It is never easy to open up about your struggle when you are under constant media attention and judgments. But there are few courageous souls, who rather than be scared of judgments, come forward to talk about their struggle to help others. One such soul is Ira Khan.
Ira Khan, daughter of Aamir Khan, has recently spoken about multiple challenges that our society refuses to talk about. From mental depression to sexual abuse, Ira Khan has spoken about her struggle that many like to shy away.
After sharing a video about how she is clinically depressed, Aamir Khan’s daughter Ira Khan has now opened up on the incident which triggered the emotion inside of her. This courageous soul shared how she was abused at the age of 14 by someone she knew. Like many young kids, she also struggled to understand what abuse is. It took her a year to understand what she was going through. Soon after the realization, she reached out to her parents, Aamir Khan and Reena Dutta, for help.
Ira spoke about the abuse by someone she ‘kind of knew’.
“When I was 14, I was sexually abused. That was a slightly odd situation in the sense that I didn’t know whether the person knew what they were doing. I sort of knew them. It wasn’t happening every day. It took me about a year to be sure that they knew what they were doing,” she was heard saying in the video.
Khan further shared how she got out of the situation by seeking help from her parents.
“I immediately wrote my parents an email and got myself out of that situation. Once I was out of situation, I didn’t feel bad anymore. I wasn’t scared. I felt like this wasn’t happening to me anymore, and it is over. I moved on and let go,” she said.
In her video, Ira also spoke about her parents’ divorce – Aamir and his ex-wife Reena Dutta. Sharing how every divorce doesn’t mean a broken family, she mentioned:
“When I was small, my parents got divorced. But that didn’t seem like something that would traumatise me because my parents’ divorce was amicable. They are friends, the whole family is still friends. We are not a broken family by any means,” she said.
Ira added in her video that even the amicable divorce was a privilege she had.
“My parents were very good about being parents to Junaid and me, even after divorce. And when people would say ‘Oh I am so sorry to hear about your parents’ divorce, I would be like (shrugs) ‘What are you talking about? It is not a bad thing. Another privilege I didn’t realise. It could be something that could scar you. It didn’t scar me. I don’t remember most of it but I didn’t feel like my parents’ divorce is something that could bother me. So that can’t be the reason why I am feeling so sad.”
Here’s the video, where Ira shared her depression struggle, coping up with parents’ divorce, and being sexually abuse:
At IFORHER, we are in awe of Ira’s courage to come forward to share her struggle with others. In a society where many are told to suffer in silence, we need more courageous souls like Ira! We wish Ira all the strength and hope she would soon be able to overcome her struggle!