Life With Domestic Violence - By Aunty Shaz

My experience...

This is my first ever blog about my very raw Domestic violent Marriage and how I survived and now have the control in my life.

This is something I have wanted to write for a very long time, for myself and children. My family don’t know the half of what I dealt with because I tried to hide the pain and hurt I was dealing with and I didn’t want to be seen as a weak person!

So, it starts as a very young innocent 14-year-old girl (1984), I met my EX thru a friend and we started to date, we enjoyed each other’s company he was 16, He was moody but that was him (so I Thought) he went without talking to me for a few days and then everything was ok again once he got over his moods.

I was a good girl and didn’t give in till I was 18 (1988) till I broke my virginity, he hated waiting, but I told him if he wanted me he had to wait, well he did.

He took me to Adelaide for a long weekend lol yep dirty weekend! We did have a great time, he asked me to marry him and I said yes!!!! (should have said no), I couldn’t wait to call mum and dad, (so I did) this was the first sign of his angriness I experienced! He screamed and carried on because I could have at least waited till morning now it wasn’t about just us anymore! He didn’t speak to me for the next 3 days, we even travelled 6 hours by road back to Broken Hill with no communication and me crying!

We arrived home and he did the fake everything is ok to our parents and friends!

We married when I was 21! (1990) 1 week before our wedding we had a disagreement over something I wanted to do at our wedding he didn’t want to... This was the first time the verbal/Emotional abuse started. This was the first time I heard the words that he thought I was so ugly and he felt sorry for me and that was why he was marrying me, who else would want someone that fat!

The day before he married me he told me that he wasn’t going to turn up and make me look like the dickhead that I was! I was devastated and didn’t tell any of my family about this as I didn’t want them to worry about me and I couldn’t bare the thought of letting them down.

So, I arrived at the church with my dad beside me and arrived 20 mins fashionably late I panicked because I thought he will be angry and I said this to my dad and my dad said to me “shaz but I don’t really like EX! You haven’t walked down the aisle yet and you don’t have to marry him…” the rest is history…

So, our life continued the moods continued and the verbal and emotional violence continued, I was called a Mole, Whore, Slut, Fat, Ugly and every other name under the sun, we had great days and good days but the bad days started to happen more often, I was scared from the time I woke till the time I slept if he was angry and how the day would be.

In 1994 we moved to Adelaide SA, to start a family and a life together, things really had become great until we couldn’t have children, we did IVF  for over 10.5 years and no success, we got results and he had a low sperm count but I ask the doctors to tell us that I was infertile so that it didn’t make him look bad, but in the end we found out that I myself was infertile as well as I went through menopause as a 28 year old! Many times, he would bring up how useless I was as I couldn’t even do what normal woman do and have biological children how could I even call myself a woman! At this stage I contemplated suicide as my whole life I wanted to be a wife and Mother… I wasn’t a great wife as he treats me bad and a failure as a woman I couldn’t birth kids! Why be here??????

So finally, in 2000, we adopt a beautiful little boy my life had become perfect and EX and I was so happy, till we arrived in Adelaide and our baby boy wanted nothing to do with his dad! I had contracted CMV virus and was so sick… he called me fat and lazy incompetent women, his Jealousy over our son and my selves closeness turned him into Jekyll and Hyde! He hated our closeness he hated our son needed me! One night I wanted to go out with my friends and he would have to look after him he told me it was my job and I couldn’t go out, so he did! When I wouldn’t pick him up because he had too many drinks I was a shit mother that was a whore! 3 months later I found out that I had a miracle pregnancy from a cyst forming on my ovaries, we were so elated about being able to have 2 children a little mate for our son, another baby boy joined us in 2001, This was when the verbal/mental and emotional abuse got worse because I was breastfeeding our son, how dare I do this when they are his breast not the child’s, This was when I was called a paedophile because id feed him 2 hourly!, one night my baby had severe colic and I sat up with him to stop the pain but he wanted sex and I said NO this was the time he had sex with me while I held my baby upright so the baby wouldn’t be in pain I cried the whole time… the next day I was told I am a dead root! This was the first time he raised his hand to me…… a day I will never forget…

When my baby was 16 months old I was accepted to have a breast reduction I was a GG cup and it was dangerous to my health to keep them as I was suffocating myself when I was sleeping with the weight of them. He told me if I went through with it he’d leave me and take the kids…. I was petrified but I knew I needed to do it… 2003 and I went from a GG to a DD… He didn’t visit me in hospital nor did I see my babies, when I did go home, I got an infection and had to drive myself to hospital because he didn’t speak to me or 3 months, he stopped giving me money, so I became home-bound with 2 babies.

We built a house and moved in at the end of 2003 this was when hell started he, controlled my life my everything, I had to have receipts to prove I only spent what he allowed etc I couldn’t go out, I couldn’t have my family stay with me and I always told them it was because I didn’t have the room,  but to be honest he didn’t like my family cause we have a loving relationship and his didn’t! my family loved him and I always made excuses for him as to why he wouldn’t attend anything but it was his jealousy,,,

If i was going out with friends and showed any cleavage I was questioned as to who I was showing my boobs too, and why I had to show them at all, I was a slut for doing it because I must have been sleeping with someone.

If we went out together I would be told off for not showing them off, because he wanted to always see them and make people know that he had a wife with big boobs! the double standards always messed with my head….

I kept a diary and he would book sex in, if I didn't feel like it I knew that life would be hell, so I laid there and moaned to make it sound like I enjoyed it but most times it was met with tears and feeling violated, id get up and sleep in the lounge room so he didn't know how revolting i felt….

I remember I broke my wrist at the gym and he wouldn’t drive me to hospital so I had to call a girlfriend to take me and I snapped it in 3 places, another time  I had my sister visit while he was at work and my mum was visiting from Broken Hill and my baby had dropped glass of lemonade on the floor and I slipped and broke my arm again I was in hospital for 3 weeks and had complications, I didn’t see him or kids once! When I got home the abuse I had endured was so verbal I was scared but as always he would say he will never do it again… one night when my youngest was about 7 and eldest 8 at about 11 pm he was calling me everything because I came to bed too late for us to have sex, I told him I was leaving and taking the boys he pushed me down on the bed I stood up and that was the 2nd hit, I tried to ask him to stop yelling cause didn’t want them to hear what was happening he told me he didn’t care he wants them to know their mum is a whore etc, he hit me one more time after this, he never hit me again as I rebound hit and busted his nose.. the verbal abuse and emotional mental abuse continued…

In the end he left me for someone else and after our breakup the kids blamed me because I left with them and their dad stayed in our home. But the text before we left that I got from him read… 

“YOU ARE NOTHING, WILL NEVER HAVE ANYTHING, WILL NEVER BE ANYTHING, WHO IS GOING TO WANT SOMEONE AS UGLY AS YOU, FAT AS YOU, AND SOMEONE THAT HAS KIDS!  ENJOY YOUR LIFE!  “P.s I have found you a rental more than you can afford but I paid your bond and first 2 weeks of rent so good luck with that.                           

I stayed there for 12 months and survived! I showed the boys the text because I needed them to see what I had been dealt with and my boys finally realised how my life had been…

Last 2 years my youngest has struggling with life attempting suicide twice and self-harming, thank god for the school counsellor because they helped me get to him and results are he blames himself for not protecting me. the night the EX abused me my baby was standing at my bedroom door hearing me cry and telling his dad not to yell cause the kids might hear too. My baby stood at my bedroom door with a knife to kill his dad, if he's killed me! He was the one that told me his dad had a girlfriend he had seen the messages on his dad's’ phone.

I did seek help from many different sources and yes, I slept with about 4 different guys to prove I could get someone but in the end realised they had just used me for sex! My thoughts are what he had told me are true I am a slut, and no one really can love me or want me and was it because I am ugly and fat… I still find it hard to let a guy into my life I friendzone them so fast and let the words of my EX allow me to not be happy…

 I struggle with what I see in the mirror and what I feel… I hate I’m still single, but I won’t settle for anything less than perfect for me! I am told often by men now how intimidating my look and confidence is, and often am asked if I’m a lesbian!

But now I have found true friends and came across a little lingerie page called Naked Curve! So, I ordered some pieces and fell in love and they made me feel beautiful and sexy! I still can not look at myself in the mirror and see beautiful and sexy! I am now enjoying the beautiful ladies of unapologetically Beautiful and helping them with their struggles in life…

I believe I was born to love and help those around me! And not to be loved!

LIVE LIFE AND BE HAPPY! LIFE IS A WONDERFUL THING!

Aunty Shaz x

Queens stick together x

References

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Lifeline.org.au. (2018). Domestic & Family Violence. [online] Available at: https://www.lifeline.org.au/get-help/topics/domestic-family-violence [Accessed 9 Oct. 2018].

Police.sa.gov.au. (2018). SAPOL - Domestic violence. [online] Available at: https://www.police.sa.gov.au/your-safety/domestic-violence [Accessed 9 Oct. 2018].

White Ribbon. (2018). Prevent Men's Violence Against Women | White Ribbon Australia. [online] Available at: https://www.whiteribbon.org.au/ [Accessed 9 Oct. 2018].

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