This interview originally aired on "In the Moment" on SDPB Radio.
Achut Deng is the author of the powerful memoir "Don't Look Back." It is the 2024 One Book Siouxland title.
A note to listeners: This interview includes descriptions of violence, war, sexual assault and suicide.
At 6 years old, Deng was driven out of her village in South Sudan on foot with her grandmother and her beloved dog by her side. They were separated from family and fleeing from rebel soldiers.
It was the middle of the night. The escape was bloody and harrowing.
Deng's dog was soon lost. Her grandmother died while protecting her from execution by soldiers. After walking more than a thousand miles and surviving captivity, illness, injury, treacherous terrain and near-starvation, Deng arrived at Kakuma Refuge camp in Kenya, where she lived for 10 years of her childhood.
In the camp, she was adopted and protected by a friend of her mother's until extended family members demanded the child leave the single woman behind to live with them.
Eventually, Deng would find her way to America, only to begin another fight for survival. One of the older boys in her group sexually assaulted her repeatedly and controlled her every moment outside of their apartment. She did not have words in English to explain what was happening to her.
Her memoir tells the story of the cost of war, the complexities of coming to America and what it means to fight for your own life.
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The following transcript was auto-generated and edited for clarity.
Achut Deng:
"Don't Look Back," to start with the title, it's from my grandmother, from the night of fleeing my village. And so we walked in the middle of the night and I was scared. I was only 6 years old.
And she said, "Achut, don't look back. It will slow you down."
And thus, I took that to my heart. So every time I find myself in a flashback, I'm like, "No, don't look back," so I just keep pushing forward.
She saved me, and I want the world to see that. You can visit your past, but make sure you are visiting it to move forward. Don't let that still control you.
So that's why I wanted that title.
Life at Kakuma refugee camp was a disaster. That place is super hot. You sleep outside.
For school, a class would be one teacher and 120 students or 200. There's no pencil; there's no papers.
So the life in Kakuma refugee camp was just a life of hope, was just a life of hope. I buried my friends. You go to bed with your friends, your classmates, and tomorrow you go to school and they're not there, so you just wait for your time to come.
That life in Kakuma refugee camp, it was just terrifying. You just wait for your moment to come.
Kakuma refugee camp, too, was the place that I learned how to forgive because I was there as an orphan from one tribe, and the other tribe that we had a fight with, they had their own orphans. So when I look at that, everybody's losing on both sides. These children are over here. So the Dinka is going to the other tribe and killing them. The other tribe is coming over here, so it was a back and forth.
When I see these kids are going through the same struggle that I'm going through, I had to let that go. I didn't see the point of me holding that, because they didn't do it. I didn't do that. So I really had to look deep into me and say, "I have to let it go."
So I learned forgiveness.
And the path forward; coming to America. Just the name, America, people were explaining that, "Oh, my God, America is so awesome. It's a nice place. You have a chance of life, you have a chance of everything."
So when I did my interview, I was not saying what everybody was saying, "I want to be a doctor. I want to be a teacher. I want to be..." all kinds of good things in the world. I told this man, "Hey, I'm not aiming for that. I just want a life. I'm still a kid. If I can hold onto, if I can still enjoy these few years of my childhood, I'll be happy. I just want life."
So I didn't want to live in a fear of or in a hope. So when I got that chance and come to the United States, of course, I was happy. But then that life turned into a nightmare.
When I was in Kakuma refugee camp, I never thought of killing myself because I knew God was there, but also, death was all over the place. You just waited for your time. But now I'm in America, there's food everywhere. There are some great teachers, great health care, so I know if I get sick, they are going to save me. So chances of just dying were never there.
And the things that I was going through. I felt alone. I was going through sexual assault. I'm being told not to say anything. "Keep silent. If you say something, no one is going to believe you because you can't explain that." So I felt really alone.
I was in the world that I did not have the voice. I find myself just standing there in the world. Now, I feel lonely.
When I was in Kakuma refugee camp, if I felt like that, at least I have friends. If I ever have to reflect back on this, I would have people. But when I came here, I didn't have nobody. I didn't have friends. There was no one for me to run to, to tell them.
So I consider taking my life away was the best, but my grandmother came back. I felt her. I heard her sound. Her last words when she died was, "You are strong."
And when she said that, I let everything go. Everything that I had prepared to take my life away. rope, I had that and then a knife. I put them down and I deal with that until December of 2002. And that's when I finally just ran away.
And so, I was placed in a group home and then transfer to Kansas City.
My hope in those moments after my grandmother showed up in the closet was, "You know what? I'm going to grow up. I'm going to be an adult. I'm going to be able to take care of myself. I can't right now, but there is tomorrow."
So that was my hope. And that is everything in that book. And that's what I want people to know and to understand.
I also want people to just be aware of your surrounding because you never know. A lot of people, including me, can have a mask at Walmart. I can have a mask on at my job. But then when I'm done with the outside world and go back home, it's a nightmare. So I really want people to have an open eye.
Lori Walsh:
Yeah. When you are a child escaping, not only your brain isn't developed, you don't understand the things that are happening. The things that you do understand are things no child should ever have to be confronted with.
Achut Deng:
Not at all.
Lori Walsh:
And so much of the loss is just deferred. You can't grieve, you can't cry. You can't stop. You can't look back.
Achut Deng:
You become numb.
Lori Walsh:
You become numb and completely surviving. But you are saying goodbye again and again and again.
Achut Deng:
Again and again.
Lori Walsh:
Because either of a death or because you have to leave before your mother can find out where you're at.
Achut Deng:
Yes.
Lori Walsh:
To even come to America and saying, "I have to leave behind these people who aren't going to get out, and I feel guilty." Too guilty to eat the food that you know they cannot eat.
Achut Deng:
I still have that. I still have that guilt. I still have that.
It's hard for me to go to a restaurant and post a plate of my food because I'm like, "Oh, my God, what if somebody that I'm friend with sees it?" My own brothers are still in Kakuma refugee camp. And if I post this and they see it, I still have that guilt. So it is hard.
Lori Walsh:
In Houston, you go into a store for clothes and there are enough clothes in that store to give to the entire population of Kakuma refugee camp. And that disconnect, that stress. And yet, you need clothes. So here we are wearing clothes.
Did working with another author on the book, did spending time telling your story, help you sort through any of that?
Achut Deng:
Keely Hutton, who helps me with the book, she has her own way of writing book. We spent two weeks so that she can get to know me, so that I can trust her.
It was Keely first that is going to hear me. I will have to be honest and comfortable enough to tell my story. And then after her, my audience was my children. And I told her, "My story is not great. And I don't want it to be raw. I don't want my children to open the book and read it and put it down. I don't want my children to be bullied at school."
And so the way she did that, she did an amazing job because it's not happening. High school kids, middle school kids are reading it and they see themselves. Anywhere I go now it's like, "Oh, my God, thank you." And even the first generation of refugees that goes, "How can I ask my parents? I want to know them. Where should I start it?"
And that's a blessing. So, having Keely help me was great because she took her time when I was emotional. Because some chapters, I go through that in that moment. For example, the death of my grandmother, I never had a chance.
I was told, "She's gone." When somebody asked me, "What's the last thing that you can remember?"
And if I go, it becomes live to me. It's like her blood. That chapter was real. And it took me to a different level of terror at my age and at this age as an adult. And when that was happening, she took her time. And through writing the book as well, I went through the trouble, the nightmares.
So I was able to be open to myself and call for help. So I was going through therapy once a week.
Lori Walsh:
Good, yeah. What was it like when your own sons turned 6 and 16 and watching them have a childhood, thinking back, reliving your own?
"I was 10 once, and I remember what was happening when I was 10."
Achut Deng:
It's a gift for me, because I refuse for my children not to have what I had never have. And even writing the book, my youngest one was 6 at the time. And when I was talking to them about the starvation in Kakuma, my youngest one, he goes, "Mom, is that why you don't want us to leave any food on the plate? Is that why you tell us to finish the food?"
And I said, "Oh my God, yes."
I did not realize for real, this is actually my past. Or when they throw the food away, it's like, "Don't do that. Why do you do that?"
And so all of them join into that, "Yes, mom. You shop and shop and then the food go bad and expired, and that's not good for you. You work too hard."
Right there at that moment, I realized, "Yes, I was living my past still."
So every birthday and when they turned 10 and 15 and 16, it's like, "These are still children."
At 16, I was going through this. I was never laughing. There was no laughing moments for me. I was emotionally abused, physically and mentally. There was no life in me. I was just empty. And so every time I do the birthday for them, of course I go back. I was this once and this is what happened to me.
I think that is probably going to stop at age 21 for me because that's when I felt like I got myself. This is it for me. But right now, I still go. I still go, "At this age, this was going on with me." So then I go above and beyond to put a smile on them. Yes, yes.
Lori Walsh:
A little something for the you as a child, too. Some delight that you get to re-experience.
Achut Deng:
Yes. And because I don't know my birthday, everybody's birthday is mine. Yes. You have a birthday today? I'm coming if you told me or if I know, I'm coming, it's my birthday, too.
[Laughter]
Lori Walsh:
This moment that you talked about in the closet where you are looking at a rope and a knife and you're thinking, "Well, I'm going to have to do something to make this stop. I'm going to have to end this on my own."
And then you choose not to because of your grandmother. This is a moment where you are choosing survival partially because you have already survived so much. Talk about the difference between hope that there might be something else to planning for I'm going to be 18 in two years, in one year, in 19 months.
What was it like to learn how to plan for a future? Because in America, people ask kids what they want to be when they grow up when they're 6. So in some ways, they're planning for an adulthood at a very young age.
You do this at a later age when you have the capacity to all of a sudden say, "I can ask for something more. I can ask for something more for myself." What was that change like in you?
Achut Deng:
When I graduate, I was 20. Can you imagine that high school, when I was freshman, I was 16. I live my life. I live in a moment.
So when I was in that closet and my grandmother came that moment and the word, "You are strong," I was upset at her. "I want to come to you. I'm tired of this life. I'll be saved when I'm there."
But when she said, "You are strong," and I remember that, I said, "Okay."
I would just take it one day at a time just like I did in the past. So to be honest with you, I never have any plans. Yes, my hope at that moment when I said, "Okay," when I'm 18, these things that I'm going through will not happen to me because I will have the chance to say, "Back away, I'm grown. Don't do this."
And so, that was my thing. I was on a survival mode. It wasn't even about, "When I'm 18, I will go to college. When I'm 18, I will make money." I was not even thinking about that.
It was just, "When I'm 18, this sexual assault that I'm going through, no one is ever, ever going to do it to me because I'm going to be an adult."
I start learning in America, when you are 18, you are considered as an adult. I'm like, "When I'm 18, this man is not going to say, 'Oh, you are a child. Nobody believes children.'"
And by then I should be able to express and explain how I feel or what I'm going through. So I live my life in a moment. I don't have plans.
Now my children, they have goals and short-terms and dreams, and I love that for them. "Mom, we want to do this. We want to be this." I love that, because their life is amazing and I would die for them to experience my life. So I am super, super happy that they had the chance to have the dreams and plan ahead.
Lori Walsh:
What does healing look like for you now?
Achut Deng:
Since I put my life to the world, I feel so light. I feel light. I don't feel embarrassed. I don't feel ashamed. I don't feel like somebody is judging me. It's like, "Okay, well if there's somebody out there that is judging me, that's their issue. It's not mine."
So I feel very good about it. And right now, I have time to say, "Do you know what? I'm going to take 20 minute to myself. No TV, no phone. Kids, go do whatever you want. I want to sit here with nothing going on. I just want to stare at the sky." And it just give me peace. Or listening to music or going to the gym. So I'm giving myself alone time a little by little.
Lori Walsh:
What's one of your best memories?
Achut Deng:
For before Kakuma, if I go back that far, it would be when my name changed all of a sudden, and I got confused. Some people are calling me Rachel. And then my grandmother say, "No, she is not a Rachel."
And so she pulled me aside and she said, "Your name is Achut and will always be a Achut." And she explained the definition why I was named that.
And she say, "Never forget who you are."
Lori Walsh:
What do you wish was in place for new refugees, new people seeking asylum? What would've made it easier for you?
Achut Deng:
When people come to this country, and I'm talking about the experience that I went through and I still see this, refugees or immigrants or someone will come here and be told, "Oh, I'm giving you six weeks. I will pay your apartment. And in six weeks or three months you have to find a job."
Okay? You want this person to find a job. They don't know how to drive. Now you just leave them there and say, "I can't pay for your light. I can't pay for your apartment." Now this person you just put them out there to the world with no access. Yeah, the organization might be able to come back maybe every two months or every year, but the organization is there for that first six months.
It's not enough for them to learn how to drive and be able to take care of themselves. So I really wish that the system can go deeper and see more instead of saying, "Okay, I don't have enough money to support you. I want you to go to work now so you can pay taxes. I want you to go to work now so you can support this and pay us back."
If that was the thing you bring them to this country, you are wrong. Then you did that because of business. That's the way I look at it right now. And so I would wish that all of these organizations, I appreciate them.
They gave me life. I came here with nothing but open-toed shoes. Today, I am a house owner. I have a house. My children have cars. I did that. Me. I did it. Sometimes, I don't believe it. I'm like, "Oh, my God, did I really did this?"
I do two jobs, three jobs, because I don't want to fail like I did. Everything that happened to me, I was a child. So I can't dwell on that. So I'm like, "Okay, it's a wrap. Forget my past. Now I'm an adult. I'm going to do this for me. I'm going to work."
My light is not going to get cut off. It's not going to get cut off because I don't have enough money. I'm going to find another part-time job.
So when I say we are refugees, we want to work. But we want guidance. We want guidance.
