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Appendix A: Ashleigh’s Story
I feel now that I am a completely changed person but it has taken over five years to get anywhere near some closure
when thinking about the turmoil I have experienced and the person I consider I am now. I do not wake up every
day with thoughts of him and the feelings I used to have and thoughts of terror in my mind – again the turmoil is
not there. I have left the relationship, body and mind. I have ‘me’ back again. When I saw her social media post a
few weeks ago announcing that she had now left him too, I thought I would experience a ‘told you so response,’
but I didn’t. I felt quite numb and unaffected really. However, when I read she had written that she thought he was
a lovely person who just turned into a monster when he’d had a drink, I felt disappointed. I wondered if she really
believed that, or it was just a cover for any shame she felt for pursuing him as a partner. I wondered whether she
had considered that the opposite was true – that the REAL him was revealed when he had had a drink. She said she
had left him due to physical and mental abuse, but I worried for her because if she thought deep-down he was really
a good person, then I considered she had only physically left him and not psychologically. Her words suggested
she was still tied to him and if he played the victim role enough, he would entice her back in and there she would
be again, living back in the mental and physical abuse−being that person again. I was so worn down with trying to
hang on to our original dreams and plans, I feel somewhat ashamed when I look back and wholeheartedly believed
that one day they would be realized, but they never were. I realize that is her journey now and not mine. I am not
that person any more.(Ashleigh)