'It took me 20 years to get out'

BROKEN: A WOMAN RECOUNTS HER HELL OF DOMESTIC ABUSE, VIOLENCE AND RECOVERY

- Elizabeth Montgomery

CONSEQUENCES. Gender-based violence is not only physical but also emotional and mental.

(Pictures: iStock)

Shame, is probably the reason I cannot write about my hell under my own name.

Shame, because I let it destroy my soul for a full 20 years.

Shame, because I let him financially ruin me and physically and emotionally break me.

But perhaps the biggest shame, because I can’t say his name: the man who flung me across rooms, pinned me to walls with a knife against my throat and beat me mercilessly.

Cleverly so and, yes, we all know this about abusers: after the first couple of beatings, he learnt to avoid the face, left bruises hidden under my long-sleeve top and polo neck. There was no evidence for a camera, unless I stripped. No alarms raised for my friends...

I now know addiction is the red flag with abusers. Mine’s drug of choice was gambling.

It wasn’t always that violent. The first 10 years it was a push here, a shove there. But the more money he spent on his gambling, the more I “got it”.