Photo: Astrid Rivera / Courtesy
We know her for her interviews, investigations and specials for ‘Despierta América’, we follow her in her advice stories or with her three children on her social networks. We see her as a panelist on ‘Sin Rollo’ and ‘Sin Rollo Extra’.
It was there precisely where this Tuesday, Astrid Rivera bravely confessed what she kept and even blocking for 31 years, what? That when she was just 7 years old she was sexually abused by an uncle.
Together with Francisca Méndez-Zampogna, Jomari Goyso, Lourdes Stephen, Marcela Sarmiento and Jessica Rodríguez, they were talking about the sentence of 19 years that actor Ricardo Crespo received found guilty of sexually abusing his own daughter since she was 4 years.
With a broken voice, tears in her eyes, when ‘Sin Rollo Extra’ was about to end, Astrid took the floor: “One of the most important things in a case like this, if your daughter tells you something like this, believe her”, she started saying but the emotion got the better of her.
Francisca, who was the moderator instead of Carlos Calderón, asked him why he was crying, and there with that courage that he uses to ask or report, he used it for her: “Because when I was 7 Years ago I went through a similar situation with an uncle of my mother, and although she believed me she couldn’t do anything, why? For not breaking up a family. And I’m 38 years old, but I’ve been waiting 37 years a forgiveness from my mother that did come, and it did come on time, but I lived 37 years of my life blaming myself for something that I did not have to blame myself for, for something that I did not have to live with
“.
Immediately, Jessi ran to hug her, and although the show ended there, was not the end of his liberation, but the beginning. Why? Because on his Instagram account, Jomari Goyso shared what they kept talking about behind the scenes.
Astrid told them that, like many times in these cases, she blocked what happened for years, both that it was only when he started moving #metoo that he began to remember.
“When many women told what had happened to them, I began to remember everything , because somehow when my mom silenced me I forgot a lot of things“, he told his colleagues.
“Last year I shared a post about when Frida Sofía was accusing her grandfather and I said ‘I believe her, I’m I think’ and for that post she sent me a Whatsapp asking for forgiveness and I told her: “I always forgave you because how do you think I was going to go through life with heartbroken having a relationship with you and not forgiving you’… Everyone has a battle”, he explained to his colleagues.
Astrid assures that today she felt that it was the day, because she went through a difficult process, of working through the pain and healing . He even related that he had told Jomari a month ago when he did her hair, he told her that he was going to save that conversation, because everything is recorded, and he assures that he did not find it, because it was never recorded.
Why did Astrid decide to share it publicly? For various reasons, one of them was to free himself and make him part of his healing, and another to help, something that he has already started doing and told his colleagues in the video that Jomari shared.
“When I started telling this about Frida Sofía, many women contacted me to tell me their story, even there was a girl who was going through the same thing in New York, and I got on a plane and rescued her from her house
… And I did things for people that I would have preferred them to do for me, it didn’t happen, but I know that I will be able to do things for women and at the end of the day I always say that there will be people willing to listen to you, that there is someone who will always believe you”.
Astrid confessed a while ago that when he was part of the army he had suffered from harassment, and that, unfortunately, that was more common than what many could imagine.
This Wednesday 10 in May, in ‘Despierta América’ Astrid will delve into the subject and will be accompanied by a specialist to begin what she considers her great mission after the pain of having been abused: to help other women.
WATCH HERE THE MOMENT IN WHICH ASTRID RIVERA CONFESSES THAT SHE WAS SEXUALLY ABUSED:
DON’T MISS THESE OTHER STORIES:
•Astrid Rivera from ‘Despierta América’ reveals that she was harassed when she was in the army
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•(If you are being a victim you can ask for help by calling 1-1184- 4-A-CHILD (1184-38-8005) )