How is Paulina characterized as a victim?

Paulina is incapable of looking towards the future, so shackled is she by the horrors of her past. Years before, during the military dictatorship in her country, she was studying medicine and becoming involved in the resistance. As a result, Paulina was kidnapped by the government's secret police and subjected to days of sexual and physical torture, during which she refused to give up the names of her colleagues, including Gerardo. Although she was ultimately freed, Paulina never fully recovered from the psychological effects of her captivity. She never finished school, and has spent the intervening years married to Gerardo without entertaining any of her own professional or personal aspirations.