going to experience this.” But I wouldn’t have had any power to stop my girls being cut if I was still in Somalia. And that, for me, was
something I prayed so hard for: that I never had kids in my home
country.

I now have seven wonderful children. Three beautiful daughters and four brilliant boys. My eldest daughter (22) thinks I’m a hero. They all find it a bit hard to comprehend what I went through, but they are very supportive. My eldest girl is doing her university dissertation on FGM. Her professor is so proud of her and bowled over. She will give her own perspective interview one day. I told her that would be called “The Daughter of an FGM Survior” and she said,“It doesn’t matter. I want to say what I really feel: how it’s affected me; how, looking at you, I can’t bear to think of what you went through; and how I escaped.”

My daughters would never ask to be cut – but if they did? I would take them to the doctor and I would show them what a cut woman looks like. And what she looked like before. And what are the consequences? You must know what happens to your body, what happens to your mind, what
happens to your soul. You must know because every cut is like a little bit of your soul is cut.

It is still happening. In the last few months, three girls in Somalia, two were sisters, 10 and 11, died. And it’s the first time doctors have put it out there that there was death because of FGM. There are many more girls dying than that but this prompted worldwide outcry and it’s the first step that doctors were brave enough to admit this. FGM is still huge. Every 11 seconds a girl is cut. So that’s another
girl dead or her life changed forever.

There are millions of mothers who are in this situation and, for me, every mother who protected her daughter, you know what you did. You know what you have changed. You have changed the life of your great-great-great- grandchildren – and you will be looked at as their hero. You will be looked at as the woman who broke the vicious cycle. You will be looked at as the most humanist mother of all. And if you are a mother who’s undergoing pressure to cut your daughter, think about your pain, think
about your screams, think about seeing your blood, think about seeing your flesh, think about the aftermath of what you went through, think about what you go through today. And get the courage from that to say “No. I will not put my daughter through that.”