I don't know how to feel. Part of me is relieved that I made it back alive, but I feel guilty that my relatives and my people are dying. I have only minor physical injuries, but the mental scars are still there. I don't sleep well at night and I often wake up screaming. Most people in Syria don't have the option of running away like I did. But I am glad to be alive.
My parents came to the UK from Syria in the 1970s. My dad is a doctor and my mum is a teacher. They're both Sunni Muslims. They'd been living here for the best part of 20 years when I was born in 1993 and always kept in touch with their family at home. I grew up in Britain, but spent many school holidays with relatives in Damascus.
Neither my parents nor my family in Syria ever spoke much about politics because they were scared about the repercussions. My parents grew up in Damascus under the Ba'athist regime where it was dangerous to speak your mind. Even in London, they were afraid that if they spoke out of turn it would cause problems for their relatives – their friends would sometimes talk about the Syrian embassy in London keeping tabs on British Syrians who were too openly political, intimidating their families back home. I never knew whether these stories were true but I didn't have much reason to challenge them.