Lejla Damon, now 31, was born on Christmas Day 1992 in a hospital in Sarajevo during the Balkans war. Her mother, Safa, had been held captive and raped in a concentration camp by Serbian soldiers. Lejla's adoptive British parents, Sîan and Dan Damon, were journalists working in Bosnia at the time and decided to adopt her after filming a news report about her birth.
Lejla was seven when she first learned of her adoption, but the full truth came at 18 when her parents sat her down in their home in Monmouth, Wales. They explained that her birth mother had been raped and could not care for her, and that she had been smuggled out of Bosnia in an armoured car. Lejla later watched the footage of her birth mother speaking about her trauma, saying she could not look at the baby because it reminded her of the rape.
The discovery did not make Lejla emotional immediately, but she felt compelled to find her birth mother. After a long search, she located Safa in Bosnia and the two met. Lejla's journey has been one of forgiveness, understanding that her mother's anger was directed at the violence, not at her. She now advocates for children born of war rape and works to break the stigma surrounding them.
