Meet Nadia, who is a survivor of sexual violence and suffers from mental health issues. Nadia wants the stigma around sexual violence to end and sees education on sex, relationships and gender as key to tackling it. 

Nadia works at the London School of Economics at the Gender Institute. Nadia recently finished their* Masters there in Gender, Policy and Inequality. Nadia has worked on numerous projects with Mind, Women in Prison and Fearless Futures who educate young girls on gender equality. Nadia had quite a turbulent childhood and witnessed domestic abuse and experienced psychological abuse from childhood to adolescence. They also experienced sexual violence later in their mid and late teens. Nadia believes the government is not doing enough to tackle mental health problems and gender-based violence, and that the government needs to do much more in supporting women’s centres and rape crisis centres. Nadia believes that mental health and sex and relationship education (including education on emotional intelligence and sexual violence) is vital for children and young adults, and thinks that the government must do more to implement adequate education so that we can challenge the stigma associated with mental health, challenge gender roles, and understand and help to prevent gender-based violence.

*Nadia has asked for the pronoun they to be used here as this is a gender neutral pronoun that some gender variant people prefer using.

"I was born with a neurological disability. My family context was quite violent and I witnessed domestic abuse. In my teens I experienced two very serious instances of sexual violence. In terms of coping mechanisms I learnt a lot about mental health, gender inequality and sexual violence. This helped me understand my mind and society. What is important to me is challenging the stigma which surrounds talking about sexual violence and mental health. From my experiences, it really emphasises how important women centres are and how important rape crisis centres are. They are fundamental to any sort of expert advice on all these things that so many women go through."

Find out more about the Women Speak Out project and learn about women who've experienced inequality like this:

Women Speak Out

Women Speak Out: Safety and Justice

Women Speak Out: Health