The floods are over and Azra Bibi and her two daughters-in-law are back to their daily chores that keep a household of 14 running in their village near the town of Thatta, in southern Pakistan, but things do not feel quite right.
“We know we are fortunate. All our family is safe, no one is sick and our home is intact,” Azra, 65, told IRIN. But she misses her two buffaloes. The family returned home from the coastal city of Karachi two weeks ago after being displaced by floods at the end of August, and found the animals gone, either swept away by the water or stolen.
“One of them had been with me for five years,” said Azra. She also misses the routine of her life, which largely revolved around caring for the family animals. Her hens have gone too, and without them Azra says “home feels like some other place.”
Far away in Swat, in the northern province of Khyber-Pakhtoonkhwa (KPK), women face similar issues. “It is all very well for the men. They just go off to the bazaars to sit together, sip tea and chat. It is us women who are left to contemplate what has become of our lives,” said Ameena Bibi, 35, from a village in Kabal District, one of the worst hit by the floods in early August.
While Ameena’s house is under repair, she and her family are living in the same village with her brother-in-law, whose home survived the floods better. “It is cramped; we feel like strangers and without chores to do in my own kitchen I feel lost,” she told IRIN.
Trauma
“I feel life will never get back to normal - and that the water could come again. Even a light drizzle, common in these mountainous region, scares me now.”
To help flood victims cope with their stress, the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) is providing counselling through existing welfare centres, which were originally set-up in 2009 to provide psychological support to people affected by the fighting in Swat Valley between militants and the security forces.
“Seven new welfare centers will be opened very soon for the flood-affected people in Charsadda and Nowshera districts of KPK. UNHCR is also running one centre in Buner and two in Peshawar,” said Rabia Ali, UNHCR public information officer in Peshawar, the capital of KPK.
The majority of the women visiting the welfare centres “are suffering from phobic or panic attacks, depression and anxiety,” UNHCR spokesperson Duniya Aslam Khan said. “This is linked to losing homes and all means of livelihood in the floods. Women are particularly worried about the future, with husbands unemployed and children out of school, and wonder how to feed their extended families.”
Fear and powerlessness plays a part in the trauma. “I had never seen water cover swathes of land like this, nor seen houses simply vanish, though we live near the sea and are not afraid of water,” Ruqaiya Bibi, 40, told IRIN in Thatta. She said that when the city was evacuated at the end of August, the sense of panic and the “idea of just leaving everything at home and fleeing was just awful.”
Ruqaiya now worries about how her parents, whose farmlands north of Thatta were destroyed, will manage, and how her husband can support them. “He is a good man, and is trying - but we have four children of our own. My parents lost everything, they are old; my younger sisters are still dependent on them and they have no shelter,” she said.
“Women have been deeply affected. So have men, but they do not speak up as easily. Women come to me saying they feel scared all the time or burst into tears at inappropriate times. They have no idea what trauma is, but they are suffering it,” said Fareeda Aziz, a psychologist in Karachi.
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“We know we are fortunate. All our family is safe, no one is sick and our home is intact,” Azra, 65, told IRIN. But she misses her two buffaloes. The family returned home from the coastal city of Karachi two weeks ago after being displaced by floods at the end of August, and found the animals gone, either swept away by the water or stolen.
“One of them had been with me for five years,” said Azra. She also misses the routine of her life, which largely revolved around caring for the family animals. Her hens have gone too, and without them Azra says “home feels like some other place.”
Far away in Swat, in the northern province of Khyber-Pakhtoonkhwa (KPK), women face similar issues. “It is all very well for the men. They just go off to the bazaars to sit together, sip tea and chat. It is us women who are left to contemplate what has become of our lives,” said Ameena Bibi, 35, from a village in Kabal District, one of the worst hit by the floods in early August.
While Ameena’s house is under repair, she and her family are living in the same village with her brother-in-law, whose home survived the floods better. “It is cramped; we feel like strangers and without chores to do in my own kitchen I feel lost,” she told IRIN.
Trauma
“I feel life will never get back to normal - and that the water could come again. Even a light drizzle, common in these mountainous region, scares me now.”
To help flood victims cope with their stress, the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) is providing counselling through existing welfare centres, which were originally set-up in 2009 to provide psychological support to people affected by the fighting in Swat Valley between militants and the security forces.
“Seven new welfare centers will be opened very soon for the flood-affected people in Charsadda and Nowshera districts of KPK. UNHCR is also running one centre in Buner and two in Peshawar,” said Rabia Ali, UNHCR public information officer in Peshawar, the capital of KPK.
The majority of the women visiting the welfare centres “are suffering from phobic or panic attacks, depression and anxiety,” UNHCR spokesperson Duniya Aslam Khan said. “This is linked to losing homes and all means of livelihood in the floods. Women are particularly worried about the future, with husbands unemployed and children out of school, and wonder how to feed their extended families.”
Fear and powerlessness plays a part in the trauma. “I had never seen water cover swathes of land like this, nor seen houses simply vanish, though we live near the sea and are not afraid of water,” Ruqaiya Bibi, 40, told IRIN in Thatta. She said that when the city was evacuated at the end of August, the sense of panic and the “idea of just leaving everything at home and fleeing was just awful.”
Ruqaiya now worries about how her parents, whose farmlands north of Thatta were destroyed, will manage, and how her husband can support them. “He is a good man, and is trying - but we have four children of our own. My parents lost everything, they are old; my younger sisters are still dependent on them and they have no shelter,” she said.
“Women have been deeply affected. So have men, but they do not speak up as easily. Women come to me saying they feel scared all the time or burst into tears at inappropriate times. They have no idea what trauma is, but they are suffering it,” said Fareeda Aziz, a psychologist in Karachi.
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This article was produced by IRIN News while it was part of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Please send queries on copyright or liability to the UN. For more information: https://shop.un.org/rights-permissions
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