Kajo is a 50 year old female born into a Christian home in Nigeria. She is married with 3 children. She did not have an intimate attachment with her parents when she was growing up. She was being confided within the space of her home while she was growing up and was not allowed to have friends come to play with her or even go out to play with friends. At the age of 13, she was raped by a neighbor 5 years older than her while his sisters made jests of her despite her screaming for help and she could not relate the incident to her parents. On the day she was raped, she tried to narrate the incident to her Sunday school teacher who was working as a manager in her father’s business establishment. Instead of counselling her, he tried to rape her as well. Coming from a part of the world where, there is no system to intervene in such case, she kept it to herself. She found solace in her friends in school (as this is the only place she could relate with friends), who introduced her to smoking cigarette. She continued to smoke and this became an addiction. She tried to hide her addiction from the society including her children who has never seen her smoking, though she claimed that sometimes she suspects that they know, but they have never confronted her about it. She is a minister in church and she lives her life in this double-faced image, as no one knows she smokes. She hides to smoke except in the presence of her husband who is also a smoker. She tried to stop but since the husband is also a smoker, she is finding it difficult to stop. Even when she tried to stop there is always a relapse as she sees it as a way to relax her when she is stressed or depressed. She is now trying to relate her shame of the rape incident to the addiction, she feels that the rape incident must have led her into smoking, in order to find solace and suppress the trauma she went through. She tends to rush back home as she doesn’t smoke in public and she enjoys staying indoors because she finds satisfaction in it and uses smoking as a stress relief. She often avoids friends so that her secret act will not be disclosed. Though she is trying to stop but she is finding it had to.

Develop this story as a reflection paper, relating to the person, as she struggles with the process and/or substance addiction.