There was a time when Concetta Caristo answered to a completely different name.

For a while, she was Siena.

It was the name she used when she moved to Perth with her mum and sister, beginning again in a city where nobody knew who they were or where they had come from. The friends she made during that time knew her only as Siena. It was the name she used at work, the name she introduced herself with, the name that helped her construct a life at a careful distance from the one she had left behind.

Watch: A discussion on trauma protection. Post continues below.

The name wasn't chosen as an act of reinvention. It was chosen for something far more practical. It was chosen for safety.

On this week's episode of No Filter, Concetta tells host Kate Langbroek the reason she needed a new identity at all. Growing up, violence was a constant presence inside her family home, and eventually the only way her mother could protect her daughters was to leave entirely.

The escape meant disappearing from the life they had known. It meant leaving friends behind without explanation, moving across the country and beginning again somewhere no one would ask questions. For a time, it meant becoming someone else.

"I think there was always that feeling in the back of your mind," she tells Kate of those early days after they left, recalling the strange emotional disorientation of starting again. "Like… is this real?"

Today, Concetta Caristo is known to Australians as a comedian and Triple J radio host whose storytelling is as chaotic as it is relatable. Her comedy thrives on awkwardness and honesty, and she has built a career out of turning uncomfortable moments into stories that make audiences feel instantly recognised.

Millions of Australians recently watched her win I'm A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here!, where her quick wit and disarming self-awareness made her one of the most popular contestants in the jungle. But the moment that mattered most to her had little to do with the title itself.

The prize included $100,000 for a charity of her choosing.

Concetta chose Full Stop Australia, a national service supporting people experiencing sexual, domestic and family violence.

The reason for that choice reaches back to the life she lived before she became Concetta Caristo the comedian. Back to the years when she was Siena.

Long before that new name existed, there was a childhood defined by silence.

On No Filter, Concetta tells Kate that she understood from a very young age that what was happening in her home was not something she could talk about. The awareness arrived early, even if she didn't yet have the language to fully explain it.

"I knew enough to know that this wasn't something I could share with anyone," she says quietly.

There wasn't a single dramatic moment where she suddenly realised her life wasn't normal. Instead, the understanding crept in slowly, through fragments that only made sense years later.

Recently she found something that transported her straight back to that time: a diary she had written as a child.

"I found a journal of mine, a little diary I had as a little girl," she tells Kate.

She believes she was around 10 years old when she wrote it. The pages were filled with the kinds of things you might expect from a child's diary. Notes about books she loved, observations about school, the small and ordinary details of growing up.

But scattered among those entries were lines that now feel impossible to ignore.

One moment she was writing about how much she loved reading. The next she had added a small note about what would happen if she read the wrong kind of book.

"My dad gets really mad if I'm not reading the classics," she remembers writing.

Looking back now, what unsettles her most is not the content itself but the tone. The entry wasn't written with outrage or confusion. It was written calmly, almost matter-of-factly, in the voice of a child who believed this was simply how things worked.

"I guess I knew it wasn't normal," she tells Kate. "But I also thought, this is my family. This is my dad. What can you do? You just live with it."

Growing up in that environment meant constantly calculating what might make things worse. It meant learning quickly that certain things should never be spoken about, and that the safest way to navigate the household was often to remain quiet and observant.

Concetta remembers moments when violence was unfolding in front of her and her sister and the instinct was simply to freeze.

"The idea of stepping in and stopping it only escalates," she explains to Kate. "Being in it, you're like… if I do this, it will make it worse."

From the outside, people often ask why someone didn't tell a teacher, a relative or another adult. But inside the situation, the calculation looks very different.

"The fear was so strong," she says.

That fear built slowly over years, reinforced by countless small moments that sent the same message again and again: silence was safer.

Eventually, the situation escalated to the point where her mother made a decision that would change everything.

One day, while Concetta's father was out of the house, her mum made a secret call to a domestic violence hotline. It was the beginning of a plan to leave.

The escape that followed was careful and deliberate. Concetta, her mother and her sister left the life they had known and moved to Perth, where they could begin again.

That was when Siena arrived.

The name created space between the person she had been and the person she was trying to become. Even then, the transition was not simple. Freedom came with its own complicated emotions and the lingering anxiety that the life they had escaped might somehow catch up with them.

"I think there was always that anxiety in the back of your mind," she tells Kate. "Like… will he find out? Is this actually possible?"

But alongside that fear were moments that felt entirely new. Small freedoms that suddenly carried enormous meaning. Taking public transport on her own. Living in a home that felt calm. Decorating their apartment however they wanted.

For Concetta, one of the most powerful changes she witnessed during that time was in her mother.

"That's something I'll never forget," she tells Kate, her voice thick with emotion. "It was literally like watching a flower blossom."

You can listen to the full conversation on No Filter. The episode, "Concetta Caristo Changed Her Name to Escape a Violent Home," here. Post continues below.

After years of living under constant pressure and control, her mum slowly began to rediscover parts of herself. Concetta noticed it first in the smallest ways: the clothes she chose to wear, the way she carried herself, the quiet joy she found in everyday things like op shopping.

"You could see colour come back into someone's life," she says.

Today, the story of Siena sits quietly inside the life Concetta has built as herself.

There is still a trace of her online. The Facebook profile Concetta created under the name Siena still exists, a small digital reminder of the identity she once needed in order to stay safe.

Feature image: Supplied.