On July 14, 2016, 4-year-old Kenza narrowly escaped death when a truck deliberately drove into the crowd present en masse on the Promenade des Anglais for the National Day fireworks display in Nice. Her mother, Hager Ben Aouissi, just has time to tackle her to the ground. Both pass between the wheels of the heavy weight of 19 tons. They come out alive, but the shock is immense. The images of dying victims, of lifeless bodies, sometimes horribly mutilated, imprinted themselves on the little girl’s memory.
“Since then, she has completely regressed, she has become a baby again”, laments Hager Ben Aouissi. In the two years following the attack, “She kept saying she wanted to go back to my belly. She took the pacifier, the bottle, she was doing it”, she details. Today, Kenza is 10 years old and it still happens that at certain times, her mother gives her diapers.
The little girl is also the prey of reminiscences which cause her violent attacks of anguish. Regularly, she thinks she sees the images of the night of July 14. “One time it was because of cardboard tubes sticking out of a dumpster. She was screaming for half an hour, ‘I don’t want to see those legs!’ It was impossible to calm her down.” remembers his mother, who founded the association Une Voie des Enfants. He also happens to draw frantically on hundreds of sheets in an hour. Always with the same motif: the white truck, its bleeding mother next to it.
Kenza is followed by Michèle Battista, from the Lenval foundation, at the Nice University Hospital. HASAlongside Professor Florence Askenazy, cThis child psychiatrist leads a research program called “14-7” which aims to assess the traumatic symptoms of children aged 0 to 18, direct or indirect victims of the attack.
A total of 300 young people are taking part in this study, which is unique in Europe. “Counting the parents, we follow nearly 900 people in total, and this number is not locked: we continue to include children, even today”explains Michèle Battista, recalling that never have so many minors been affected so massively by a terrorist attack on French soil.
The provisional results, published in 2019, are instructive: more than 60% of children monitored suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Among the most characteristic symptoms is the avoidance of anything that suggests the attack. “In Nice, the most present fear is that of the truck. It’s impressive”, noted in particular Florence Askenazy, during her testimony at the trial, on September 15. There are also physiological manifestations, “with children who develop inflammatory diseases, who always have pain somewhere“, specifies Michèle Battista.
Some also develop sleep disturbances “sometimes very disabling“, a certain irritability, even great anger and school phobias that can lead to a total dropout of school. Still others are subject to reliving, these sudden flashbacks in which the victims see the images of the scene again traumatic.
These symptoms, Ornella, 18, knows them by heart. After narrowly avoiding the truck, his mother and stepfather – who was then a volunteer firefighter – rescued the victims for more than three hours. The teenager, then 12 years old, remained on the beach with a young student, crossed a few minutes before, while waiting for their return. On the walk, his childish eyes had time to see corpses, including a woman, almost scalped. “It is this image that remains in his head”says his mother, Laetitia Robbe.
“She exploded a few months later, in October, in the middle of German class, after a simple reflection from her teacher.” Since, it multiplies the temper tantrums and becomes uncontrollable. “She could lift furniture, smash dishes and be violent, even if I managed to hold back some blows”describes the quarantine.
“Growing up, Ornella started turning that violence against her. She was banging her head against the wall, throwing punches and threatening to kill herself.”
Laetitia Robbe, mother of a child who witnessed the attackat franceinfo
“The attack for us was the start of the tsunami”, blows Laetitia Robbe. Gradually, Ornella learned to control her anger, helped by the psychotherapy sessions and the drug treatment she was offered. The young woman measures 1.65 m for 42 kg, “eats well, but his nervousness and anxiety are blocking his weight gain”slips his mother.
Tom, on the contrary, has gained a lot of weight in recent years “because of stress and treatments”, explains his father, Bruno Fossard. He was 14 when he managed to avoid the truck, as was his sister Emma, 16 at the time. Both had time to see the carnage around them, before running to safety with their parents.
Subsequently, the brother and sister reacted in opposite ways. “From the start of the school year, Emma no longer spoke of the attack. She returned to a form of denial. The shrinks said that it was a time bomb that should be watched”, says his father. Tom himself has exteriorized. He initially continued to attend college, despite having sleepless nights and recurring nightmares. But he fell asleep in class and began to trigger phobias: he was seized with anxiety as soon as he left his house. In October 2016, he stopped classes and never went back.
Tom has been on antidepressants since 2017. “The treatment stupefies him”, confides Bruno Fossard sadly. The money from the Guarantee Fund, dedicated to the victims of attacks, nevertheless allowed him to resume home lessons in September 2021. “He lasted until February this year and he stopped because he couldn’t follow, to concentrate.” Her son began to drink alcohol in large quantities, withdrew into himself. He ended up losing his friends who did not understand his condition. “You’re lucky to be alive though!” he heard himself say several times.
People who suffer from stress disorders post-traumatic often find themselves confronted with the incomprehension of those around them. “There is a side ‘must move on, must forget’, ‘manage to make it a strength'”, notes Thierry Baubet, child psychiatrist specializing in psychological trauma and co-director of the CN2R, National Center for Resources and Resilience.
“People murder you with sentences”, laments Laetitia Robbe. Recently, her daughter came out of her classroom crying after photos of the war in Ukraine were shown in history and geography class. The CPE then launched “It’s been five and a half years since the attack took place, we’ll have to move on.” The mother also regrets the lack of adaptation of Ornella’s high school. “She is often absent because she has anxiety attacks that prevent her from going out. School life knows this very well, but each time I am asked to explain the reasons, it is exhausting”she gets annoyed.
“Problems related to school are the biggest concern of parents”, points out Hager Ben Aouissi. Many children have developed hyperactivity problems, attention deficits. And very often, teachers do not know how to react.
“It is important that the teacher understands that violent crises can occur because of flashbacks and not at all because of what is happening in class. He must not take it against him.”
Thierry Baubet, psychiatristat franceinfo
Michèle Battista acknowledges that “everything is not done at school for children on this subject” and particularly regrets that the requests for school life auxiliaries (AVS) in Nice have not “almost never succeeded”. “There is still a lot of work to do.adds his colleague Thierry Baubet. But we ask so much of National Education, with so few means…”
Can these children, teenagers and young adults hope, one day, to succeed in leaving their traumas behind? “You have to try to be optimistic and tell yourself that the worst has already happened”underlines Thierry Baubet, who notably followed dozens of victims of the attacks of November 13, 2015. “You have to accept that this event took place and that you have to deal with it. But you can rediscover the taste for life, a little different from what you imagined, but in which you can find a lot of happiness, despite the scars, assures Thierry Baubet.
While the victims are preparing to testify to the tragedy, everyone is moving forward, small steps by small steps. Kenza panics less at the sight of a truck. Frantic drawings tend to decrease. For her part, Ornella has started EMDR sessions, a therapy that helps treat traumatic memories. “The effects have been incredible, she has a lot less anxiety“, rejoices Laetitia Robbe. The teenager has just returned to the final year and already knows that she wants to work in finance.
Tom is also making immense progress: he decided this summer to challenge himself and go alone for a week in Greece. He has returned “transformed” according to his father, for whom he is a real “click”. “For the first time, he talks about goals: he wants to resume his studies in September, doing a work-study program”he says.