I was born in a very religious family. Women in my father's family all wear hijab and chador and are very conservative, so much so that the only way you can be present in the family and in gatherings is to abide by their beliefs, and dress according to their wishes, otherwise you will be removed or humiliated. My mother's side of the family wears a more loose and "normal" hijab. The thing that had the greatest impact on our lives was our father and his family. From the time when I was 10 years old, I was forced to obey this mandatory coverage. The day I stood up to all of the pressure and force was a few years after my father had passed, and after I had managed to get a divorce after about six years of struggling with the tension of living with a religious family in-laws. I began my life again at 30 from below zero, and without any financial support.

It took me a year to find myself, and to understand that who I was, was entirely shaped by fear, coercion and the patriarchy that had ruled my life for 30 years. Heavy looks and stinging words related to my divorce and abandoning my chador, the long piece of clothes that cover my body like a tent, meant that I was an apostate to my father’s family..

I remember the first time I appeared at my father's home, wearing a pomegranate-red skirt, green stockings, black shirt, and a red shawl. Everyone stared with contemptuous looks that were easily interpreted as to their meaning. It can be said that my first battle for freedom of choice began within this religious family over my clothing and body. 

Gradually, this battle was dragged to the streets as I realized that my father's family was but a piece of this regime, who were doing to me exactly what the regime does to women. I was trying to bring this revolution that sparked in the family to the streets. My scarf was on my shoulder most of the time when I was out of the house. I was a mountain climber and I made sure I stuck to my choice of hijab in tall places.

Then I saw the exemplary courage of Vida Movadeh. The first woman of the “Dokhtaran-e Khiaban-e Enghlab”, the Girls of Revolutionary Street. She stood on top of a utility box in Enghelab Street, waving her scarf which was tied to a stick in protest of mandatory hijab. I saw myself and my desires for this journey very much aligned with her courage. This courage was multiplying rapidly, with videos being published under the campaign of White Wednesdays. Women were shouting out for their right to choose, removing their scarves to wave them in protest against years of oppression. This inspired me deeply every day to do something to stand united with these women.

Since I am a climber, I decided to take the white scarf, symbol of Girls of Enghelab Street and the White Wednesdays campaign to the Peak of Damavand Mountain for the first time.

In 2018, I waved a white scarf over Damavand peak at an altitude of 5610 meters. This event brought Mojgan Keshavarz and I closer together. Mojgan was also a climber, and one of the activists campaigning for women's freedom against mandatory hijab.

While Ms. Nasrin Sotoudeh, the lawyer who represented the Girls of Enghelab Street, was in prison, we tried to bring awareness to the public by talking to everyone about her on the subway and buses. In front of the Vanak morality police station, I raised my white scarf and waved it in the air, and a photo recorded that moment. We gave women on the subway white flowers, representing our basic rights and freedom of choice over our clothing, and invited them to stand united in solidarity. I remember we held our white scarves above our heads on Valiasr Street and walked to maintain and reproduce this courage. Unfortunately after a few months, all the girls who had participated were brutally arrested.

One day, when I had planned to drop off my resume at a company; my building superintendent who was colluding with the Revolutionary Guards called me back to my house claiming a water pipe had burst. When I entered my home, eight men and one woman from the Revolutionary Guards intelligence rushed into my house. They searched the whole house and confiscated all my belongings, from my laptop and hard drive to my passport and other belongings.

They blindfolded and handcuffed me, and took me to a Revolutionary Guards safe house, where I was subjected to mental and psychological torture. The screams still ring in my ears.

As soon as I arrived, I was interrogated in the famous mirror room, and spent the night in solitary confinement. It looked exactly like a grave and had no windows, and it was an unforgettable torment for me, due to my claustrophobia.

The following day, I was taken to the Ershad Prosecutor's Office to receive a temporary sentence, and then was transferred to Evin prison's solitary confinement. I had not eaten anything since the day before, and even water was given to me in small rations, so my mouth and throat were dry from stress and thirst. I was forced to sign a series of papers that I was never allowed to read.

Thereafter, with a broken body, a swollen head from pain, hunger and thirst, I was transferred to one of Evin's solitary cells, which was exactly like the cell I was in the previous night. I dealt with 15 days and nights in that cell. I can't bring to words what I endured there, whilst no one knew about my whereabouts, not even my immediate family. With threats and intimidation, they offered a call to one of my family members to say that I was with my friends up North. They quickly cut the call off, causing more concern to my family who, in those 15 days, searched all of the hospitals and police stations on foot looking for me, but found no answer anywhere, as no one had any news about me.

For the 15 hellish days and nights, I endured long and continuous interrogations that sometimes made my whole body so stiff that I could hardly get up from the interrogation chair. From the endless humiliations and insults, to the forced signatures documenting false accusations, I didn't even know if it was day or night. Sometimes I even felt glad when they called me for questioning because I would be able to pass by the stairwell and see outside through my blindfold.

Throughout all the interrogations, I sat blindfolded on a rigid and slanted chair facing the wall and answered for each and every one of my Instagram posts, stories, and activities. I will never forget the insults they made about Mrs Farokhrou Parsa because of a post of hers that I had shared on my page.

I had false red nails that they threatened to pull out. While they hit me on the back of my head, the whole time I thought that all this was because of a choice I had made, and I will never forget it.

After 15 days of solitary confinement in Evin, I was transferred to Qarchak General Crime

Prison. I spent three days in quarantine and was forced to wash my head with Tide laundry detergent to avoid catching lice. I was then transferred to Ward 5 of Qarchak. It was there that I was introduced to, and had to endure the concept of a floor sleeper in prison due to the lack of space.

In the prison, I saw some of my dear friends again, which boosted my morale. Yasman Ariyani, Monirerh Arabshahi, Saba Kordafshari, Sepideh Qoliyan, Neda Naji, and Atefeh Rangriz were there, and I found out that Mojgan Keshavarz and Fereshteh ?? are also in another ward. Later, when I was able to meet up with them, after the many difficult days of feeling the exile and stress, I felt as if I was reunited with my family with a warm embrace.

I was imprisoned in Qarchak prison for three months, and after the initial trial in August 2018, my first trial was held at Branch 28 of the Islamic Revolution Court, presided over by Judge "Maqiseh". I was charged with: "Insulting the sanctities of Islam, complicity and collusion against the country's security, cooperation with the enemy, and Masih Alinejad channel, propagandistic activity against the regime through uncovering the hijab in public places and encouraging people to do evil deeds and insulting the founder of the Islamic Republic and insulting the leadership". I was sentenced to 12 years in prison.

During all this time, I was denied the right to a lawyer, and my family was forbidden to attend my court hearing. Sometimes I could defend myself if they allowed me to. The court was held only in the presence of interrogators and the judge. In the court, I discovered the reason why they took the mandatory signatures on the second day of my arrest at the Ershad courthouse. Since they did not allow me to read any of the papers, and resorting to forceful  means and creating terror, I had signed under duress, as I had neither a lawyer, nor their experience. One of the provisions of the papers was the inability to give a bail bond, which they forced me to sign.

In my second court appearance, they suspended the five year sentence, under the condition that I not repeat the activities outlined in the charges. I was able to get a release from prison after three days. During this time, they played mind games where sometimes they would say that I would stay in prison and sometimes they would say no, I would be released on parole.

I can't put to words how I was able to put the pieces of myself together and get back on my feet. I had lost everything again; my house and all my belongings that I had worked so hard to obtain, done so with love and effort, were taken away from me again all at once.

Six months after this temporary freedom, when I went back to the Ershad Prosecutor's Office to retrieve my belongings, they said that my verdict was overturned because of a complaint from the prosecutor and that I was to be sentenced to prison again! They held a court session without me being present and reinstated the suspended sentence to 12 years again.

After a few hours of explaining how my mother is sick and the car would be abandoned on the street if they arrested me right there and then, they kept my birth certificate, the only document I had and let me take the car home and voluntarily surrender myself to prison the next day.

I really don't know how I drove home, and I kept thinking how much I couldn't bear to endure all the hardships I had been through again.

I responded positively to my brother's suggestion to escape the city overnight and take myself to the border. I said goodbye to my family and took the bus to Maku. I met the person that the family had found to arrange my crossing of the Iranian border into Turkey, and the same morning I set off on foot with a group of 20 other people towards the border. All I had packed was a climbing outfit, a t-shirt, a backpack, water, and biscuits. It was May 17, 2020, the beginning of three days and nights in the worst conditions and cold.

It was difficult for me to walk, as both of my ankles were twisted many times from running away from the border police, and I could no longer feel my legs, because of multiple blows to my ankles. We were shot at twice by the Iranian border forces, and I was very lucky to hear the bullets pass by my ear and not get shot. When we were trying to cross the barbed wire, a barb stuck in my swollen foot and took a big piece of my flesh as a souvenir and left me with unstoppable bleeding to top off all my other pains.

The next morning in the mountains, I noticed that one of the guides had stolen my smart phone from my bag and with it took part of all my remaining photos and memories with him.

On the way from Iran to Turkey, I was assaulted several times and sometimes I was molested. I was already at zero, and then I reached below zero again.

On the last night when we had to cross the Turkish border, not only could I not feel my legs, but I couldn't feel my body either. I really don't know how I was able to walk up, down and through the hills with legs that felt separated from my body. Once again, with the constant shooting of the Turkish border guards, I passed out between two large stones from weakness, dehydration, hunger, and an exhausted body. When I regained consciousness, no one was there, no officer had seen me, and all the members of that group had either fled or were arrested by the police. It was three in the morning when I woke up in the border mountains of Turkey to the sound of howling dogs or maybe wolves.

I tried to remember the last words of the group leader. He had mentioned that if you were separated from the group, that you should cross that deep river and reach the village, where other people will be looking for you. But first I had to cross that deep and cold river with a sore foot. With all the strength that I could gather, I crossed that river. In the absolute darkness of the monstrous mountains I went searching for the lights of the village. Between the mountains, my wet and lifeless body fell on the ground, and I waited for the morning in the cold.

They came and took me to the village of Dubayzid. From there, I took a bus to Istanbul. It turned out to be the wrong bus so I had to stay in Qoniyeh for three days until I finally arrived in Istanbul, where my life in exile began.

To this day, I still have pain in my ankles. At that time, I could not go to the doctor because of my situation.

There was a time when I was on the verge of being deported back to Iran, which was resolved with the support of Turkish women activists.

I have been here for three years now, and their threatening messages of acid throwing and kidnapping me in a sack to return me to Iran have become ordinary to me. I have been introduced as a refugee, and only I know how much I want my homeland to be freed so that I can return to my own country, instead of going to a country that I know nothing about.

That’s why, after the death of Jina Amini, with all of my anger and disgust for the cruelty done to women and men, I cut my hair in front of the Iranian Embassy in Istanbul, as a sign of protest and as a symbol to cut the hand of the dictator who decides for our lives. For Jina and for the moment after moment of cruelty that I lived through.

I know that I must start my life again from zero. I do not expect compensation for all the pain and tortures I went through, but I also sometimes feel that I could have been more useful and I wasn't.