Thinking back on those years I seriously wonder whether they ever happened but then I seek out the few photographs that survived that devastating inferno and remind myself that I am not mad or hallucinating, that I did not make them up and that I really did live through those dreadful things. And yes I contemplated suicide many times, and yes I nearly drank myself to death – why not? Don’t us all when things get so far out of hand that we lose control over our own lives. But somehow I got through. Then I pinch myself to remind myself that I am here and living another life and that this is not a dream and that I won’t wake back in those awful years. Nevertheless here and now I still feel sometimes as if I am living someone else’s life in an alternative time.
This tale is not one of self pity or sympathy seeking. Being of a scientific turn of mind I truly believe in cause and effect and so even now I still try to work out when and why it all went wrong. There must have been a point in time when I could have stopped it and if there was why I didn’t. Was I deaf, blind or possessed? There must be a lesson in their somewhere. We should all learn from our mistakes. Individual disasters are no less so because they only happen to one person. When they happen to many much sympathy and relief kicks in or there is support from those in the same boat but when such bizarre things happen to one person explaining them, their contexts, influences and effect on you is beyond understanding for others. Frankly they think you’re lying or mad or both.
During those years when I felt as if I was living on Planet Zog and a public parallel life I asked a friend who was on the periphery of living through a great deal of it with me -
“How and where would you begin to tell the story?” We agreed that it was almost impossible but since so were the circumstances I am going to try anyway.
I suppose my greatest failing is my massive inferiority complex and the need to please. “Frankly I don’t give a damn” is completely out of my universe. So when the first marriage broke up and he left with my best friend leaving me looking after her two kids I blamed myself. Somehow life straightened out and the kids eventually went to live with their mother and my ex but I avoided men like the plague. So it was not my enthusiasm that got me into marriage number two but I was determined (having failed as I saw it) that this one would work. On reflection all number two wanted was to get on with his career, have a respectable wife and screw every woman he could behind my back but I was so focused on family and making everything perfect for him that I did not notice. More fool me! He was successful and I was his partner… It wasn’t actually until the birth of one of our children many years into the marriage that I found out about the others and blamed myself – again. Still we patched it up and soldiered on. Did it stop – no – but I guess that was my fault too.
On the outside many saw us as a perfect couple. We had money and all the trappings of success. What they failed to see and I never told was the domestic violence, the drunken rages and the obsessive control that my then husband exercised over us within the family home. His own relationship with his parents had been difficult so I wanted to give him enough love to make him see that love could conquer all. I went to church; I prayed and would have moved heaven and earth for him if I had been able to.
Quite what was the straw that broke the camels back I don’t know – perhaps the fact that it was Christmas? Christmas was always a special time for the family and here we were nearly Christmas Eve and he was on a business trip. As it happens this business trip involved being at the Albert Hall at a concert and showing yet another much younger female round London. I calmly loaded his clothes into the car, drove down to his office, stuck the family portrait sunshade style on the windscreen and left the keys at reception. Christmas Eve saw me in court asking for an Injunction against him returning to the family home. I knew that if he ever came back we would all suffer badly. Many years later I still felt that if he and I were in the same room alone I would not leave it alive.
Despite all the difficulties of the marriage I truly felt that I understood the man and what made him tick. To a certain extent the years had taught me how to deal with much of it. How wrong I was.
Apparently this latest flame had actually been introduced to his side of the family (I did not know) though in quite what capacity I cannot say. Nevertheless my then mother in law certainly knew of her existence before I did and even knew where they were when I called her to sort out Christmas arrangements. The finality of the injunction and the rapid move towards divorce left me breathless as I needed to finish this chapter of my life and the children’s and move on. What I did not know was that he would pursue me in any way he could for many years and indeed to this day.
Still my husband he set up home with the latest flame. Friends say that had I not thrown him out she would have gone the way of all the others but she was like a limpet and no doubt saw the money and lifestyle as within her grasp and grab it she did. I just wanted out.
My solicitor got me a divorce in six months and I moved away. We had an arrangement for the teenage children and I really felt that we could all now move on. It was strange because twenty years of my life had disappeared. All those little things that you remember or have done, the places you have been the things that you shared suddenly become a little unreal – did it really happen or did I read about it in a book.
We communicated by phone until the limpet banned our talking directly and so we communicated by solicitors letter. What was she afraid of I wonder. Certainly he had at one stage told the children that we would remarry but that was absolute nonsense.
Having spent over twenty years working for my ex I was unemployed. I had lost my marriage, my home, my job and to a certain extent my personal purpose. I was 50 and without purpose or direction. The children needed me less and less and I needed something to do.
So I started a b/b and I guess that my new troubles began at that point or perhaps it was at the point that I acquired a new man. Until then the ex had not been publicly or outwardly obsessive or aggressive during the divorce proceedings – we had sorted out our separate lives and got on with them. - At least I had thought so. On reflection perhaps he needed me to curl up and die without him, he needed me to fail in life without him, and he needed me to be nothing without him. He was the front man who had totally missed the fact that in all those years he had only been that because I had subjugated to him, always put him first and I suppose put him there.
From those points in time my ex interfered in our lives at every point. Admittedly circumstances went his way but much of that was possibly due to the amount of money that he threw at them. He paid people to spy on us incessantly. He knew when we left the house and when we came back (He lived over 400 miles away). He would call the police and say we were abusing the children. He interfered in the business at any and every stage - we had incessant visits from the council, trading standards or health and safety. After a while all the officials cottoned on and knew what was going on but they would have to come out. On one occasion the officer had not had any breakfast so I made him a cup of tea and a bacon sandwich. The next complaint was against the police – police corruption!!!!!
I suppose we could have laughed the whole thing off and nearly did had it not been for a dire twist of fate – my new and thriving business went up in flames. An accident pure and simple – started by a guest but that’s when my ex really went to town. Using the press who love to print anything he destroyed us and our reputations. We had done it for the insurance, we were gangsters, we were criminals, I was a whore, and the list went on and on. He was a respectable professional man and as I was sitting in the ashes of my life for the second time in a couple of years he really stuck the knife in hard. My partner lost his high profile job because of the accusations because the company could not do with the ‘Bad Publicity’ which was seemingly endless.
If you’ve never been involved in an insurance investigation avoid it at all costs. They pick over your entire lives with a fine tooth comb which is like psychological rape. Not only that but the police were involved because of the fire and my ex made quite sure that everybody was aware of my ‘dreadful nature.’ Quite why he had stayed married to me for over 20 years and why it had been my decision to divorce him and not the other way around never occurred to him to consider. Many of the things that he had done to me now became what I had done to him. His womanising became my affairs. His money transactions became my money laundering. His blatant lying became my fraud and so it went on and on and he made sure that in was in the public domain. The articles were photocopied and sent to anyone and everyone that we had known during our two decades of marriage. Do you really think that people don’t believe what they read in the papers? My ex made sure everyone did. I became an outcast after twenty years of knowing people – but then perhaps they weren’t worth knowing anyway. He even told Social Services that I was going to jail and so should have the children removed. He was ruining any chance that I had of a business reputation. We had nowhere to live and no money. All our assets had been put into the business and because of my ex’s constant interference the insurance issues could take years. So we moved in with family and still he did not leave me alone. I was not fit to look after the children etc etc etc. and the legal bills were mounting. I was not poor enough for legal aid and not rich enough for it not to matter. Once again I had no job and now I was now nearing my mid fifties. .
A chance conversation some months later brought the offer of a temporary part time job. I jumped at the chance since we desperately needed the money but even here my ex decided to interfere. He wrote to the Chief Executive about me in what can only be described as libellous terms and that he (my ex) would never employ me. That he (my ex) had for many years been suspicious of my actions etc etc. and finished the letter off with a flurry of two lines of his qualifications. At the time I did not know about the letter. . Clearly this company were more sympathetic than my partners had been. They had investigated, they knew something of the background because I had told them about my circumstances when I took the job. The matter was settled and when my contract finished I was offered a fulltime permanent position. Were things looking up at last? Obviously not satisfied with the outcome an anonymous letter was sent to the local paper. Once again the whole sorry mess of the fire investigations was dragged up.
However in the meantime we had made representations to the Press Complaints Commission and won our case about the coverage of the fire and the lies that were printed. The papers settled out of court and only a couple of lines of apology were printed but nevertheless we had won our case. The insurance had finally settled – although most of the money was taken by legal bills and we felt that we could perhaps now shut the book and once again move on.
Ten years on and I still get solicitors letters from my ex’s solicitors about anything and everything and the law seems to allow him to continue to harass me and make me spend more money on legal bills. I earn perhaps a tenth of what my ex does so he can afford to play these games – I can’t. I am still with the same company moved on and up and very content. I am pursuing university studies and my own research. My partner (now my husband) is also in gainful employment. He has suffered so greatly these last few years through no fault of his own – just by meeting me and being involved with my ex’s insanities. How we have managed to stay together I sometimes wonder but had it not been for him I know that I would not be here.
My ex was a professional man who had everything and more. He married the limpet and she produced a child very quickly – perhaps just to cement things. Am I being cynical? Possibly. An aquaintance’s daughter told me some years back that they had all been at a function when my ex disappeared outside with a blonde. My daughter pointed this out to the new wife ( who is not much older than the daughter) and got the reply “So what can I do about it?” Someone else told me those only two weeks after the wedding he was liaising with another woman. Leopards don’t change their spots. I only hope that she isn’t being knocked about like I was.
So we return to the question of when and how did it all go wrong. Should I have tried to love my ex enough to put right his childhood, why didn’t I see him for what he was, was always going to be and when I did after many years of marriage for the first time why didn’t I leave? I’m a clever woman so I should have made better decisions. I am also a strong woman but somehow my ex within a very short period of time had sucked all my strength and confidence from me and made me believe that I was only wherever I was in life because of him and on reflection that was where he wanted to keep me and obviously still does.