STEPHANIE’S STORY

I didn’t divorce him sooner because I was scared of him and worried I’d have to drop my standard of living. Now I look back and wonder why it took me so long.

Marriage with him was like a roller coaster ride. He was wonderful in the beginning. I gave up work to have kids. When the kids were small I helped him build his business and apart from the occasional outburst from him we had a great life.

Over the years, his outbursts and attacks became more frequent but, as he pointed out, it was really all my fault. He was the one with all the stress. He was our sole provider. He bore all the responsibility. The children and I were burdens to him when we didn’t support him, didn’t fit in with his routine, and didn’t show him sufficient respect or gratitude. Of course, as children grow older their needs change. They become more vocal, more opinionated, and more aware. According to him I failed to control them properly, I failed to maintain the image of the perfectly dressed and picture perfect wife. He demanded that I portray the adoring little Stepford wife to his role of indulgent husband.

Our friends and families regarded us as the perfect couple …. but it had become an act. It was shallow and pretentious beyond belief. Our social life was superficiality personified and our relationship was nonexistent. When he had affairs – brief flings he called them - he explained it was my fault - I had driven him to it. He would put me down in company with his sarcastic sneers and witty little sardonic disparaging remarks but always with a bright smile on his face so I thought no-one noticed he had denigrated me. No one saw his constant vengeful rages. They never witnessed him attacking me, never heard him swear filthy epithets and threats at me; never saw him rip the clothing off my body, never saw his fists beat into my flesh. That was our dirty little secret.

We were very well off and he didn’t stint on money for good schools and extracurricular activities. We always went away for holidays – either overseas or to some first class game lodge or a five star hotel at the coast. As for myself, I enjoyed a generous allowance which afforded me good quality jewellery; expensive cosmetics and facials, hairdos, manicures, pedicures, health spas and an ever changing designer wardrobe of clothing, shoes, bags and belts. I was often the envy of my friends and, although that pleased me in one way, it made me feel guilty and cheap in another. I knew it was a sham but he’d told me he’d kill me if I ever left him, and I believed him. He’d also said that I couldn’t make it in the world without him, and again I believed him. He’d insisted I was the cause of all his stress, and I was brainwashed into believing him. I was trapped.

After too many years of this, with the children in their teens, I went to consult with a Divorce Attorney. He told me I could reasonably maintain my standard of living after divorcing my husband, and he reassured me on quite a few other worries I’d harboured. Of course, a few days after that meeting my husband had another of his outbursts and I was so scared of him finding out I’d seen an Attorney that I never went back.

A few years later, as a result of my husband’s uncontrollable temper, I ended up in hospital and because of the injuries I sustained I was there for a few weeks. This gave me time to think. By now the children were in their late teens and older. It was time to decide about my own future.

I found  Martin Vermaak Attorneys’ team of Specialist Divorce and Family Law Lawyers, and although my husband made a lot of threats in the beginning, my Attorneys looked after me really well and my ex husband has had to pay. My standard of living has hardly dropped but best of all, I waken up in a morning looking forward to the day and, most importantly, I don’t have to put on an act anymore, I can just be myself.

By the way, my friends knew all about it, they just didn’t know how to approach me and discuss it with me…but all those years of pretending - when all the time they knew….what’s worse, some of them were in a similar situation to myself…..what a waste….