Anonymous Story 4

I was a troubled 17 year old girl when I met my abuser. He was 25 years old and he’d abused other women before me. I was actually warned by a friend of mine. He told me to "be careful Amy, he just tied up & tried to pour power steering fluid down his ex partners throat." To me it sounded so insane that I thought it was a made up story, especially because the man I thought I knew was “so kind”.

Soon after I started dating him he introduced me to ICE (methamphetamine). We smoked it together but he was the one who would hold and light the pipe for me, he didn’t want me to know how to do it myself. At the start he was so charming and seemed so protective over me but that all changed. I remember the first time he ever put his hands on me. We had been arguing and as I went to walk away, he grabbed me by my long blond hair and ripped me back towards him. My reaction was to turn around and raise my hand back at him but I never hit him, it was like my body subconsciously knew how he’d respond to that before I truly did. I should’ve ran then. It didn’t take long to turn from hair pulling to being hit, kicked and punched in public and in broad daylight by this man.

I could list countless times where he psychically abused me but I’ll just list three:

1. I was 18 at a friends birthday in Coolangatta and we were all drinking on the veranda. It was early morning by this stage and I had his jumper on tucked over my cold legs. He spoke to me so rudely in front of my friends “get your fucking legs out of my jumper you're stretching it” I was shocked and humiliated so I told him "no it’s keeping me warm". He demanded again "take it off your fucking legs before I throw you off this veranda". I thought he was just trying to be tough in front of people so again I said "no it’s keeping me warm". He instantly jumped up and picked me up then he walked me to the side of this high rise veranda and lent me over. I reacted by wrapping my arms and legs around him and said "if I’m going you're coming with me" and he soon pulled us back over. Not one person there said a thing to him. 

2. Another time I was in Coolangatta Hotel with him and a few of his friends and a few of mine. I ran into an old male friend and we were chatting as we hadn’t seen each other in a while. He said "come over here, I’ll introduce you to my partner". As I went to walk with him, my ex grabbed me tightly on my arms and asked "where the fuck are you going?" I remember pulling my arm out of his hand and said "I’m going to meet his partner, I was bringing him to meet you" my partner grabbed my arm again and said "we’re fucking going". My other friend said "don’t touch her like that" and my ex punched him straight in the face, then punched me straight in the face too. Security quickly intervened and he was arrested. 

3. One more story time; I was 18 or 19 at the time and I was in surfers paradise for ladies night (if you know you know), anyway after the free drinks the club used to provide to ladies on the ladies night and the goonsack my friend and I had consumed on the bus ride up to surfers, I was highly intoxicated and kind of came to on the beach with a bunch of random people. My friend rang my partner at the time and told him the situation I’d gotten myself into. He said "stay there! I’ll borrow mums car and I’ll come and get you".I said "no you’ve got no license, just stay on the phone while I get myself back to the bus" but he insisted that he was coming. He picked me up from the bus stop and the arguing started the minute I got into the car. He was yelling stuff at me along the lines of "you made me take my mums car and drive up to get you because you can’t control your alcohol intake". He was telling me that it would be my fault if he got caught driving without a license. He started saying he will kill us both, now swerving the car into oncoming traffic. I was terrified I honestly don’t remember much after that.

Any way, it took me years to get away from that man. I literally moved 14 hours interstate, but that didn’t stop him. He started tormenting my family. He literally tried lighting my family’s house on fire because I moved interstate. I flew straight back to him so he’d leave my family alone. I thought I was going to die at the hands of this man. My family sold their home and never told me where they moved to. I ended up in a DV Refuge and he ended up in jail multiple times. Never for long enough though. I know he went on to continue abusing other women.

That was ten years ago now, but he still holds anger towards me. He saw my fiancé and 1 year old baby in the shopping centre over last Christmas holidays and he screamed abuse at them saying that they're "going to get got".

Ten years later and however many other women he has abused since me and he’s still angry, oh and walking free.

The system with Domestic violence needs to be changed! it’s broken. I’ve got plenty of opinions on how they should change the system, instead of making the victim feel so isolated and alone.

Kind regards a DV survivor.