I know this happened many years ago but even now I still live with the memories of what happened that has affected my life ever since.
At the age of 17 I married a police constable after a 2 year courtship where I had no indication as to what sort of person he really was.
The violence began on the 2nd day of our honeymoon and continued throughout the 10 years we were married.
During that time I was punched, slapped, kicked in the stomach whilst 6 months pregnant with my son, spat on, dragged upstairs by my hair, humiliated in front of people, slowly cut off from my friends and family. The reason I didn’t leave him sooner than I did was that he told me that if I ever tried to leave he would kill our son in front of me and then put me in a wheelchair for the rest of my life so that all I would be able to do is sit and remember that I had killed my son.
That statement haunts me to this day. The police force he worked for was fully aware of his abuse, he even beat me up in front of a club full of officers at a New Years Eve party and still he was able to work as an officer and not one single person from the force visited me to see if they could help in any way. Time and time again he was allowed to get away with the abuse and kept his job until he retired with a nice pension. I shudder to think what he was doing whilst on duty.
Constabulary: South Wales Police
Timespan: 1977 to 1987
Did you report it to the police?: Yes
Do you want to revisit this with the police?: Yes
Your ethnicity: White British
Have you experienced suicidality due to this?: Thoughts/feelings
Are you disabled as defined under the Equality Act 2010?: No
illustration by Danny Noble
