For almost ten years she has lived with the consequences of terror both at work and in private.
Now Tonje Brenna, County Council Leader in Viken (Labor Party), is ready with a strong eyewitness account of both what happened that day – and in life later, in the book «22. July – and all the days afterwards ».
To Good Morning Norway, Brenna says that there are several reasons why it is only now that the book is published.
– Firstly, I think that having some distance to big things is good for thinking well about. And gaining some experience afterwards with how to live with the consequences of terror – it is an eternal process, she says and continues:
– Ten years is both short and long. Also, like all the others who were there, I have thought that it might be a bit contradictory to be an individual who has survived, and to engage in politics and be a victim of power at the same time. So I have spent some time reconciling myself with the fact that it is entirely possible to be both.
See the strong interview at the top of the case!
Brenna says that she has never before told the story as directly and honestly as she does now.
– POLITICALLY COMMITTED: Although Tonje Brenna experienced the nightmare on Utøya, she has never stopped getting involved in politics. Photo: Ørn E. Borgen / NTB
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– I think it’s about the fact that it is not a good thing to be a person who inflicts pain on others, because it is clear that it makes an impression to read and hear about terrible things people have experienced. So to protect myself and the people around me, I have told an ever shorter version.
But now she has decided. She wants to tell the whole truth.
The politician points out that if we are to understand terror and understand what it does to people, we must also understand what the young people on Utøya experienced, what they were exposed to and how it has been. Including all the days they have lived afterwards.
– July 22 was not like that for us that it was July 22, then it was July 23 and then it was all life. We’ve had it with us all the way.
Lying on a cliff
Every single story from July 22 is unique. And terrible. Also Brenna’s.
She says that when the explosion went off in the government quarter in Oslo, there was chaos on Utøya. Many were worried about family and friends in the capital. They tried to handle the situation in the best possible way. The young people chose to have fun together and told each other that they are in the safest place in the world. They took care of each other.
Also, within a few hours after that, everything was turned upside down and hell comes to us.
The 23-year-old general secretary saw friends and colleagues being shot. She hid at the back of the island – on the cliff of steep mountain ledges. She lay there for an hour and a half, but which to her felt like an eternity. While this was going on, she spotted a girl who had been shot. Brenna took her with her, and kept a finger in the wound so that she would not lose too much blood.
– There were people who were killed and fell around us. People who were injured, people who ran in panic and had destroyed themselves because they ran on sharp rocks. It was blood and really pretty awful pictures.
Thought Norway was occupied
Eventually, the task forces arrived on the island. Brenna and the rest of the survivors were transported to Sundvolden Hotel.
But even though she was now safe, it did not feel that way.
– Those hours at Sundvolden were difficult, because it was not the case that everything was clarified and we were safe. I experienced that I was almost as scared on Sundvolden as I had been on Utøya.
The sum of the explosion in the capital and the shooting on the island – far away from people, made the 23-year-old get a picture in his head that Norway was occupied or that there was war.
– Many have asked; “Why did you not swim, Tonje?”, But the answer to that is that I thought there was nothing better on the other side. I got a very strong feeling of being completely abandoned and that there is nothing I can do; either I die here or I drown, or I die on the other side, she says.
Still, she folded her arms as soon as she arrived at the hotel. Brenna was given the task of registering who had survived and who was missing. A nurse received telephone calls from relatives and wrote down the names. The list then went on to Brenna.
– I walked around with this sheet and looked for young people. I crossed out the ones I saw and the ones I heard rumors about, I also handed it back to the nurse. It was the system to find out who survived and not Utøya for quite a few hours. It shows a vulnerability that we have something to learn from, because that is not how it should be, she says and continues:
– We should be able to rig ourselves in place even in a chaotic situation, but for me it was important to be part of it, because I think it was part of the processing the first hours for me.
Changed perspective
It has been a long struggle to get back to normal. When she became the mother of little Emil for the first time in 2014, she noticed a different type of fear than before.
– When he was born, I was full of anxiety and worry about dying and that those I loved would die. That’s why I was so scared to fall in love with him.
– BACK: Tonje Brenna on Utøya with her son in her arms. Photo: Private
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For every inch he grew, and every body that became too short, she wanted him not to grow any more. Because then she had more to lose.
– I was so scared that something would happen to him. I spent about a year before I managed to shrug and think; “I’m your mom! It’s incredibly cool and I’m incredibly happy about it ». So I spent time overcoming that fear of my child dying, and it also took some time before I realized that it had something to do with July 22nd.
In 2019, she became pregnant again.
When she was 14 weeks on the road, they decided to share the news with family and friends. The next day she miscarried. As the bleeding subsided and it was full at both the emergency room and the hospital, she never went to the doctor.
After another seven weeks, the body was still not quite as it should be, and the weight did not go down. She consulted a gynecologist, who could tell that there was a living fetus in there. It was the twin she had miscarried seven weeks ago.
The happiness was great and today she enjoys life as a mother of two. The new phase of life has made her sympathize with another group who had their lives turned upside down almost ten years ago.
– It is perhaps the biggest discovery after I have grown up and had kids myself; going from just relating to the AUFs and the surviving teens to feeling very strongly with parents who I remember very well who went looking for their children but did not find. That’s a big change in ten years for me.
We must not forget
Now Brenna hopes that her book can help start conversations. Between generations, groups of friends and family members. She points out that it is important that we do not forget that this was a politically willful act.
– The last ten years we have told each other that we should never forget. But then we have not spent so much time agreeing on what to remember when we talk about this day, she says and continues:
– July 22 was a right-wing extremist politically motivated attack where AUF and the Labor Party were the target. The goal was to kill as many as possible to stop the political force we are and were. That realization I experience may not be as strong anymore. We tend to talk about July 22 as the events and that it is more like an accident or a catastrophic disaster.
– I think it is dangerous, because if we as a society are to be good at securing ourselves against what is dangerous, then we must know what we are suitable for. And the fact that extreme people can go to the step of killing someone because they have a political motive – it is important that we have with us, because or I think it is more likely that something similar can happen again.
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