The Statement: Trauma, Truth And Justice

Some stories don’t end when you leave 🥀

In Episode 2 of House of H.E.R, I sit down again with my friend Cassie to talk about what happened after I left the part of the story that rarely gets spoken about, and the part that almost broke me.

This episode is about the aftermath. The crash. The moment survival mode finally catches up with you. With the relationship over and the truth beginning to surface, my body and nervous system collapsed under everything they had been holding in for so long. I share what it was like to hit rock bottom, experience suicidal thoughts, and realise that leaving didn’t bring instant relief it brought grief, fear, confusion, and the most intense emotional pain of my life.

We talk honestly about going to the police, the shock of how serious the case became, and what it was like navigating statements, evidence, CPS decisions, arrest, remand, and court. I share why the Victim Personal Statement became one of the most powerful moments of my healing not because it changed the past, but because it gave me my voice back.

This episode also explores the losses that come with speaking up. Friendships ending. People choosing sides. The isolation that can follow telling the truth. And the painful reality that sometimes you have to lose everything connected to your old life in order to save yourself.

We talk about trauma responses no one warns you about  emotional numbness, flashbacks, body-based anxiety, fixation, shame, and the urge to minimise what you went through. And we talk about the slow, uncomfortable realisation that healing doesn’t begin when the danger ends  it begins when your body finally feels safe enough to fall apart.

This is not an easy listen. But it is an honest one.

If you’ve ever wondered why leaving didn’t feel like freedom, why you struggled more after it ended, or why your nervous system feels like it’s still fighting a war that’s already over  this episode is for you.

You are not dramatic. You are not failing. Your body is processing trauma.

What we cover

• What happens after you leave an abusive relationship
 • Nervous system collapse and delayed trauma responses
 • Suicidal thoughts and hitting emotional rock bottom
 • Going to the police and navigating the justice system
 • Arrest, remand, and the court process
 • The Victim Personal Statement and reclaiming your voice
 • Loss of friendships and social fallout after speaking up
 • Why healing doesn’t start when the abuse ends

Trigger Warning

This episode contains discussion of domestic abuse, coercive control, physical violence, strangulation, stalking, suicide, and mental health struggles. If you’re struggling right now or something in this episode has brought things up for you, please know you are not alone and help is available.

UK Support

Samaritans
Call 116 123 (free, 24/7)
https://www.samaritans.org

National Domestic Abuse Helpl

House of H.E.R. is a space for women who have lived through abuse, trauma, and relationships that broke them. This podcast exists to tell the truth, raise awareness around domestic abuse, and remind you that you are not alone in what you’re healing from.

Resources & support:
https://stan.store/houseofherpod

Join our healing community:
https://patreon.com/HOUSEOFHER

Follow @houseofher__ and my personal account @holliedowdingx on Instagram and please share this episode with a woman who might need it 🥀

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:34

Hi guys, welcome back to season two, episode two of the House of Her podcast, your home of healing, empowerment and richness. I am joined again by my lovely friend Cassie.

SPEAKER_01: 0:50

Hello everybody, and thank you so much for having me on again, Holly.

SPEAKER_00: 0:54

You are very welcome. It's so nice to have you. I absolutely loved, well, I say love the last episode. I loved doing it with you.

SPEAKER_01: 1:01

I loved doing it with you. I was traumatised, but I loved doing it with you.

SPEAKER_00: 1:05

But this is why I think after that I decided that last episode, if you've watched it, we went back to the beginning. Yeah. Why the House of Her started, what is the House of Her and my story. And then I thought, you know what? If we're gonna do that, I may as well do the whole lot again, fresh, fresh voice. And I think something like this, the the story can never be told too many times because you know it's something maybe said and picked up in a different way by a different listener. Um, but as you do know, we had a lot of problems with season one with the lighting, the sound, and so I think it's just better to just do it all at fresh. So we're gonna do a little three-part series.

SPEAKER_01: 1:47

We are, we are very excited. So equally as well, though, I watched your first season and I watched the episode where you talked about what you had been through, and I learnt so much more this time round. Yeah, excuse me. I learnt so much more this time round. Um, and I've got to be honest, I drove home in complete silence and was just traumatised by what you'd been through.

SPEAKER_00: 2:12

I just went and had a Chinese, which shows how emotionally unaffected, not unaffected, but it's just an emotional block that I have. Like it's just so weird. I was saying to you as well, like it's like when I watch things and I watch the episode back, it's like I'm watching an episode of East Enders. Like I don't like you're watching someone else. Yeah, I just don't I don't I I just I watch it and when I talk about it here, there is parts of it when I think of my kids, and and it takes me back sometimes to an emotion that I felt in that time, and it and it does flaw me, and you can see that when the emotion comes out in me. But when I'm watching it back sometimes, and I see things or I look on my phone and something comes up, I'm very emotionally blocked off from it. Like it doesn't affect me.

SPEAKER_01: 3:04

That's definitely a coping mechanism, though. It has to be.

SPEAKER_00: 3:07

Yeah, that was the only way you could survive. Survive, and I think I don't know whether it's for so long I did have to block it off. You know, when I was speaking to my friends, when I was speaking to my family, when I was going and doing things like I had to be emotionally completely shut off. So I think I just that was just my way of surviving the relationship, to be honest. So I don't know whether now I've just now is my way of coping because it's the way I survived the relationship, you know, no one knew and everyone was like, yeah, I'm fine, and I would just it just like we said in episode one, it just became so normal for me that I've just built up this wall. But I need to get it down a bit, I think.

SPEAKER_01: 3:42

Yeah, absolutely, and I think also as well, and well I know we're gonna talk about the healing, um, your healing journey and and what you've actually done, but I think in order to move forward with healing, you have got to go back and really feel those emotions in order to move forward, Holly. Or you're always gonna be in a place of like being stuck. Stuck.

SPEAKER_00: 4:02

And the thing is, I don't like we will talk about on the healing part of it, but I don't um I don't not think I don't shut it off and not I actually really struggle with not being able to stop thinking about it and having those constant like there isn't a I would say there's not a minute of the day where there isn't some sort of flashback thought of what happened, it's just dealing with the it's like it comes and I'm like right I and I think when you're a mum and you've got kids around you, it's also another thing that you don't have time to sit and cry over it and deal with it. So when these things happen, I'm just yeah, I'm just so used to just thinking it being a bit like that, and then right, come on, gotta get on with make dinner now or and I think that's trauma full stop.

SPEAKER_01: 4:46

I mean, obviously, you know what I've been through, and I think it's uh it feels like it happened to somebody else.

SPEAKER_00: 4:51

Yeah, and just for the listeners listening, um, and we will actually have to talk about this because you're a woman of empowerment, which is what the podcast is also about. But Cassie um going off subject for a minute, yeah, had breast cancer. You don't remember. Disease, no, not at all. Um, breast cancer, which is how we kind of connected. That's a story for another day, because this is you know, when you talk about alignment, that's crazy. But um, yeah, you know about trauma.

SPEAKER_01: 5:21

And that and it does, and it feels like that time of going through breast cancer treatment and surviving and coming out the other side and and you know living life after. When I think about it now, it feels like it happened to somebody else, yeah, which is crazy. But I'm here and you're here, and we and I know we have got a lot to do, and you as well have found a purpose, absolutely, which is wonderful, yeah. Yeah, so we're gonna dig a bit deep now, and I want to take you back to the point where you decided that enough was enough, you left the relationship, and then you went to the police. Can you talk to me about that?

SPEAKER_00: 6:02

Yeah, so I think in uh episode one, yeah, we went over, didn't we, that I left and then I went back when my aunt died. Yes. Um and then I think I did mention, you know, nothing really changed, and it was the same and the whole Christmas situation, and I think I can't remember. I remember just it being like, oh, I had the car accident and I spoke about that, and I just got to a point I was like, whoa, I'm done. And actually through then, um, I think at the end of December, I I had really bad vertigo, like, and I was going to the doctors and I was going to um the hospital was actually like three days, four days before Christmas, I can't remember how many days, but really close to Christmas, I was literally in a hospital I to the point where I was throwing up. I couldn't, I I it was so I couldn't stand up properly, it just got so bad, and every time I was going, they were saying to me it's stress. Yeah, and I have a friend who uh went on to be my trauma, she has a trauma clinic who I worked with very closely, and she kept saying to me, You are on under so much trauma, um, because I'd started opening up to her a little bit about everything that happened that you know this is your body's this is the way it's coming out with you. Um and I remember being in hospital and he was still on the phone to me, and I had to send him messages in the hospital to show because he thought I was lying.

SPEAKER_01: 7:34

I have like a burning sensation in my chest when you talk about things like this.

SPEAKER_00: 7:38

And I had to send a picture of the hospital. It's just crazy. And he wouldn't let me get off the phone. And at this point, he was saying to me, like, but just tell me that you're gonna think about it, just tell me that you're gonna get an I used to, and you know, wrong or right, I don't know, but at this point I was just like, Yeah, who knows what's gonna happen? Who knows? Maybe I will come back, maybe we just need time away. Because if I said to him, No, it's done, I'd I I would never have got him, he'd have been at my door, and so I just had to go along, and and it probably wasn't the right thing to do because I was getting given hope, maybe, because his mum actually said to me after, you know, you've got to stop doing that. But it was like it was my way of calming him down, and when you'd you know, I didn't want him turning up at my door, and if I didn't answer him, he would threaten to turn up at my door and all of this stuff. So that happened, and I remember being in the hospital throwing up, and he'd be down the phone at me, and I'd just be like, one second, and any normal person would be like, Go on, go. But he was like, I was frying up on the phone to him and just hanging on hanging on. So that was all going on. He didn't leave me alone. The whole of Christmas bombarded me. Mine games, if I didn't answer the phone, he'd say to me, I'm gonna turn up. And then I think we got into January, and I don't know what I can't remember exactly what happened, but I went full throttle. Um, if you follow my Instagram, I always go for a really big promotion with work, and I don't know how I got through that month, but I literally put everything into hitting this promotion. It was almost like I was proving to myself, yeah, you have taken every part of me, I can't stand up. I felt so it was really starting to affect me, but you are not fucking taking this opportunity from me and my children. So when I do something, yeah, I don't do it by halves. I literally, and I think it's a bit of an ADHD thing, like fixating, I threw myself into this, and I can't actually remember what happened in this period, but he actually left me alone for a little while. Um, but I came out of the back of January, and I'd also at this point just started therapy, and what therapy undone or unlocked was what was going on a realisation of the thing. And the severity of what I was going through. And a bit like everyone's reaction, she was like, I was like, well, he does this and he done this and he done, and she was like, Holly, do you understand what and I was like, well, yeah, I know it's domestic abuse, but you know, I went back and I done this and I talked to him like this, and I and she was like, No, no, and I think that was going on while I was going for this promotion, but I just couldn't, and then I got to the end of that month, I hit the promotion, and what I think in my eyes, I think what a lot of us do is I think we're always working saying, Can you think when I do that, that's gonna solve that? Yeah, and what I came to realise that just because I hit this life-changing opportunity and this promotion, it didn't change, it didn't give me the peace number one that I was hoping for, and it didn't change internally what was going on inside my body and what I'd been through, and it's like all of a sudden I had all of that focus, and I focused so much on hitting that promotion, but when I had nothing to focus on after that, and all that was left was my reality of oh my fucking god, what is going on, and and I think I found it really hard. I think you just at this point I had no idea how our bodies worked, I'll be honest, how our nervous system worked. I walked out of that relationship and thought, I'm gonna be peaceful, he's not in my life anymore, I'm gonna have peace. Yeah, you don't. No, let me tell you, you don't, and uh and that was a really hard thing, and I think because I'd thrown myself into this work promotion, he actually emailed me. Um and the emails were so crazy, it was like, well done on your promotion. And I actually went back and said thank you, and then it was like, Look, I need to talk to you. I think this was around this time, I've got a life-changing opportunity, and you need to be an adult about this, and you need to do this, and you honestly, they were just so you need to stop being cold-hearted. You need to, I'm on the verge of a life-changing opportunity that could change my life. And basically, if you don't help me, he wanted me to give him peace in what he'd done to me so that he could move on with his life and live happily ever after. Um, so during this time, obviously, I came out the back of January and I hit the all-time low. The therapist was making me very aware of what was going on, and I hit an emotional breakdown. Yeah, and my sister then became so worried about me, and at this point, everyone had started to know what was going on. And this was at the point that you couldn't even get out of bed, right? Yes, so this is when it started happening because I had really started opening up, and of course, I'm going into therapy now and I am talking. You're putting it out in the universe. My friend had told my sister, so instead of me now internalising it and shutting it down, I am talking about it and the floodgates are opening of what's been going on, and it it ruined me. It really honestly just I just I went into this complete state of I don't know, I uh of suicidal stage. I don't know how to it was horrendous, like and I kept myself together, these are the bits that choke me. I kept myself together so much like the kids knew nothing. And I remember picking Georgie up from school one day, and this was when it got really bad. This was in the must have been in the February, and I I remember picking her up from school and she got in the car, and I just this is the bit that gets me because when I talk about the kids, it like I just could not hold it in any longer, and I really tried to for so long keep myself together and I just could not hold it in anymore, like I literally couldn't see through the tears. I was like sobbing, and I got home and I remember I messaged my friend Steph and my sister and I was just like I can't do this anymore. And my friend Steph bless her, like she came round literally in seconds and slept basically on the floor with her little girl and the dog that wouldn't leave me. But my sister came round, and there'd been a bit of a build-up to this, but I feel like this was like the bit where I was like, I I can't, I I've I just physically I can't fight this feeling anymore. I can't, I can't cope with how it's making me feel. I was looking at my children, and I just it was a dark place, and I just honestly, like so many people, and this is the thing that I want to get across, is like so many people say to you, you're not gonna feel like this forever. And at the time, you really like honest to God, I've never felt like that. You know, everyone has bad times and that, but I genuinely was at the point where I was like, I just I can't face this again. I cannot wake up. I used to like go to bed and I couldn't sleep because I was fearing waking up the next day and how I how I was gonna get through that day and my thought process and all I cared about like obviously my job was social media and all that was was what he thought of me. And at this point I had this fixation which was sending me into a spiral of how I looked. Yeah, and this was when I started seeing my trauma there. It was all going on at the same time, but I couldn't look in a mirror, and it wasn't out of being vain, and I and there's still parts of it, you know, that are very much there, but I mean when I was like this, it was uh like awful. It there wasn't a second of the day that I couldn't look in the mirror, and all I cared about was what he was gonna think of me, is he gonna be looking at me, thinking, ugh, look at her. And I I had it was body dysmorphia, which actually I want to do an episode on because I think people think that it's vainness or whatever, and no one understands it, but it literally took over my life. That was driven your anxiety. It was something for me to focus on rather than the pain of what it was. Like another my therapist said to me, it was it was my way of focusing on something without focusing on what I was dealing with. And also, like I said to you, he had never put down my the way I look. And this isn't me saying it in a I am the I am beautiful way, it's just it he never did, and I think because he'd put down every other part of me, all I felt like he liked about me was the way I looked, so I became so scared that I was gonna lose that, and he madly that he was gonna look at me and think, ugh, like that's what that's the madness that was going round in my head, and it's so hard to explain and understand, but it was a dark, dark place to be, a really dark place to be. And at that point, that night, I just hit that point, and I think my sister thought she's gonna I think that my sister and Steph just did think they must have been absolutely petrified. Yeah, they must have been forced to be able to be able to my sister, my sister actually said, like, I I have to tell mum and dad now, I have to tell mum because if I don't and you're gonna do something, they are never gonna forgive me. Yeah. So she told my mum, and that night, it was that night, and I I I just I remember just laying on the bed, and Georgie was walking past the bedroom, and I was just I about that point I just lost, I just didn't care, like I had nothing else to give. I just lost all control of myself and my feelings, and it had just finally become too much. It it had hit me. Your body was just shutting down on you. Yeah, literally, and oh god, that feeling is just honestly like I never ever thought that another human could ever or or that you you think about people that I've never understood suicide until now, yeah, and and thankfully I didn't, and I have got a good amazing family, which is half the reason I went to the police because I know how dark I felt, and the only thing that got me through was having the support around me for people to literally pick me up, and I'm not joking when I say pick like literally pick me up, but I've got to ask you a question.

SPEAKER_01: 18:26

Did you when you when your mum finally was told the truth about what had been going on by your sister, did she then put two and two together because she'd seen a change in your behaviour? Or had you just become so good at masking it?

SPEAKER_00: 18:40

I think my mum actually saw bruises on my face once that were yellow from where he had strangled me. Um and I just was like, oh, I don't know what that is. She was like, Oh, have you got flowers at home? I was like, Oh yeah, maybe it's a bit of pollen. I mean, this is how ridiculous it was getting. But at the time, but she never liked it, she never got close to him, she always knew he wasn't right for me. But I'd always, I'd never even told my mum, like my sister knew the arguments, my sister knew the controllingness, so did my friends, but I never spoke to my mum and dad about it.

SPEAKER_01: 19:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 19:14

When she knew she came over that night, well, I mean, her head nearly spun off her shoulders. She got in her car and she nearly she wanted to drive to his, she wanted to drive, you can imagine it broke her. And she came round, and you know, even her, she sat in front of me and was like, Why was you going back? You know, you just don't get it. And I think this has been a whole learning curve for a lot of people in my life and for me of understanding because the first thing that everyone said to me was, Why was you going back? And I had no answer at this point. I was like, I don't know. I just and then you feel guilty because then you're like, Well, I and then you feel ashamed, and then you feel stupid, and then you go back inwards because it's like I don't actually have the answer to why I'm going back, maybe because I'm just as bad as he is, or um.

SPEAKER_01: 20:00

It just goes to show though the coercive control and the effect that it can have. But you finally got to the point that night.

SPEAKER_00: 20:08

Yeah. So they said to me, we didn't actually tell my dad for a couple of weeks because we was going away for my uncle's 60th, and he was been looking forward to it and it would have just ruined him. But when they eventually did tell we that I wasn't there, that they got him at my sister's and sat down and he was heartbroken as you can imagine. He went through every emotion as a dad, angry, upset, hurt that he hadn't known, they hadn't picked up on things, and um he then said to me, they said to me, You are going to the police. And I was like, at first I was like absolutely not, like I wasn't, that was not in my like agenda at all. Um but they was like, that was when they said to me, if this was Georgie, what would you be telling her to do? And also, are you gonna let him go and get in another relationship? And if that girl hasn't got what you have got, the family and the support and all of that, how how will it end up for her? Yeah, and that really affected me. And my dad was like, You can't even get yourself out of bed, and he's out enjoying his life. And this isn't a thing of how dare he go out and enjoy like his friends and family, you know, thought that I'd done it because they didn't want him to go on holidays and didn't want him to go to his friend's wedding or whatever else. But why should someone like that be able to go out and live in normal and then I'm left in therapy paying hundreds of pounds a month and not being able to look after my children and wanting to end my life while you're out gallivanting with your friends onto your next victim? No, absolutely, yeah. And so that was that. And I went to the police, and to be honest, I had no idea or thought that this was gonna be what the outcome was. I really didn't. I just thought they were gonna give him a slap on the wrist and say you don't treat women like that.

SPEAKER_01: 22:04

I remember you telling me that. I remember you being like, I I cannot believe that it grew legs and that it carried on going.

SPEAKER_00: 22:10

Honestly, still to this day, I'm like, I think that was probably one of the biggest things that made me think, oh my god, this is fucking serious.

SPEAKER_01: 22:16

Yeah. Um so let's talk about that. Let's talk about the the seriousness of this. So you go to the police.

SPEAKER_00: 22:23

So I filled in a form um online. So, you know, this was the process of what so I went online, Essex Police, I think it was, and filled in a form, and they say we'll get in touch within 24 hours, I think it was. And literally that night they rung me. Um by the time I'd got home. No, it was a Mao, actually. Okay. Um, and they literally said, Can we book an interview with you? Can you come in to the police station? And I think they booked that for the next day or the day after, really quickly. Um, I went in and um they was lovely to be I I cannot, honest to God, my experience with them is phenomenal. Um they were just amazing from start to finish, but when I went in, I basically told them, and he basically said to me, We think you should make a statement because what I was saying when I went in was kind of a bit off the record, it was me saying it. Yeah, he said to me, We want to make a statement. Holly, this is really serious. Um, we want to make a statement. And are you happy? And I was like, I don't know, I don't know. And I phoned my mum and I said, What do you think I should do? And obviously, she was like, Don't leave that room. Um, so I did, I was in there hours. Luckily, and weirdly enough, I think the whole time, I think I was actually worried for my life a lot of the time, and I think because of that, I did always take pictures. There was a lot that was missing because he'd smashed my phone. So when we were away at the beginning of when we went to Cyprus, yeah, he'd smashed my phone, so I lost a lot there, but I always did, and and I had 18 months worth of messages of coercive controlling, but I had a lot of evidence which I was lucky for. Um, so they had all of that, and they took it away, and at the end they said, right, well, we've got enough to bring him in and hopefully charge him with. I can't remember, there was about six charges at the beginning, I can't remember exactly what they were. Um, and they said a warrant will go out for his arrest. Um, and what they explained to me then and there, and even at this point it was so downplayed, is they said to me basically, and this is what happens for anyone listening, you know, if you're going through the same thing, is because it's domestic abuse, they can't, if someone nicks something out of a sweep shop, they can pull them in, take them off the street, charge him with theft or whatever, but because it's domestic abuse and it's very serious, the Essex police and the police officers cannot charge. So it has to go to CPS. Right. So they can bring him in and they can question him, but they have to release him pending further investigation through the CPS, and the CPS have four weeks to come back and say, right, we've got enough, and we think this is a doable, uh chargeable thing that you know we can take to court. Yeah. Um so my thing was they were going to bring him in. He was getting released on bow, and the CPS might not even do anything with it. It took them three weeks to arrest him. They did try a couple of times, but because they're so understaffed, it kind of goes in an order. You know, they go and try and find him, and if he's not in, they go on to the next one, and it goes in a bit of a loop. Um, during this time, he was still driving on to where I live because he got his hair cut down the road, and funny things were happening, parcels were going missing out my garden. I've got no proof of that, of course, but weird things were happening. Um it's like a film. Yeah. And um actually, just before this, before when my mum and that found out and I had gone to the police, obviously, my best friend was married to his friend, and I think he got winged because he actually started bombarding me again with relentless calls, like one call after another, m hundreds of times. Um, so I think he knew what was happening and was maybe trying to save himself. Um I don't know, again, that could be coincidence. Um but when so it took them three weeks. They three weeks later, I was in Katz Kundalini class. I came out and I had a missed call from his sister and the police, and they'd arrested him. And oh my god, I can't even tell you. I was I don't know even how I drove home. Like I was just beside myself. But they were amazing, the police, and and basically they arrested him at like nine o'clock in the morning. They didn't interview him till 2 a.m. the next day, so they kept they kept him in there squirming for as long as they could, making him sweat. Um when he got arrested, he done a statement to say he had never touched me, and it was just a bit of both, basically, or something like that. I can't really remember, but he denied all anything. And he didn't, I heard through the grapevine, think that it was as serious. He didn't realise in his opinion that yeah, right. He didn't realise how bad it was gonna be.

SPEAKER_01: 27:46

Right.

SPEAKER_00: 27:47

Um and he so they took him in, they kept him in. They interviewed him at 2 a.m. And basically, they originally it's so hard to remember what the charges were, but it was one coercive control charge. Now, coercive control covers everything in domestic abuse, it's the highest domestic abuse charge. Um, it can cover even things like rape. It's not that that happened to me, but it can cover, it's just it covers a lot. Um, one of that um stalking and harassment. I can't so bad I can't actually even remember what the charges were, but I was a little bit like, oh, when they told me the charges. Um, and also the thing is what I want to explain is when you go to the police, because I heard a lot of this from his friends, and that you don't get to say what you want them to be charged with. So they will only charge them with what the evidence is that they have got, you know, it goes to CPS, they look through it, and if they think that it what they see and what they've got fits under, they will charge. You know, it's not down to me to say I want him to be charged with coercive control if they haven't got the evidence for that or they don't think they're not gonna do it. Um so when they interviewed him, um they said to me, Do you want us to let you know? And I was like, Well, I'm not gonna sleep anyway. At 3 a.m. they text me, and bearing in mind, I'm expecting them to interview him, bow him, and this go on for four weeks until CPS. They took him in and they got an emergency CPS charge within seven hours, and they didn't release him on bail. They kept him in. This is when I started to think, oh my fucking god, because this doesn't happen a lot, you know. You read a lot of stuff and unfortunately, just you it's a bit unheard of, like how serious, and I think this for me was like, oh my god, this is really serious. Um they kept him in and they charged him with um two counts of coercive no, sorry, one count of coercive control, ABH for breaking my bones, two counts of intentional strangulation, um harassment. I think there was something on there for damaging my property and my house smashing my door in my house. Um and they took him to court the net they kept him in, they said he won't be released on bow. Then at that point, they said to me, he may probably get released in court. We're gonna take him to court first thing in the morning. If he gets released from court, it's a better thing because court bow is a lot stricter than police bow, so he will have a lot stricter. So they took him to court. I actually was travelling to Birmingham that day for trauma healing, and I hadn't heard anything. It got to four o'clock in the afternoon. I rang the police, I was just all over the place, and when I rang them, they was like, Oh no, we've got nothing in. Um we haven't heard anything. And then while I was on the phone, he was like, Oh no, absolutely actually it's just come in. Um, yeah, he's not been released on bow, he's been held on remand, he'll be held on remand now till called. I was like, did that give you any kind of comfort that actually you had expected? Yeah, I think at this point, I think it really did make me think, oh my god, how serious Christ, this is serious, like they don't keep people in prison, you know. And yeah, that was that was that, and that he was kept on remand until and the court process I will say is a long one. I my heart got broke a lot of times. I learned a lot through the process of you know, at the end of the day, the outcome that I got was incredible. Should they be locked up in the key thrown away? Absolutely, but you know, what I learnt through the process is no justice was ever going to come from the how much time a judge said he gets to spend behind bars. For me, I stood up for myself, I stood up for millions of other girls, I stood up for the women that have lost their lives, yeah. And there's one less monster on the road for a while, you know, however long that may be. Um, but I think it it gave me a sense of no, you're not getting away with this. You're not, you may tell me that it's this. Now stand up and tell the police that you've done it because I spoke to you in the wrong way, or that I didn't do this, or my skirt was too short, and then let's see if they say, Oh, you know what, mate, you've got a point. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 32:33

Like your friends do. Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_00: 32:35

Let's see if they've got to say finally he was being. Yeah, and they did, and and the dates changed, and it was meant to get sentenced in July, and it didn't, and it got moved back. And all I would say to you is don't hold, get your heart set on dates because it it is so disheartening.

SPEAKER_01: 32:51

But it must have taken so much courage, Holly, to go to the police to carry on going through all of that. You know, you're reliving all of this trauma over and over and over again, but you're also putting it out in the universe pretty much for the first time because you'd got so good at hiding everything, and actually, everything that you went through was everything that it was. Yeah, it was complete and utter abuse at the highest degree, yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 33:22

And also, I think once this came out, um people then found out I can't say too much about his ex-partner, but things started resurfacing, which also gave me the courage, not the courage, the I don't know what the word is, but I always felt responsible when like I had made him this monster, and that was always a fear of mine. Through things coming out, I realised I wasn't the first, and I wasn't it wasn't me that made him a monster, he is a monster, and yeah, and I think you were the victim in all of this, yeah. And as were his ex-partners, yeah, and I f I really I really struggled with that, like I really struggled to, and I think that's what I just found so evil about him, is that I would say to him, like, you know, you can't I can't be in it the first one, and you know, you stopped me taking my medication and made me feel like I was going mad, and the whole time you knew it was you. You whole time you knew that you were watching me to the point I remember actually in the December when I was going to a therapy session, I had to leave him in my house. He came to my house and I was rocking. At this point, I was literally rocking on my stairs, staring into a wall, and he messaged me and or was sitting in front of me as well and saying to me, Are you okay? Like, I think you need to go to the doctors, I don't think you're right. Like, and I genuinely at this point was clinically insane. I think I was rocking, and and I'm I believed it was me, and he was making me like, Are you okay? Like I'm worried about you, and he let me. He let you that's the evil part. I feel like that is worse than what actually hitting me. Yeah, you genuinely was making me feel like I was insane, like I was, and that's dangerous.

SPEAKER_01: 35:14

That is so dangerous, Holly, and the cycle of abuse that happened in his past relationship continued in your relationship.

SPEAKER_00: 35:22

And each time it got worse, and it got worse, and it got worse, and actually, it's funny because his ex-partner actually said, you know, she had fears that one day he would go on and kill. And actually, when it went to court, um the strangulation charges got dropped. Not because I've got evidence, I had pictures of strangulation marks. They actually wrote me a letter, the CPS, to say basically they're not dropping it because there's no evidence or that he didn't do it, but actually, crazy enough, he ended up getting two coercive control, guilty for two coercive controls. Um, he actually went guilty for a lot of the charges. He'd done a plea deal, which meant he went guilty to them, but not the strangulation. But what they said to me is how it works, the the cat the um charges get put on top of each other, he would have got no more time. The biggest charge was the coercive control, and he had two of them. Yeah, he would have served no more time. So to save me from going through a court case, because he went not guilty to the strangulation, I would have had to go to court and do a trial on those, and they said to me for the outcome to be no him serving no more time because they're only going to stack them against, and the highest charge he can get is for the coercive control, and he's got two. Yeah, it's not worth it. Yeah, you know, as much as I would love of guilty, so it wasn't because there was no evidence or that he didn't do it, the evidence is there in plain sight. It's because it would have got no better outcome for me. So why drag me for a trial? Why also for the police time, you know, why go through six weeks of a trial when the outcome's gonna be no different?

SPEAKER_01: 36:59

But the really positive thing about all of this though, Holly, is that you felt so heard, so seen, so supported by the police that were looking after.

SPEAKER_00: 37:08

Oh my god, they was incredible. They was absolutely, I cannot, I know, and you know, and I hope this gives hope. And I don't want to, you know, I I do know a lot of people through being on this journey, through you know, building this community online that a lot of people haven't had that same experience, but a lot of people that I do know actually from Harlow police station have had amazing experiences, um, and I just feel very, very lucky, not lucky, but lucky that that was the police station that I was under, you know, it the court, the judge absolutely just hold that for one minute because we're gonna get to that.

SPEAKER_01: 37:45

What I think is important to say as well is that if women are in this position actually hearing the positivity coming from you from the way that the police have have treated you.

SPEAKER_00: 37:59

Oh my god, yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 38:00

It we want to encourage women to speak up.

SPEAKER_00: 38:03

Yeah, because I think when I went to the police, actually, it's really important. This is where I started finding out a little bit more of the trauma bond side of things and all of that. When I went to the police, I actually said I'm really sorry, but I went back to him and he was like crying, he was like, and I felt guilty because that's what everyone around me was saying. Well, why did you go back to him? His friends, his family, my friends, my family was like, You're going back there, why are you doing it? So when I went to the police, I was like, I thought they were gonna tell, I genuinely thought they were gonna tell me off don't you get into it?

SPEAKER_01: 38:32

It just makes me so emotional. Yeah, like it just makes me feel so emotional. I f I feel like you were this young woman.

SPEAKER_00: 38:39

Woman, yeah. I look back and I just remember like I just I was like I was so vulnerable and so confused, but I remember them saying to me, Holly, this is the cycle of abuse. Yeah, you've gone back a couple of times. We deal with women that go back for 25 years, yeah. Um and they were they were just incredible. They actually they actually put it down as high risk. Um, so I got immediately transferred to a domestic abuse charity who were incredible. Um they were changing pathways, they were absolutely incredible. They actually sent me ring doorbells to put on my house because um, in the meantime of him, me going to the police and him getting arrested, obviously I didn't feel safe. We wasn't sure if he was going to get bail, if he was gonna get released. They were incredible. Um, and they treated me, you know, they put all the safety measures in place. I had a safety plan. They they were amazing, and I couldn't have asked for any more. Um, and you know, I hope that the the laws are changing, I do believe, around domestic abuse. And actually in court he spoke about the seriousness of domestic abuse, and he ended up actually getting because he went guilty, how lovely of him, they get a discount on their because Obviously, they've done they've won a photo. They get less time. They get 25% off. Um so he actually would have got, I think it was eight and a half years. Um he got two. Oh god, it's so hard to remember. This is so bad, isn't it? Two counts of coercive control and an ABH for breaking my bones. I can't remember what the other one was, I'm pretty sure there was. There was one more, then wasn't there? Um I should know this, and I can't remember what it is.

SPEAKER_01: 40:35

That's protection. I can't actually protect it.

SPEAKER_00: 40:39

But basically, he ended up getting eight and a half years, but because he got 25%, it took it down to six and a half years, which is still, I mean, an incredible outcome. And it shows the seriousness of it. And yeah, I think he got maximum sentencing basically for each charge. Yeah. Then the 25% taken off. Then obviously, he'd done six months on remand, that counts as double. So I think I don't actually know when he's going to beat you out. I'd rather not think about it right now. No, absolutely not.

SPEAKER_01: 41:07

Um, let's talk about the victim statement. Sorry, let me get this right. It's called a VPS. It's the victim personal statement to the cult. Let's talk about that and actually what did it mean for you to have your voice heard? I think that's everything. That's courage. Like you must have been shaking in your boots.

SPEAKER_00: 41:29

And you know what? I've just got to say about that. This is, I think, it must have rocked the judge and everybody in that room. When it went to call, I chose to start because I thought I need I need him. It was very closed off. I need him to understand once and for all. I still cared a bit too much about what he thought, but I wanted him to understand, I wanted his family that decided to show their faces and friends to understand how much it had impacted. But also I thought this is my last time to stand up and and have something. But I'd asked for screens in front of me to not be seen. I didn't want to see him. I I think that would have just I wouldn't have been able to do it if I'd have seen him, and I didn't want him to see me. Yeah. Actually, when it went to court, he refused to he asked for me to not have the screens in the case.

SPEAKER_01: 42:22

Even at the final hour, that man. Yeah. If I can even call him a man.

SPEAKER_00: 42:28

Yeah, he uh he said that he doesn't want me to have the screens. Still wanted and the judge basically was like, fuck off in the nicest way possible. Absolutely. But I think that proved to the judge that even I think he was still trying to get that power over me, look at me, maybe make me feel a bit timid. I don't know why, but still control. Yeah. So I think that just didn't do him any favours.

SPEAKER_01: 42:48

But you know, in like his warped brain, I mean, I would want I would want to look at you, you're an absolute beaut. And maybe in his mind it was almost like I know it's like quite warped, but maybe he did just want to cast eyes on you one more time, you know?

SPEAKER_00: 43:02

Yeah. Um, but the victim personal statement, that's the only thing that I would say into anybody going through this, do your own victim statement. Because basically, when the police said to me, they gave me a form to fill in in and they actually half-filled it in forming, it was like, How has it affected you? Business shutdown, suicidal. It was like so much, it showed nothing, it was just them ticking something off, it showed no emotion, and I was like, absolutely not, like that. Is not there is so much more to that. So I'd done my victim four pages. It was when I tell you what, that was that was emotion. That was hard. It took me so long. They was chasing me. Have you got your state? Because it was just so actually writing it down and and getting it out was awful. And actually, when I sent it to my sister, and she was just like, oh my god. It must have just been so heartbreaking for your family. Yeah. Did your mum go to court? Yes, and my dad didn't. My mum, my all my friends, we had an army, I remember seeing. And actually, his ex-partner, the mother of his children, came with me and her sister to stand in solidarity solidarity. That is, and I think when he saw her, oh my god, I think he must have fallen. Because he would have been able to see all of the. Yeah, and also, yeah, he could see, and he was quite brazen, I think, when he came in. Obviously, I couldn't see it. I actually watched it from a video link outside, but I couldn't see him. Um, and everyone said, my friends were like, they didn't take eyes off of him. And they said that he was quite when he went in, as they were reading everything out, but the judge wiped the the judge actually, when I read the CPS on the police head were crying, oh my goodness, listening to my statement and everything that he had done, and they were reading things out that you know, messages in front of his friends and family and text messages that he'd send. He'd send yeah, and I I think everyone said that his face as it was going along was going more and more like a lead balloon, just someone putting it, he was like deflating. But the judge actually reread my victim statement.

SPEAKER_01: 45:09

You know it's a bit like humiliation. Sorry, we'll come back to that in one sec. You know, it's a bit like humiliating him the way that he did to you.

SPEAKER_00: 45:15

To you, yeah. And his barrister, is it his barrister, his solicitor or whatever, actually tried to stand up and say it wasn't a prolonged period of time. Um, and the judge turned round to her and said, if you had been under the level of abuse that Miss Dowdin has for 18 months and um was inflicted with the level of abuse that she was day in, day out, physically and mentally, I think you would class it as a prolonged period of time. Like, honest to God, every single thing that they tried to argue, the the judge I mean, he literally used him as through the book at him as a as an example. 100%. I mean, we all came out and was like judge, I can't even remember what his name is, Judge for Prime Minister, because he was the way he looked at me when I read my victim personal statement, which I cried the whole way through, how I actually got through it, I don't know. But if I can say to anybody to to have your final say, if you are brave enough and strong enough to go through that court process, that for me, I think showed the impact that it had. And I said, you know, he can do however long. I am I was served a life sentence now because my life is will never be the same again. I will never be the same again in whatever way I may become a stronger version, but I will never ever be the same again, and I am forever changed for that. So for him to just walk through, I don't it's not fair. You know, I couldn't cut my children's dinner, I couldn't every part of my life, and and why should they just walk away? Why should that why should he get away with it? And I am left scarred, not physically maybe but mentally.

SPEAKER_02: 47:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 47:03

Um tell me about the you've just flawed me again, sorry. Tell me about the judge and what did he do with your victim personal statement?

SPEAKER_00: 47:12

Yes, so he reread the victim statement because that impactful and yeah, everyone was crying in the room. His friend at the end got up and when that they he basically said he actually said how much serious it was. So basically, in terms of like breaking my bones and doing all of that, the because it was in a d a domestic relationship, a loving relationship where I should feel safe, it made the the the severity of it so much worse. Um and when they actually read out the time, his friend got up at the end and was like, Oh, so he's coming out in this year, yeah, coming out in this year, and it was just uh go away, honestly, just yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 47:52

They but let's talk about losses, Holly, because I know you suffered a lot with this, and I know that you know you may go on to talk about this in more detail, but talk to me about the losses that happened. You went to the police, it went to court, he got the book thrown at him, and rightly so.

SPEAKER_00: 48:09

I think his friends and family knew everything, yeah, they were always on side. I think I mentioned it in the other episode. His mum had always said to me, It's lucky, you don't call to the police, go to the police on him. Um, everyone knew what was going on, and everyone was on my side. Um, his sister was amazing, and I'll still say, you know, I had a great relationship with her. Um, I had a great relationship with his mum, I had a great relationship with all of them, to be fair, until they obviously realised that he their son and and brother and whoever else, it it was gonna become knowledge, and I think you know, the shame then it became my fault. Yeah. How dare you? They told me because it was his mum who sent me the voice message that I shared on social media about you know, just everyone's sick of hearing it, just brush it under the carpet, you know, he's done this, but you've got your issues too.

SPEAKER_01: 49:04

And did she at this point know that he had broken your bones?

SPEAKER_00: 49:08

I don't know. Brush it up, but but regardless She knew he was violent because she had all the pictures of me covered in bruises.

SPEAKER_01: 49:14

This is this is exactly what I've done.

SPEAKER_00: 49:15

I don't know whether she knew ins and outs, but she knew he was violent with me. She knew she knew he'd dragged me back. You shouldn't touch a hair on your body. Um so that was I I lost and I was so panicked. I remember I remember his sister when he got arrested sent me a message basically saying, Why didn't you why didn't you mention that he was harassing you? Why didn't you say all of this? I'm I'm I'm gutted that it's come to this. Basically, I'm gutted that it's got to him, you going to the police. And I got to and it made me feel so so I just went back, have I done the right thing, I just completely lost myself again. Um and then through it I lost my friends. His friends were very much still like, you know, he's our friend of 15 years, and that's my friendship circle. It was I lost so much, I lost my best friend.

SPEAKER_01: 50:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 50:10

Which has been really one of the hardest things, I think. Like I've said, you know, he was part of my life for a couple of years, bar being friends with him. She was my best friend since I was like five. That's a huge loss, Holly. Um so yeah, I know we'll touch more on that, but yeah, I I lost I lost every like a lot. I lost a lot, but you know, to the the girl listening to this, you can't you can't heal in the environment that breaks you. Yeah you can't, yeah, you can't you can't, you physically can't, you can't, you have to you have to break away from that. Like it's and it's the hardest thing, but nothing changes if nothing changes, and at that point in my life I was never ever gonna break free from what was happening and that environment and all that that was happening, and it wasn't my friend's fault, but every time I was speaking to her, I naturally wanted to say, What's this person saying? What's that person saying? What's and they were speaking to him inside, and I was then every time I got off the phone, I was caring zero about how I was feeling, and all about what everyone else's opinions were of me going to the police and how I was coping and what I was doing and what I was saying, and it just my whole thing came about them, yeah, and I was still connected, so I was never gonna heal.

SPEAKER_01: 51:38

No, you literally had to cut everything off, everything, yeah. It is the only way to heal. It is um god, that was a lot. That was a lot. How you feeling?

SPEAKER_00: 51:55

I don't know. I don't know, it's tough, it's tough when I I do sit and talk about it, and I think when I I talk about things with the kids, it's hard. Yeah. It's hard because I sit here now and and I feel the emotions of it and I think, oh fucking hell, like it's heavy. That's heavy, but then I walk out them doors and I'm like, right, it's done now.

SPEAKER_01: 52:16

Yeah, absolutely, and I think that is the beauty for a Chinese time for Chinese. Jesus, I need a glass of wine. Um, just in rounding up, let's talk about um what you want to say to a woman, a young girl, an older woman, doesn't matter age.

SPEAKER_00: 52:34

I think the biggest thing for me is, and I don't want to sit here and and preach, you know, go to the police and stand up because not that I don't want you to, but I also don't want to be an abusive relationship and coming out of that is traumatizing and hard and difficult enough.

SPEAKER_01: 52:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 52:54

If you can find the strength, please do it. To remove yourself, to remove yourself from that situation. My biggest thing is cutting contact. Like I said, you cannot heal in the environments that break you, and friends, family, anything that surrounds that person, anything that connects you to that person, you have to break away from. You physically cannot heal, you cannot change you, you cannot change your environment while being stuck in the environment that you know and survival comes at a cost.

SPEAKER_04: 53:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 53:33

Survival comes at a cost, and the cost is losing people. But while you're losing people, you are saving yourself.

SPEAKER_01: 53:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 53:46

And that is the most important thing.

SPEAKER_01: 53:48

Do you think that the court case? I I have two questions. Sorry, one was just coming to my head. Do you think that the court case gave you was the real start of healing and moving forward?

SPEAKER_00: 54:02

I think I tried to heal while I was going through court. I think I threw myself so deep into a healing journey, but you can't. I put so much pressure on myself. It's physically impossible. You're still in fight or flight, and I'm only just realizing that now. You physically cannot heal while going through cult.

SPEAKER_01: 54:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 54:20

I I I don't think that listen, there was things that I'd done, and I'm so glad that I started that healing journey because it gave me the strength to get through cult and get through the the hard times through that process. I lost my best friend, I lost my friendship group. Um but do I don't know, it's it's a hard one. I think I'm only now healing, yeah, and I think or starting to heal.

SPEAKER_01: 54:49

Yeah, and I think healing has no end.

SPEAKER_00: 54:51

Oh no, it and it's fucking not linear. No, it's absolutely not linear, it's one second to the other alone one day, yeah. Um but I think the healing journey, I'm glad I started, it gave me strength and let me see. But I think my healing journey now is so different because now I feel like I've got space to breathe. I'm not, you know, going through court, I'm not dealing with police, I'm now doing it away from everything, and I'm now completely cut off from my friends, I'm completely, you know, separated from that, and that's part of my past, and now I'm last year was all about surviving. Yeah, this year is hopefully a bit more thriving. Yes, but this year is a bit more stepping into the next version of me.

SPEAKER_01: 55:34

Yeah, you should be so stepping into her proud, stepping into her. You should honestly, I'm so moved, I'm so proud of you. My heart is beating out of my chest. Just for every woman that is out there suffering, Holly, you're an absolute inspiration. I want to cry again. I'm so sorry you've invited me on your podcast. I feel so emotional.

SPEAKER_00: 55:54

I've got ADHD and I'm really not touchy feely, so I'm not gonna come back.

SPEAKER_01: 55:57

Touching my hand, thank you for touching my hand. But yeah, I just feel I'm just so proud of you. Like you've been to the depths of despair, and you are turning all of this pain into something so meaningful that is going to make a difference to women's lives, Holly.

SPEAKER_00: 56:12

Yeah, and I think this is was one of the biggest things is there's so many things I've uncovered, and I just thought nowhere talks about it, nowhere talks about it, nowhere knows, and I just don't the the depths of where I went to, I just want you to know this is my message. It does get better, yeah. And I never believed that. And when I tell you I was at the brink, I I I don't I think I was had my my friend and my sister not told my mum that night, I'd dread to think, in all honesty, I'll be completely honest, I don't know what would have happened because I was at that point and everyone said to me it'll feel better, and I was like, there is no way I'm ever not gonna feel like this, and here I am, yeah, and that's my message to you. Yeah, absolutely. It's hard, it's not linear, it's up and down, but it doesn't forever have that grip.

SPEAKER_01: 57:07

Yeah, that's a great way to describe it.

SPEAKER_00: 57:10

And brighter days do come and you won't ever be you again, but you'll be a different version of you, a stronger, and you will know what you will accept and what you won't again, and now I have a little bit of hope for my future, and I didn't have that last year. That's a really beautiful thing, Holly.

SPEAKER_01: 57:31

Yeah, I have so much hope for your future. Watch out, world. Yeah, watch out. Are we done?

SPEAKER_00: 57:39

I think we're done. We're done on that part, anyway. And the next episode will be all about healing.

SPEAKER_01: 57:45

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00: 57:46

Um so thank you guys for listening. Thank you, Katie.

SPEAKER_01: 57:50

Thank you, Sol, thank you so much. Such a pleasure. Thank you for having me here. Thank you for trusting me with your story and being so vulnerable and so open. You're you're creating magic here, Holly, and you should be so proud.

SPEAKER_00: 58:04

Thanks, guys, and we will see you on the next episode. Next episode. Bye.

SPEAKER_02: 58:14

Lovely joby.

SPEAKER_00: 58:15

That was the nuts. But thank you so much for being here. Please follow, share, like, subscribe, comment. House of Her podcast is available on all normal podcast platforms. And we may not have all the answers, but if you are struggling, you need help, you are in any domestic abuse situation or going through any trauma, please, please reach out to us and we can always point you in the right direction.