When the repatriation of Afghan refugees began, her world collapsed. Her dreams, her education, her fragile sense of home-everything scattered. Some of her relatives were arrested, others were sent back to Afghanistan, and she remained in Peshawar with a few close family members.

Now even the morning sunlight feels foreign to her. She cannot go to university, nor move freely. She has been stopped at police checkpoints several times, escaping only with the help of Pakistani friends, though they cannot protect her forever.

Shabkha is now alone in a city where she can neither raise her voice nor seek help.

Sometimes she looks at her mother, whose eyes seem permanently wet with tears, and quietly wonders,“How long will this continue? What will become of us?”

She whispers to herself,“The most precious years of my life, my youth, my education, have been lost. Worry has turned my hair grey. I've grown old before my time. My dreams are unfinished, and my life has been emptied of peace.”

With a trembling voice she adds,“Sometimes I feel like ending everything, but my mother's face stops me. I'm only afraid that one day, in despair, I might take a step I can't undo.”

Shabkha's story is not just her own. It echoes the lives of thousands of Afghan youth trapped in the storm of uncertainty and displacement. It is the cry of hearts no one listens to.

She says quietly,“My dreams remain unfinished. Perhaps I will never wear a white coat now, nor place a healing hand on someone in pain.”