‘After experiencing sexual exploitation, disbelieved and refused asylum, I’m finally starting my journey to recovery’

As a child, Silvana was moved from house to house, forced to work as a servant and farm hand. While still a child, the people supposed to be caring for her pushed her into sex work. Later she found a job with a man who prostituted her and trafficked her to the UK.

She was picked up and detained on arrival.

Silvana went through the asylum process, but her claim was refused. Disbelieved as a trafficking survivor and kicked out of her accommodation, she was exploited again by someone who said they’d give her a place to stay. She escaped, but the damage from years of exploitation was profound.

She ended up in a hostel too afraid to go out, even for essentials. She sat up, night after night, frightened and unable to stop thinking. By day she slept, exhausted. Her psychiatric nurse and ATLEU’s lawyer would call her but she could not engage. Eventually the pressure of her fears became too great and Silvana was hospitalised. She ended up in hospital four times. We visited her there, and over time were able to build her trust. For respite, we took her out to run in the park with our lawyer’s dog, as she loves animals.

ATLEU helped Silvana secure a safe house to stay in, with dedicated help from local mental health services. We helped her to make another asylum claim and a human trafficking protection claim, and got an expert report on her mental health to support her case. After two years of our support, she was finally formally identified as a victim of human trafficking. One and a half years later, she got refugee status (over seven years after she first claimed asylum).

Fast forward to 2025, and Silvana has started university and completed her first year in Adult Nursing. She loves baking, sewing and knitting and has applied to get a cat from a shelter! She thinks it’s important to do something you like with other people – and to give a life to something that needs life, focusing on them more than yourself. Her model is ‘God first, others second, and myself last.’