Natalia & Tamara know the dangers of abusive relationships. They both survived & they’re speaking up.
Read their stories here.
Read their stories here.
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On a September night in 1993, on a remote banana plantation on the outskirts of Carnarvon, 16-year-old me stood terrified in the doorway of my bedroom. I had woken to the screams of my mother who was again being bashed senseless at my dad's hands. Read the full story here.  I Went Back To My Abuser After A Week. This Is Why It’s So Hard For Women To Get Out For Good.22/3/2019 The first time he hit me, we were in the car. There was no warning before his hand flew out and smacked me in the face. We both sat there in shocked silence for a moment. I felt my lips to see if I was bleeding, and my fingers came away red. We both looked at them in horror. Read the full story here.  I was matched with the guy by a couple that didn’t know him very well, they described him as “really nice....almost too nice”. Our first date, we went out for a drink, the next night he cooked me dinner but before we had our main course, I was so intoxicated we had sex. He always mixed me very strong drinks. My kids were away for 2 weeks so he practically moved in. He wanted to see me constantly and he couldn’t stop touching me or holding my hand. He wanted to see me everyday, but I wanted to see my friends. It was a little suffocating. One of his daughters said to me, you’ve got so many friends, dads got none. I thought that was weird. He would turn up on my doorstep with a coffee in the morning. He could fix and would do anything for me, it was amazing. Within about a month he told me he loved me. He’d got caught cheating on his wife and because she ended the marriage it was all her fault. The way he spoke about her was disgusting and frightening. Everything was always someone else’s fault. Five months into our relationship we were at a function and a friend of his kept coming up to chat, I was polite however I got accused of cheating. We were in the city and had to leave the function and in the street he yelled and called me every vile name he could think of...the public humiliation. He didn’t worry about making a scene. He yelled at me for two more days until he eventually apologised. This continued, however I was blamed for how he reacted and lost his temper for anything. I was always made to apologise no matter what. It was my fault that he couldn’t control his temper. He was jealous of every man that spoke to me. He broke into my iPad to read my messages. I couldn’t have any male friends and soon it became my female friends he wanted gone also. It grew worse and worse and he would break up with me constantly. I was always sick and on edge. He tried to control my life, got angry with me for buying clothes, for joining sporting clubs, even though it was my money. He told me “that at the age of 47, with minimal income and no assets, no man would ever want me.” The abuse got so bad that one day i had such bad chest pains, I broke down and I thought about ending my life. I had to be taken to hospital. I told him I had had those feelings, I then tried to break up with him. He talked me round again and we stayed together. A few months later in a disagreement, he came up to my face and said “why don’t you kill your self”. He eventually broke up with me and had a new girlfriend a week later. I have a fractured sternum that has calcified into a lump on my chest, to remind myself everyday of 4 1/2 years of hell. It took a psychologist to explain the behaviour of a narcissistic sociopath for the light to finally go on in my head. I’d been told by him for so long that our relationship problems were my fault. I have a wonderful partner now and my health has returned. from here  |
