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Aotearoa in 20: Torranice Campel was abused as a child – now she encounters some of her abusers as a social worker

Thursday, 3 September 2020

Torranice Campel suffered sexual and mental abuse as she struggled with her gender identity growing up. She's become a social worker in the hope other young people will not have to endure what she did as a child.

A South Auckland transgender woman became a social worker in the hope that youth would not have to endure what she did as a child. Torranice Campel shares her story for Aotearoa in 20, a Stuff special project.

WARNING: This story addresses grave sexual abuse and suicide.

I never wanted to be a social worker when I was younger. I thought social workers were those people that took babies from their mothers and that was it.

All I wanted to do was make it through the school day without being sexually abused. The first time they did it, they forced me to give them oral sex, and then they peed on me and laughed.

I feel like I was deprived of my education because from there on, my focus went out the door, I didn’t really care about education, I cared about survival.

Sometimes I would dream about jobs I could do. I thought maybe I could be a checkout operator at Woolworths in Māngere. The supermarket workers always smiled, they chatted to the customers, and they were always nice to me. They were the only ones who were nice when I was younger.

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Torranice Campel didn’t know she was transgender until she was in her teenage years.
Torranice Campel didn’t know she was transgender until she was in her teenage years.

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Torranice Campel became a social worker in the hope that youth would not have to endure what she did as a child.
Torranice Campel became a social worker in the hope that youth would not have to endure what she did as a child.

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**

There wasn’t much time to concentrate on work when I was in school, so my reading and writing skills weren’t very good. I avoided sports and physical education, too. Teachers didn’t like me much because of that. One time, a teacher beat me up and I didn’t say anything because I felt like I deserved it because of who I am.

Torranice Campel knew from a very young age that she wasn’t like the other boys.
Torranice Campel knew from a very young age that she wasn’t like the other boys.

I tried to avoid the boys’ toilets because that’s where my abusers would wait. But every time I went into the girls’ toilet block, I would get in trouble.

I knew from a very young age that I wasn’t like the other boys I knew. I tried to be. I would model behaviour from other males I considered to be a typical heterosexual and I would walk like them, and try to make my voice not as high. It didn’t work, though. Kids would tease me, strangers would point at me and say mean names.

I didn’t know I was transgender until I was in my teens. I can’t remember what age it was, maybe 17? I heard the word “transgender” and someone explained what it meant and for the first time, I thought, wow, that’s me – I’m transgender.

As a child I felt lonely, I felt isolated, I felt there was no one I could relate to. Being Pasifika, and being brought up religious it wasn’t safe to be transgender and it wasn’t tolerated. It wasn’t safe to be me. My home environment wasn’t safe either, it was kind of like Once Were Warriors.

Torranice Campel wants people from the LGBTQI+ community to feel safe, comfortable and included.
Torranice Campel wants people from the LGBTQI+ community to feel safe, comfortable and included.

Being visible outside the normality of heterosexuality was seen as a bad thing. I remember feeling angry a lot, and angry at God for making me like this.

When I was a teenager, I became a street worker. Working the streets gave me the acceptance I was after, that I wasn’t able to get elsewhere. But it didn’t last long before I spiralled.

I would think about dying and what dying looked like. I didn’t want to be a burden or upset people because that’s all I would experience: people’s anger because of how I presented. I ended up in a mental health facility after trying to take my own life. That’s around the time things started to change for me.

I remember waking up and seeing this lady at the end of my bed. She was very abrupt and told me she was there to help. And I remember trying to make sense of what was happening but also thinking: “OK lady, I’m not in the mood to talk to you.” I was also scared because I thought being under mental health care meant they were going to put me in an asylum in a padded room or something.

After I was discharged, I started thinking about what I wanted to do with my life. I knew I wanted to help people, and I wanted to be a positive support in a person’s life.

Torranice Campel has worked for Oranga Tamariki, has been a foster carer and has worked in a child protection role in Melbourne.
Torranice Campel has worked for Oranga Tamariki, has been a foster carer and has worked in a child protection role in Melbourne.

So I flipped through a university prospectus and I read about being a social worker. It said that you can choose what your role in a person’s life is. I thought about how this career could provide positivity in the rainbow community, and how it could provide support to people of diversity.

I’ve always had the tendency to give. I didn’t have that support when I was younger, so I thought if I pursued this, I could help others out there like me.

When I was 19, I gained a six-month social work certificate and I went to work for a local organisation, who then went on to support me through a social work degree. I have just turned 30, so that was a few years ago now.

When I first started in the profession, one of my abusers came into my work. He came in under a probation order to start anger management and I opened that door for him. When I saw him, I knew it was him straight away but I pretended I didn’t know him.

I buried a lot of that stuff. I blamed myself and thought I was the reason these things happened to me. I thought I should have just been a boy but, as much as I would try to force myself to be my assigned gender at birth, I just couldn’t.

I’ve come across a few of my abusers in my profession. They don’t remember who I am, but I remember them. I blocked out a lot of the abuse from when I was in school, but it is also a reminder of why I do what I do.

I’ve had a great career. I’ve worked for Oranga Tamariki, I’ve been a foster carer, and before Covid, I was working in a child protection role in Melbourne, Australia.

People from the LGBTQI+ community are always being left out; we face stigma and discrimination when applying for housing and jobs, and many struggle with being accepted by their families.

We have a lot to offer. All we want is to feel safe, to feel comfortable, to feel included. We want to go to school knowing we’re going to get an education and not be deprived of it because of bullies or abusers.

We want to go into public spaces without being attacked. People from the LGBTQI+ community just want to be happy.

I remember wanting to feel like that, as a child, as a teenager. And today, I can say that I am, I am happy.

As told to Donna-Lee Biddle for Aotearoa in 20, a Stuff project.

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