Immigrant women are overrepresented in shelters for victims of domestic violence, a phenomenon on the rise. Even permanent residents may be more vulnerable because of their immigration process.
Ivonne Fuentes, never the same again
After being thrown onto the street with her two teenage daughters, it was she, rather than her abusive partner, who felt caught up in her emotions. “I was very ashamed, because I thought people were going to say that I had used it to immigrate,” says Ivonne Fuentes, who married a Quebecer in 2015.
It is she who, by writing to Duty, was the spark that sparked an investigation that spanned many weeks. “I think it’s very important that many women know what happened to me, so that they don’t experience the same thing,” she wrote in her original post.
A confidence in the desire to tell his story openly, but which falters when talking about his difficult journey.
She arrived in Granby in 2017 with her two daughters, then teenagers, after several years of a long-distance relationship and travel between Mexico and Quebec. Her partner was introduced to her by mutual acquaintances, and they got married.
Upon arrival, they are already permanent residents. Her Quebecois husband sponsored them. He therefore committed to the government to take care of their basic needs for three years (and more in the case of the two teenagers), such as providing them with food, clothing and accommodation.
Even when they sign the sponsorship commitment, Ivonne considers that “at no time does a woman receive information about her rights in Canada”.
Pretty quickly, “it started to change very drastically.” What she describes as a great asymmetry sets in: “He didn’t wash his clothes, he only put them on the floor,” says Ivonne. But it didn’t bother me,” being used to doing a lot at home. “I think a lot of people think that if you’re married to a woman from Mexico, she’s a woman to clean your house,” she adds.
Above all, it is the sudden angry reactions that begin to create a permanent state of stress in her: “One day, I forgot to wash his lunch Tupperware, and he got angry because of that,” she says. -her as an example. She had also disconnected the microwave because she wasn’t using it: “He started insulting me because of the microwave and telling me that I didn’t want to fit in and adapt to how the things are being done in Quebec. »
The mother, wife and new Quebecer nevertheless quickly formed friendships, both with classmates in the French course and through cultural activities. “It’s certain that she had good cards in her game” thanks to her rapid integration, underlines Claire, a worker at Maison Alice-Desmarais, a shelter where Ivonne will stay.
Ivonne wants to say, like many other women, that nothing “predisposed” her to suffer this violence. An artist and professional dancer, she had always studied, traveled and worked as she pleased. She is not only an independent woman, but also someone active in her community. Violence knows no barriers, according to Claire, who preferred to withhold her last name for security reasons. “I can assure you that there really are some in all neighborhoods, in all walks of life and in all professional, but also economic, spheres. »
Tumble
At the end of November 2017, less than a year after her arrival, Ivonne wanted to install a Christmas tree in the living room. She has to move some furniture to do this. “He started shouting, he said not to scratch the floor, that it was his house and his furniture,” she recounts. He pushes her, then locks himself in the adjoining bathroom and starts punching the wall.
When he comes out of the bathroom, Ivonne pretends to want to escape the discussion. He then grabs her by the neck and pins her against the wall, before shaking her and throwing her to the ground.
“I remember his eyes. […] I had never seen a person so angry in my entire life,” she said.
A friend notices a change in her in the following weeks. Her French teacher invited a representative from Maison Alice-Desmarais shortly after to demystify what domestic violence is and talk about support and listening services. “But it wasn’t clicking in my head yet,” recalls Ivonne Fuentes.
She will recount this violent event in the same terms to the workers at Maison Alice-Desmarais, as well as to a friend. The following winter, in 2018, she began external follow-up with this help resource, while the climate remained very tense at home.
“There was a lot of control, because I felt all the time that if I did something wrong according to him, he was going to get angry. » One day when her partner gets angry, he tells her that he is preparing “a big surprise” for her. Ivonne then prepares to leave home with her daughters; a place is ready for them in a shelter.
Despite her fear of what could have happened, above all she feels thrown out on the street, “like trash”. After leaving his native land for love, the wound is deep.
She rebuilds herself little by little, finds a job, an apartment, begins the divorce process requested and recognized due to “mental cruelty”. She is then not entitled to social assistance, because it is still her ex-husband who, by virtue of sponsorship, was responsible for her and her daughters.
Ivonne ends up exiled in a small community on the Lower North Shore. A little to put distance between her and her ex-husband, she admits, but also to find a simpler life, at her own pace.
In fact, he was diagnosed with fibromyalgia, a disease associated with chronic pain. A psychiatrist also determined that she was experiencing depression and anxiety. “My doctor told me that yes, stress could create this illness,” she says, without insisting on proving the cause. “A doctor told me it could be post-traumatic shock. I didn’t understand the trauma, because I wasn’t in a war. But the war was at home. »
Lucienne, the long-time immigrant
Lucienne spoke for 90 minutes, all at once, almost without interruption. As if to make up for all the years she was silent.
She arrived from Cameroon in 2011 with her husband and their two children. She was then pregnant with her third, and the family moved several times during the first year. His identity cannot be revealed in order to protect that of his children.
Shortly after their arrival, they go to the bank to open a joint account. Family allowances from both levels of government are therefore deposited there, but the mother does not have access to this money: “I did not have the right to touch the money in the joint account. If I touched him, I was to get a reprimand. […] He was saying how he’s the one who has the right, he’s the one who brought me here. »
She therefore had to ask for money drop by drop, she says, even to buy milk for her youngest. She frequents community centers for children’s clothing and food banks to meet their needs. “When I asked him for money, he had to make conditions, either that I would sleep with him to get it. »
Attracted by a course on starting a business, she also had to ask him for permission to enroll. Subsequently, she began doing housework and made a few hundred dollars from it. She quickly obtained larger contracts, particularly on renovation and construction sites. “My husband started to get jealous,” says Lucienne.
The story she continues to unfold is that of a woman who fights for her children – soon to be five in number – and who gains her independence through the sweat of her brow, by carving out a place for herself with a husband. controlling”.
“And when I called my parents to tell them, they were like, ‘No, calm down, that’s what men are. You shouldn’t complain too much. Men do that, there are others who do worse than that,’” she explains.
There were also beatings, she points out. She called the police twice over the years, but each time she feared that filing a complaint would turn against her: “He worked so hard in my head, I told myself that I was at fault. »
Shortly after she gave birth to their fourth child, in 2017, he notably put his hands to her neck, pressed, then put his hand in her mouth to pull her jaw, she describes. She then bit him to defend herself.
The fact that she had been a permanent resident for a long time did not prevent her ex-partner from using immigration to manipulate her: “He always told me that it was he who brought me here, to Canada. I do not have the right [d’appeler la police] because if he had [eu] the possibility of bringing me in, he could have me expelled. »
She says today that she regrets having believed him: “I was stupid there. So I couldn’t understand that by being a permanent resident, I had the same rights as him since I set foot on the earth. »
She compares all these years of cohabitation to “brainwashing” by her husband, made worse by pressure from her extended family. “People are always telling you to put yourself down in front of your husband, [tu penses] that the family, what will they say? What will people say too. »
Lucienne trained as a beneficiary attendant in 2019 and has been working in this profession ever since. Little by little, she says, fear gave way to more confidence and a certain independence. Her husband begins to threaten to kill her among other insults, a threat uttered in front of the children: “Often he says: “You don’t know my animal side.” »
She finally filed a complaint in October 2022 and four counts were brought against her ex-husband for assault and death threats over a period from 2015 to 2022. He pleads not guilty.
“Since he left, it’s true that I feel relieved because before I was very thin, […] I was like a walking paper in the street. Well, I wasn’t myself. Now, I’m a little more myself,” she notes. The steps are multiple and rather cumbersome, admits this mother. Not being eligible for legal aid to finance her divorce, she is therefore looking for a lawyer.
Need help ?
If you are a victim of domestic violence, you can call the SOS domestic violence emergency line at 1 800 363-9010.
Need help ? Contact À coeur d’homme (by telephone: 418 660-7799, toll-free 1 877 660-7799), or go to quebec.ca/famille-et-soutien-aux-personnel to contact organizations helping men in difficulty.
Directed by The duty, the first episode of the podcast Twice locked, which gives voice to the victims cited in this investigation, can be listened to online. The next episodes will be released over the coming weeks.