Andy thought that as my husband he had a right to have sex with me if he wanted it and would not take no for an answer. He often dragged me upstairs even though I was saying ‘No’, and then raped me. This happened very regularly, probably a couple of times a month. He used just sufficient force to stop me from escaping, usually pinning me down by holding my wrists or tops of my arms, which hurt then he would get his legs between mine and use them to force mine open. I seemed to always have permanent bruises on my inner thighs. Sometimes I struggled or tried to tilt my pelvis so the angle I was at made it harder for him to penetrate me. If I struggled he said it was turning him on more. I have learned over the years that it is impossible to escape as he is bigger and stronger than me. I am completely powerless and helpless to stop it from happening. He forces himself into me. It is very aggressive and there is no tenderness involved at all. He thrusts really hard like he is trying to teach me a lesson. Even if I am crying all the way through and telling him he’s hurting me and begging him to stop he will continue. He has admitted to me recently that it is not about sexual gratification but power and control. It is not uncommon after he has finished, for him to say something demeaning like “Thanks, that was a great f*ck”  or that I am frigid, then he just leaves me to cry myself to sleep and goes to sleep in another room. He never says sorry or shows any remorse for what he has done. If he withdraws before ejaculation, which sometimes he does, he thinks this means he hasn’t raped me and that he was being really nice to me and I should be grateful.  Sometimes after I have said No he will try to stimulate me with his fingers or orally, and if this results in me having an orgasm he feels justified that ‘I wanted it’. I didn’t. Even though I may have subsequently had an orgasm I had still not consented.

Sometimes I do consent to sex, reluctantly. I never initiate it or want it because of the way he has made me feel. And if I start it he will probably want me to do things I don't want to do. I just felt that as we were married I was obligated to say yes sometimes. He told me that if I didn't say yes he would be perfectly within his rights to go and get it elsewhere. At these times I was always coerced to do things I didn’t want to do. Sometimes I tried to tell him what would make it better for me. He said he knew better than me what I liked. (What a stud).It was never a pleasurable experience. In fact it disgusted me. I hated it all.

Andy started to abuse me sexually very early in our relationship. He used to pin me down by my arms, pretending he was going to bite my nipples. He would come within a fraction of a mm of biting me and usually ‘accidentally’ did bite. I was always screaming, struggling, crying, frightened and sweating profusely, which he said turned him on so he did it more. Afterwards I wouldn’t speak to him and he minimised and made light of it suggesting I was over reacting and it was only a bit of fun.

Andy used to look at porn on the computer even though he knew I was not happy about it. He said I was a prude and all men did it. I could have coped if it was private and I knew nothing about it but he would deliberately call me into the study when there was something on the screen for me to see. Some of the things in my opinion were extremely obscene. One example was one he called ‘tub girl’. I didn’t see it but he insisted on showing my son who was disgusted with him. He did not want to see it. I gather it was a girl in a bath or something, covered in faeces. Gross. He looks up things on the net, like girls having sex with animals. I really did not want to know this stuff. He also keeps alongside all his pornographic magazines in his bedside table, a photo of his previous girlfriend with her legs open and with no knickers on. He also had photos’ of me there which I have now destroyed, so I don’t in future end up in the drawers of another womans bedroom.

The worst thing he has ever done to me, for which I have never forgiven him, was when he forced me to have anal sex. It was fairly early on in the relationship, in the first year or two. I had just put up the Christmas tree. I am like a big kid at Christmas and love that time of year. I had turned off all the lights except the fairy lights on the tree and it looked really nice and romantic. He then raped me. It was anal sex which I have never consented to in my life. He had asked me before and I always said quite categorically that it was absolutely out of the question. I can still visualise the scene today. All I could see was the lights all blurred by my tears. It was very painful and afterwards I bled from the rectum for several days. He said it was because I wasn’t a virgin when I met him so he wanted one hole that only he had used. Of everything Andy has done to me over the years, this act has traumatised me more than anything else and it is one thing that I still don't know how to come to terms with. To this day I continue to feel degraded, humiliated and violated. I can’t describe how bad this still makes me feel.

Another thing happened I think about 1990. I don’t know if this would even be considered abuse as I consented to it. I was having a career break as a full time mum. Andy was unemployed and we were struggling financially. After reading an autobiography by a prostitute, he got it into his head that I could earn good money working as one. This is the degree of control he had over me. At the time I went along with the idea (I am embarrassed to admit that I thought it was quite exciting at the time). We got a number from the newspaper and I had to go to see this guy for ‘an interview’. The place when I got there was a squalid apartment above a shop. The guy was obviously a drug addict. He had the gas stove turned on full trying to get warm and he was shivering uncontrollably. He was hardly even aware I was there. I left and never went back. Undeterred by this he got another ad from the paper. This time it was a fairly run down council duplex. The guy there said I had to have sex with him (for nothing) which I did. I was totally niave and didn’t even understand some of the things he wanted me to do. There was an expectation that I would do this regularly-because he got bored there on his own! Poor thing. After this event Andy changed his mind and got concerned about my safety, however in hindsight he had already put me at huge risk.

Andy has always refused to listen if I try to tell him how sex could be more enjoyable for me. He is insistent that he knows me better than I know myself and knows what I like. He doesn’t. He always makes me do things that I find degrading and humiliating. My breasts and nipples typically get very tender before menstruation, but he insists on handling them and sucking them really roughly. It is agony, believe me.

I was forced to have sex straight after having given birth. I had lost a lot of blood and was anaemic, so feeling extremely weak and exhausted however he didn’t seem to appreciate this.

After we first separated in January, we were living apart in the same house. Even though we were separated and he must have known it was not acceptable, he came into my bedroom and kept trying to remove the doona so he could caress and look at my body. I told him he had to stop it straight away, then he bent over and sucked my nipple. I pushed him away and told him to stop. On other occasions he kept trying to kiss me on the lips. I have made it very clear to him that I didn’t want him to do this. I know this is not actually sex, but it still makes me feel my boundaries are being violated.

Ironically Andy blames my lack of sex drive for his behaviour, but when I met him I did have a healthy sex drive and it is his behaviour which has destroyed it.

Any way after 27 years together I finally seperated from him this January. I got a temporary protection order which said he had to leave the house and he is not allowed to contact me at all. I have changed all the locks and I feel safer than I have in years. I love my protection order. I have to go to court on the 30th for a mention where I know he will not agree to the order and I will have to go to a hearing, but I am taking my solicitor with me and I am confident that they will make it a permanent order. He has asked for a variation to the order to allow him back into the house assuring the court that he would behave, but since that application he has already breached the order so hopefully his chances are slim.

I love my new single life. This is the best I have felt in years. I am being supported by my lovely family and friends, my solicitor, my psychologist, my two counsellors from the domestic violence service and sexual assault service, the court supoort workers and now you guys at Pandy's. I am reading everything I can get my hands on about sexual abuse. Knowledge is power and I am finding it very healing. I know I have a long journey ahead of me but I am going to take it one day at a time and just do the best I can for myself each day. I am now advocating for me and putting my own best interests first. I am going to find an assertiveness for women's course.