Blindside

in different European cities. Yes please. Plus she didn't really have anything or any keeping her at home, so she packed her bags and off she went for a couple of years of good old English bun.

deleted dating apps so many times in disgust. But one Sunday morning, I was lying in bed, really hungover, feeling sorry for myself, and I redownloaded Bumble for the hundredth time and straight away this guy comes up and he was just really handsome. His name was Phil. He was so I think I was thirty five. He was thirty nine, dark hair, beard, very much my type, really good photos, six foot three. I matched him and we started chatting

straight away. So it was a Sunday morning, and he said that he lived in Belfast, but he was just in London for work. He had an office there. So we sort of flirted and the banter was really really good, like really really good. And I asked for his Instagram and I can remember like he gave it to me and he's like, oh, now you'll see why I'm single. So I looked him up and he had two children, and I was like, oh, okay, and I just said, look, I'll be honest, I'm not planning on staying in the UK.

I don't want to date someone who's got children because I don't want that. As a rule, I didn't date anyone with children because I didn't see myself their long term and if I met someone, I wanted them to have the flexibility to move to Australia with me, so it couldn't be someone that already had children. So this

was the start of June. Twenty eighteen. I also had quit my job because I planned to do a europe summer having a good time, like I was finishing my role at the end of June and then just to take some time off and move back to Australia. So I said to him, oh, well, it doesn't matter. Like when I saw her children, I just said, look, I'll be honest, I'm moving back to Australia in October. I've quit my job and I'm just going to enjoy one more europe summer and then I'm going to get head home.

And he was like, yeah, absolutely, I'd love to take you out, so I chose we went the following week he was back for work again and we went to my favorite pub in notting Hill, the Cockham Bottle, and I was really surprised when I was waiting for him at the front. I still remember being really shocked because he didn't really look like his photos. He wasn't quite

as tall as expected. I don't know, he just didn't look the same, but then kind of looked the same, just looked different and I didn't find him very attractive on site, but then we started talking and he was just so funny and so charming. I had the greatest night. We got really, really, really drunk, and it was probably

one of the best first dates of my life. We come from completely different countries, backgrounds, we'd work in different industries, but we got along so well and had so much to talk about, which I think is quite rare.

dating long term or anything. I was just enjoying his company for what it was. I was kind of butterflies, that kind of cliche. Yeah, I was quite giddy about it, and I definitely know I was because I had all these Europe trip plans with my friends. I was in Mikinos with some friends, and I flew back and met him in Dublin for two nights before flying back to Obitha for another thing. So I made the f to go back, so I knew I really liked him when

I did. That interrupted my trip. If I wasn't in Europe with friends, doing all the travel plans with friends coming over from Melbourne, I was in London, and London summer is so much fun. And he was just always there and always available, and he never spoke about his children. I must say, like he you know if I asked him questions, he would answer the questions about his children,

but he didn't ever bring them up ever. And he was always available anytime he'd say, what do you want to if I had free time, he was just available and he's like, oh, work is quite at the moment, I can take time off. So it was kind of anytime I said that I had time, he would just magically appear. And I had no responsibilities, I had no job. I was just enjoying London life, just going to the pub, having a boozy lunch and just yeah, that was just the whole summer. And he joined me for the whole

thing and it was just so much fun. He booked another trip in between the other trips that I was doing with my friends to Auntie in France. We just spent every day on the beach, drinking champagne, just enjoying the sun. It was just so much fun. And one of those days there he told me he loved me. And I don't know if it was the googa or

the alcohol in my blood system, but cried. I remember I cried and I said I love you too, which is just very I don't think i've ever told a guy that I love him before in my life, actually I haven't, so there you go. That was the first time, at thirty five years of age, and I can remember I said to him, well, it took you long enough. And that is just so cheesy and so silly in honsight because it had been two months, but we had

been quite inseparable for those two months. I do trips, i'd come back, and he was just always there and there was big chunks of time spent together. And I just did not see this coming. And I think because I was planning to move home to Melbourne and he had children, like all the things that were big nos for me, I think I let my guard down as well, big time. I know, I just didn't see it coming. But yeah, here I was when you know, you know, yeah mushy. So from then on we had the conversation.

We had some more serious conversations. I had told him prior to this that I wanted to move back to Australia because I wanted to meet someone, I wanted to have a child and everything. So he brought it up. He said, you know, I would love another child. I really want a girl. He already had two sons, one was three, one was eight, and he said, but I really want a daughter. I've got two sons. I'd love a daughter. And I said, I'd love to have a girl,

you know. And he said, okay, look, I have to stay in the UK until my sons are old enough to travel back and forth to Australia. But I want to live in Australia, like it's my dream to live in Australia, like I would love it so much. So he said, just five more years here and then they'd be old enough to travel together back to Australia. So I thought, okay, excellent, I'm in love. He wants to

have a child, and I love life in London. I get to spend another five years here and then I get to go home and I have everything I want. It was just all blissful and happy. And I said, well, if this is going to work, you need to move to London. So this was all the conversation we had two months in and I didn't want to do back and forward. I wanted a relationship with someone who was going to be there most of the time. So he did.

He moved in with me and I was living with a friend and after a trial period of three months. Then we got our own place, so he had his sons two days a week, so he was in London with me five nights a week, and then he would fly back and spend two nights a week with his sons. And I just thought he was just such a fantastic father because no matter what was happening in London, he always went back. He never shirked his responsibilities, and he was always so respectful of his ex wife. He spoke

about her respectfully. But he also like when I questioned him because his youngest son was three, I said, you know what happened. You know, he's still quite little. And he said that his wife was quite cold and that he got married too young because he just thought it was the right thing to do, and that's what they do in Belfast. If you're dating a nice girl, you

just you marry her and you have children. He didn't say this all at once, but the story that came out over a bit of time that he felt she used him to have children because she was a bit older and saw him as a good father and everything, and that it was a loveless marriage. So he said, when he said, you know, I'm leaving this isn't working. She said, yeah, I agree, and she said he said,

it's all very amicable. And when he told her about me, I think it was the two month mark because he wanted me to meet his children.

so well with my friends. Everybody loved him. Everybody that met him loved him, and I found him even building friendships with some of my friend's partners and going out with them, and it just could not have been more perfect. I think It was around October, four months in started asking me questions about what kind of engagement ring I would like, and this is actually really embarrassing. So I was taken aback by the comment, but then obviously went back to my girl chat and was talking about it,

and I was super excited. This is embarrassing. I started a Pinterest. I'd never been on Pinterest, and I started for engagement rings. And my sister called me and she said, Sarah, you do realize that your Pinterest is on Facebook. And it was in the newsfeed of me adding all these engagement reads to my Pinterest. I was so embarrassed. Oh my god. She couldn't stop laughing. So I promptly deleted that.

But we had such a good, fun relationship where I didn't have to actually feel that awkwardness because he had brought it up and asked me what kind of ring I wanted, and I just there was no question that we were headed in that direction very soon. So I told him about the Pinterest and we both laughed about it.

So I think I felt just so comfortable with him I could tell him and we both really laughed about it, and I showed him, I showed my Pinterest page, so yeah, that was quite funny, and we were talking about babies and I had one of my best friends in London. She is a gynecologist and an obstetrician, and she said, well, you need to go and get some fertility testing right now out so you just know how long you guys have. Of course you don't want to rush into it, but

you also you might need to. So he and I attended fertility testing together and yeah, quite a few appointments. We went down that road and decided we wanted to start trying straight away. I had the AMH level of a twenty six year old, which was fantastic. Plenty of eggs so it wasn't an issue, but I had some other things that they couldn't figure out why it wasn't happening. I wasn't ovulating, so we just decided to get started straight away.

to have a baby. Things were fantastic, we were living together, We had the most beautiful apartment on a Hyde Park. Life was just perfect. And I just wanted to know, like, because he really wanted a child, if we were doing that, when's this engagement happening? And I just kept kind of wondering, and he brought it up. I remember we were him Pullier and we were overlooking the ocean one night and

it was just the two of us. Our friends had walked ahead a little and he said, oh, baby, you know, I know you're probably wondering when that is, and it's coming, Like the engagement, it's coming. I just when I get my bonus, that's what I want to spend it on, you know, when I get my bonus. And I was like, oh, yeah, of course of course, like it kind of had become a bit of an uncomfortable discussion for me, because you know,

that's awkward. Someone sort of brings up a conversation, Oh, I know that I did ask you about this ring six months ago. We're trying to have a baby, all these things, and then they're saying, oh, by the way, I can't really afford it. That was kind of a bit uncomfortable for me.

too small. The budget kept increasing because he was like, I work from home, so I was looking at a lot of places and I'd finally found the perfect place, and once we sort of signed the least in everything, I guess there must have been a few hints of financial stuff then, because I do remember saying to him, look, I think how our rent was eighteen hundred pounds plus bills and I was already paying eleven hundred or something like that where I was, And I said, well, I'm

already paying this, so I'll pay that and you just pay the difference, and he was like, yep, fantastic, fantastic. But then he kept complaining about finances. And it's from when we met. He was always very generous. He was a gentleman, like paying if I went out for dinner with my friends, he would insist on paying for everybody he wanted, you know, the best department in the best area. And money wasn't a problem, and I was on a

really good salary, so that was fine. But then when it came to actually getting the deposit together, so paying the security bond and the rent upfront, he was like, oh, well, actually, oh I can't. You know, I've just paid school fees. And I went, oh, don't worry, I'll do it. And so I'd done that first offer to pay the bulk and him just pay the difference. But then he was

talking about other expenses and being a little bit stressed. Sorry, honey, I'm a little bit stressed about money at the moment. So I said, look, I'll pay the rent. Like you're the one traveling back and forward, so I'll pay the rent. He's got a house back in Belfast, which he told me he'd nearly paid off. He said he bought it out of UNI. So he's got a tiny mortgage with

not much left on it. Because he was such a gentleman who loved to pay for the table and everything, I didn't want him to feel he couldn't do that anymore be himself. I didn't want our relationship to put any financial pressure on him. So I just went, you know what, I'll pay the rent. You just pay the bills.

I just remember seeing like the water bill constantly like coming in the mail, and I didn't open it because it was in his name, but yeah, there was just overdue, overdue, overdue, And I mentioned him, oh the water bill came, and you know, yeah, yeah, kind of like just brush off. He didn't even open it, just sat there unopened. And there was several of them. So eventually I opened it myself and it was three hundred and thirty pounds, which is like six hundred dollars. So I just paid it.

And that's just the first of many things. There would just be bills and he would just kind of just ignore things. And I am an accountant and I don't like having any kind of debt. I pay things on time. I can't remember exactly how it came up, but I had an AMEX and I got lots of points on it, and I used it for free flights. I'd get companion vouchers for free flights, like you'd only buy one ticket. And I've always like worked the points system. And he

just used a debit card. So he was like, oh, well, maybe I should get a card, Like I said, get one of these, and he's like, I could just get a secondary card to yours and then we could get lots of points. And I was like, oh, okay, fantastic, So I just got him a supplementary card. I trusted him completely, and we used the AMEX for everything, and then when the bill came, it was idemized of his spend and my spend, yeah, separate statements, and I would just let him know how much it was, and he

would transfer it to me. So I was in New York for work, and I think this is around maybe eight months, no month mark I had got the credit, I'd be while I was in New York. I emailed him his statement and so, could you just send it to me before the fifth because I have to pay it? And he was like, oh, well I can't afford that, like the boiler has busted and I need to pay to get it done, and oh, I'm so stressed. Like his messages was kind of a radic in coming through.

I'm stressed about this. How am I going to pay for that? And I was like, oh, well, you've got till next week, you know, and he's like, oh, like I just don't get paid till this day whatever. Like I was like, oh, can you pay me? He's like, oh, I've got the money, but I need to fix my boiler because otherwise the boys will be cold, Like when the Good Boys are at my house, there's no heating.

It's winter. He was booking a lot of his work expenses on there, and I just said, do your reinvestment for work, so that's what you usually do, and he said, oh, I've done it, but there's just like a delay. There's a delay and getting the money. Okay, fine, I guess my boys will have to be cold. I'll transfer it to you now. But yeah, So there was that, like that big guilt trip, the icky feeling that it gave me. I don't like talking about money in that kind of way.

I just like things to be easy. When I got those messages like talking about the him getting annoyed with me about the money and bringing his kids into it to kind of killed me. Like it just felt really gross and it wasn't a conversation I wanted to have.

him saying how many people have you slept with? And I went, I beg your pardon, and he's like, I want to know how many people? And I was like, what are you talking about? Like it was so left a field, Like I've heard of guys speaking to girlfriends and whatever, like in a fight like this before, but usually there's a build up, you know. He'd been angry that morning, but he'd never spoken to me like this before. So he said how many people have you slept with?

And I was like, that's none of your business. What are you talking about? And he just kept on asking me all these weird questions and then he just unleashed on me. And it turns out while I had been going into the office those couple of days, I had my Max sitting at home and my WhatsApp plugged in to the deaktop. He'd just been reading all my messages and he'd found this message from when we had been

dating for two weeks. So in that time, we've been on I think three dates, and he read messages that I had been at the pub with a couple of my girlfriends and we were all talking about how hot the bartender was and that he was flirting with me, and one of my girlfriends was like, you should go there, like he's so hot, he really likes you, and you know, we were all joking about it, but nothing happened, and

he just went ballistic over it. So he was just blowing up my phone and he said, I'm packing up and leaving. I can't trust you, and I was like, I'm coming home. So I made an excuse at work, my brand new job, to say, look, I have to go. I think I said that he had locked himself out of the house, my partner had I had to go let him in. And I get there and he'd literally just moved over, you know, a couple of months before to be with me, and he just packed up his stuff.

He'd packed up his suitcases and was sitting out the front and when I got there, he was crying and I was crying too. I was so upset, and he's like, I can't believe this, Like I was just so in love with you. I should have known it was too good to be true. And I was so panicked at the thought of losing him that I was apologizing. He then agreed, like he said, yeah, I'm sorry, like, I'm

just so upset. I don't want to lose you. Backtracked all by the time I got there, and I said, look, I have to go back to work, but you know, we'll talk about this tonight. So I went back to work, and then that night he was just very sad and sorry, but also cuddling me and saying, I'm so sorry. I got so upset. I'm just so scared of losing you. There was another incident, I think it was actually before the big blow up, where he caught me looking at

a guy in a bar. I was standing at the bar and this sort of silver fox, like a good looking guy with gray hair, caught my eye and Phil was staring at me and he was like, who's that guy? And I said, I don't know, and he's like, you were staring at each other, and I honestly was not staring. I did look at him and look back again, like I did a double take, because there was something about him. He was harsh, but it's not like I was staring at him and drooling over him. We were there with

a group of friends and the mood just changed. He was just he was furious. He was bristling. It was really awkward and I just instantly felt sick and uncomfortable. He brought that up. That was his lamp post of like this is an example that he would bring up anytime something was wrong. He would say, I just can't

trust you. And I'd remember walking around Paddington and if I saw a good looking guy coming our way on the path, I would look at the ground because I was so aware of him picking a fight with me over jealousy. I'd go out with my friends and he would blow up my phone, like he'd be back in Belfast with his boys two nights a week, pretty much from the first time he got really mad at me

about looking at that guy. Every week when he was back in Belfast, he would just be constantly online and he'd say, at the start of the night, have frun with your friend's baby, Like, what are you doing tonight? I'd be going up for dinner and drinks with my girls. He would see on one of their Instagram stories that there were guys at our table at a bar. All my girlfriends were single, and he would just start blowing

up my phone, who is that guy? There's a guy sitting beside you, so I would put my phone in the end on aeroplane mode because he would just be blowing up my phone. And he would then go to Instagram when things weren't delivering, he would go I messages, WhatsApps, Instagram, Facebook, everything, and he would also delete and block me from social media. When they brought in the feature that you could unsend messages, I would wake up to fifty unsent messages. But that

was I would say. At least once a month, there'd be a huge blow up like that, and it would all come down to I'm sorry, I just don't trust you. After he lied about that guy you were looking at, I don't trust you that I kind of it just became the norm that I put up with it. But then there was just so much good. The things that worried me were really tiny in comparison to how many good things like he was just amazing. And I had my concerns about his jealousy that I spoke to my

friends about, but my friends were champion him. Everybody loved him.

the guy for you. And I was like, what do you mean, And he's like, he doesn't treat you well, Like I'm just watching this and there's just something not quite right. And I like him. I really like the guy separate as a person, but I don't like how he's treating you and you're not happy. And I knewish this is just fourteen months in. I knew it then, but I loved him so much, but I couldn't handle

the mountdowns anymore. It was at least once a month at least, and they were big, and it was over nothing, and it was really controlling. And I had said to him that I thought he needed to speak to a counselor or something. He would always bring it back to I'm just so sorry, and he would say, you know, I'm just so scared of losing you. After that trip, I tried to break up with him because of my friend seeing it and putting it back in my face

of what it really is in a kind way. So I tried to break up with him, and he broke down in tears and he begged me. He said, I'll do whatever it takes. You can't leave me. I love you, I want to be with you. I want a life with you. I don't like myself like this. I've never been like this with anyone before. I've never been in love before, and I don't know how to handle it because it always came back to you're going to move back to Melbourne. You're going to move back to Melbourne,

and you're going to leave me. So I agreed to give it another go, because you know, he beat and I loved him.

a girl, Like what do you think? And I was kind of taken it back that he was suggesting names to me because we had agreed if it was a boy, he could choose and if it was a girl, I could choose because we'd sort of narrow down our list. But we disagreed on names, and I was sort of taken aback and I went, oh, okay, like I'll have a think about it. It'll grow on me. I had brought it up with my friends, what do you think

of the name Imagen? And then later on he was like, oh, actually I've gone off for a bit and sort of decided to kind of change his mind. But I was like, no, it's growing on me. I really like the name image and it's quite cute, and you know, it's pretty. We decided that we would keep it quiet because I wanted to tell my mum in person. So I found out I was pregnant the start of December, and my next trip back to Australia was booked in the March, so

I was four months pregnant by this stage. I told a few friends, and the male friend i'd been on the Italy trip with that had said to me, Sarah, he's not the guy for you. He got along really well with Phil, like they had a separate friendship, a bit of a bromance. So I was talking to Alex and I told him and he was happy for me, but also a little bit worried because he knew where things were. And then that night I can remember getting home, getting ready for bed, and Phil was like, I'm so

excited to tell Alex. Let's tell him together. And in that moment I had a panic, the sheer panic I would get any time there was something he would get annoyed with me about, because his temple was just so bad. I remember panicking and I went, yeah, yeah, so I should have in that instant said I actually told him today. I couldn't help myself, but because it was just easier, I thought, fuck, I'll tell Alex to say he doesn't know,

to pretend he doesn't know. So we go back to Australia and told all of our friends as we saw them, and Alex pretended to be surprised, and then we had dinner one night with my best friend and her husband. She said, and then, you know, we are like excited about the baby. And Alex was round at our place a couple of months ago. He said, oh, you guys know, yeah, I know, and we were all like so excited for you, and I could just feel feel tense up beside me, and I thought, oh God, here we go. So at

this stage, I think I was twenty weeks pregnant. And that night we got back to my friend's place where we were staying, and he was so furious with me and cold, like the stony treatment like you would expect with silent treatment. But then he was also saying horrible things to me. So I was exhausted. And the next day I had my best friend's engagement party. He kept me up all night fighting with me. I was just exhausted. My eyes were puffy. The next day he said he

wasn't going. He refused to go. I'm a liar. Why would he want to be here with a liar? I can't be trusted. It was like I stared at that guy that time. I just can't help myself. I'm just a liar, and he doesn't even know if he wants to have a child with a liar. And so I went to my friend's engagement on my own. He called Quantus and separated our flight bookings, canceled Hughes, and changed it to fly home the next day. So while I was at my friend's engagement party and just leave me,

they're pregnant. I was devastated. We had booked a holiday house down in Sorrento with my family for me to spend some time with my family. I said, well, I'm still going. I'm going to that, and then he changed his tune as he did the rollercoaster of Phil. Sorry, I love you. I'm just really upset. How could you do this? I feel really betrayed. You know, I'm worried about your I'm just really worried about your dishonesty. Sarah.

You have a problem with lying, and would just bring up the two lies that I had ever told him, and he up changing his flight again so he could stay and go down the coast with my family. But then he spent his whole time hold up in a room and not even mixing with my family, and they were like, is everything okay? It was just really really tense and awkward. So I don't know why he decided to stay. Things got really bad while we were there with COVID, so it became clear that we needed to

get back straight away. Our flights actually just got canceled, so we had to just book the next available that we could get. Most airlines had shut down. We have to get this urgent flight back and it was probably one of the last ones you could get. And when we're in transit, I saw like because it was just hectic.

It was just absolute chaos. We're in masks, rushed, panicky, stressed, and I can remember looking at my phone when we're changing flights that it must have been Hong Kong or something, and I had a pop up Facebook notification and it said Imogen. I can't remember so her name wants to send you a message, and I screenshot it because I thought, so I've got that screenshot. How funny, Like I've never heard that name before and now it's a name that

he likes. Now this is one messaging me. I didn't think anything of it.

It's not somewhere I really I really enjoyed. I think that's perhaps because of the area that Phil had a house in. It was not very nice. It was about twenty minutes out of the city proper and yeah, so quite isolated. So I found out. Yeah, the day that we got back to Belfast, I found out I was being put on furlough, that we would have to be in Belfast full time, had to give notice on the apartment in London. And then a couple of days later

I was lying on the couch. Phil was in the kitchen making lunch and I was really pregnant by that time. I can still remember laying there and looking at my phone scrolling through Instagram. Then I had a look at Facebook, which I very rarely do. No one really uses Facebook anymore, and I saw the red message request that there was other messages, so I opened it up.

like I've been punched, but I didn't believe it. I just showed it to him straight away and I was like, what is this and he looked at me call as a cucumber. He said, I don't know, just block them, and I was like, but like, I don't understand. Maybe someone's used your pictures for a profile, like there was just no way that I could ever believe that he would do that. So he's like, oh, I'm sorry, and just just ignore it like whatever, and he changed the subject.

And I think that didn't sit well with me because I think, like, but I was still kind of I don't know, it was just upsetting and I laid there and I just burst into tears like half an hour later, and he's like, oh, honey, what's wrong, Like, oh my god, just just block them, don't listen, and I just said, I'm just upset, like I know it's not true, but like why this now? You know, I've just lost my job, why this now? I just everything's shit. I just had

to leave my family really abruptly. I don't know when I'm going to see them again. I'm here in Belfast. I don't know anyone. And I just like I cried and he was like, you know, comforting me, and all was fine. We went to bed later that night and I just tossed and turned. I just could not sleep, and I think it got to like five o'clock in the morning or something, and I text a screenshot of it to my best friend back in Melbourne. She was like,

oh my god, like what did you reply? And I said, oh, well, I haven't replied. I mean, it's not true. I looked to this girl up on Instagram. She's twenty two years old. She looks even younger than that, like there's emojis all over her profile, like she's a young girl. Phil is forty five, Like there's no way. Plus he would never do that. I don't question him whatsoever. But you know, I can't sleep. And my friend said, look, why don't

you just say prove it? So I wrote back and I just said, thanks for letting us know it's a fake profile. Could you please report it? My friend said, us for proof, So I did, and she sent proof. She sent so many screenshots. He had matched with her on Tinder, deleted Tinder really quickly, come back and spend a couple of days in London with me, then went back to look after his boys the next week for

the two days. At eleven thirty am on a Friday, while his kids were at school, the first time he met Imogen was by showing up to her house do you have sex with her? For forty five minutes and then leaving again? And I know the timeline because the screenshots that she sent me he said, I'm here, and then afterwards he said that was amazing. The filth that Phil sent to her. I just couldn't believe what I was reading. It wasn't the guy that I was in

a relationship with. He had never been so disgusting with me. I was just sickened, absolutely sickened. I'm not a rude by any means, but the things that he said to her were just filth. The whole time that we were in Australia with my family, he was texting her, making plans with her, but then canceling the plants. We're in Australia, like he's not going to see her. So he would be making plans with her and then say sorry.

laid there reading the screenshots. It was just a sample to start with, and he was asleep beside me in bed, and I turn around and I just started punching him and screaming I was so furious, but absolutely in shock, and I feel so stupid because I just never believed

that he would do something like this to me. Was naked photos that he was sending her from my parents' house, from the holiday house when he was hold up in his room refusing to speak twenty one because he was so angry with me from my friend's place the day of the engagement party that he refused to come to that he blew up my phone all day saying that he didn't know if he could be with someone who

is dishonest. He was sending her naked photos. And in case you missed it, the real kicker is that he suggested her name when we found out we were having a girl. This twenty two year old girl.

So I got a flight back to London. I still had my apartment there for another month, so I spent some time there without him. Was really isolating and depressing, to be completely honest. I would grab a baguett I'd go to a hyde park and sit down to have something to eat, and the police would come along and tell me to get up and keep moving. But I was really questioning myself and what to do because I was bringing a child into the world and I just didn't know what the best thing to do was. And

I was so scared of doing it alone. But I felt so unsafe with him, and I was just really scared. I felt like I didn't know him anymore. The cheating obviously is up setting, but I think the most upsetting thing was that I felt like I didn't know him at all. This is the person that I had wanted to spend the rest of my life with and he was a stranger to me because it was like a

whole different person the way he spoke to her. I called another close friend who was a barrister, and I told her the situation and I said, I don't know what to do, and she said, you need to come back to Australia and you need to have the baby here that will protect you. So okay, I have to do that. So in the meantime he comes back, I'm still in love with him. I'm so torn, I'm so upset. There's just daily fights and discussions. Like when I say fights,

now the tables have turned. It's me angry with him, him, begging him, trying to smooth things over. There was the possibility that I wouldn't be able to get back to Australia. There was no flights. I was trying to get on one of the ones to get the Australian citizens back, So in the mix, I had to register at a hospital in Belfast in case I had to give Bertha, and I can remember going to the registration appointment. He wasn't allowed to go in because of COVID rules and

I'm sitting in there with the midwife. They're doing all the registration for me and going through all the questions and I can't remember what the question was, but I burst into tears and she was like, are you're okay? And now that's when she said she asked me if I was okay, and I burst into tears and told her everything. So they kept me longer, got in a counselor. It did full blood work to do an STD check, which is something that had not even crossed my mind.

I just had so much stuff going on. I just did not even think of that, but they were like, it could be a concern for your unborn baby, and I was just bawling the whole time. When I finished that appointment, I text him and I said, look, I've gotten really upset in this apartment. I'm barely keeping it together, so when I come out side, I don't want to talk about it, okay. And it was his eldest boy's birthday, so I come out and he demanded to know what

was wrong, demanded to know. So I told him and he was so angry. He said, well, I hope you're happy with yourself. They're going to send child protective services around, probably because you've done that, because you've told them about this. And I can remember sitting there in the car and I was like, how are you putting this back on me? Like he still had a way of trying to beat me down and try to make me feel guilty about things.

He said, they might take my boys away from me because this is like domestic abuse, da da da da da, and somehow that was my fault. So yeah, I was really scared. I guess I was scared of him. I was frantically looking for flights, but I had to keep the peace. I might be stuck there, So I was sort of trapped between trying to keep things smooth, trying to work out my broken heart, and all my confusion,

like what I was going to do. Because also, I mean, even though I planned to live in Australia eventually, I definitely did not plan to come crashing back without a job and with a baby on my own. I didn't know if our relationship was going to continue. I couldn't really think too far ahead. I was just focusing on getting this baby into the world safely. I sort of had that as my goalpost, and I just didn't know what I was going to do. But I was still so in love with him the way I felt being

back in Australia really pregnant. I loved him so much. I didn't know if I could trust him. The thing that I couldn't get past it wasn't the cheating again. It was just that it was like he was another person and I just didn't the trust was gone for me, and I didn't know what to believe. So I just didn't know what the right thing was to do. I was really really confused. So I was back here. He flew here for the birth. I had Emily, a perfect

baby girl. She's absolutely adorable. She was a very cute baby, and he spent the first three weeks of her life here with me in Australia, and then he had to fly back to Belfast. But he's got two kids, and you know, I thought he would sort of really take charge. I didn't know what the hell I was doing. I knew i'd know, and I really wanted a kid, but it was such a weird thing. I loved being pregnant, and then it's just all of a sudden, Oh Gold, she's here, and now I have to look after her

and keep her alive. It's actually quite stressful. And she was a baby who needed to be held to sleep, so I had a c section. I was so exhausted. I was breastfeeding and during the night I had to sleep with I ended up having all these pillows around me to sleep upright, holding her with my head like uncomfortable to the side, like with a travel pillow on, because if I put her down, she would just lose it.

And Phil didn't take any turns on that. He was actually getting frustrated every time I put her down when she cried. He'd be like, oh, like I can still remember his impatience. But then by day, in front of everybody else, he was just missed a charming, attentive dad. Wanted to give her the baths, wanted me to record everything,

lots of photos. So he goes back And because I think it was just that fear I just being a single mother isn't something I even wanted to Like, that was just the most daunting thing I could you could think of. And I think as well, like it's just I had my whole life ripped away in a week. I'd lost my job, my apartment, everything, and now I'm back at home and my parents live in regional Victoria. I'm back at home in my old bedroom with a cot shoved in the side, and I just knew it.

I was just so depressed it COVID meant I couldn't come to visit my friends. I didn't know anyone back around my parents' place. I just had My sister eventually told my parents what had happened. They were shocked and upset and furious.

to myself. It was just an a four page I read back to myself about like reading it in black and white. When I summarized our relationship the abuse, I went, what the fuck am I doing? What the fuck am I doing? What am I doing? I paid three grand to write this page that made me. It was just in black and white, like pretty much, Sarah, You're an idiot. It's crazy, I guess, because there was just so much good there, which doesn't really sound like it does it.

But he was charming, He was funny, and he just doted on me. I got a foot massage every night. He hooked me dinner every night. He was the partner who would walk me to work in the morning, have a coffee with me, and then I'd go to the office and then he'd meet me for lunch as well. Like he was just always wanted to be around me and do nice things for me. The abuse aside. So when I read this page about the things that he had done. It was the emotional abuse more than the cheating.

It was just and the secrets and the lies, and I just I couldn't. I was just in shock and I just said, there's no way. And that was in October twenty twenty. I said to him, not coming back. I'm staying in Australia. If you want to work on this relationship, you can come back here. I'm not coming back. So I made that decision then, and yeah, the next couple of months were just fights, just that roller coaster of him first agreeing like he would agree, going yep, yep,

like I want to make it work with you. I love you so much. But then he would be like, you know what, I'm going to start dating again because you're never going to come back, and that thread of it, and I would be like, are you fucking kidding me? I looked back over the messages recently and it's just an absolute rollercoaster of him at first meaning that I love you, I want to come back, I want to

live in Australia. How do I come back? Like like where some kind of Romeo and Juliet torn apart by COVID, But then getting abusive with me as well, threatening to kill himself. Yeah, all that kind of stuff, up and down, up and down.

our child. She's growing quick, she's adorable, and I was just really looking forward to sharing that experience with someone else. And yeah, he just canceled. I was just so angry. And then if flipped again like he couldn't afford it. That's what it was about. Then two weeks later, he was desperately trying to book that. Now, Oh, shock, horror, there's no flights. Yeah, the world is pretty much shut down. Like I planned all those for you months in the making.

So he said to me, well, at least you know, like trying to smooth things over with me after the canceled made trip. Because this is the trip, by the way, where I said to him that I'm not coming back. He works from home anyway, He said, I can just do European hours in Australia. It'll be tough, but it's worth it. It's worth it because I want to be with you and Emily. We were sleeping in separate bedrooms because I co sleep with Emily. But it was just so

nice having someone to parent with. There were no fights, like everything was great. And he had said, you know, at least I'll be here for Emily's first birthday now, like you know, I can stay a couple of months. Two weeks, ten days before her birthday, he sent me a screenshot of an email from his boss saying that he had to go to a conference in Dublin, and I'm like, I just remember feeling sick. I was just

so furious ten days shy of Emily's first birthday. So he goes back, I have her first birthday without him.

finally took him back, accepted all his excuses. They had a second child. He did it again, like she was holding a newborn and he was having an affair with another woman. There was photos on social media of them, like having his romantic trip to Paris while his wife is at home with their six week old baby. He left her in debt, He maxed her credit cards out, he left their shared account in overdraft. Her credit rating

hasn't recovered from being with him. And I'm finding out all of this years later, years in, I've got a one year old child with him. That he's a really bad guy. He's a bad.

him anything. He hasn't paid it off at all, and he's paying a huge, huge interest rate, which means that he's borrowed against it many times his income statement as well, he lied to me about how much he earned huge council tax bills. He hasn't paid them since twenty fifteen, twenty sixteen, credit card debt, all totally as much as I could see in the bills, mortgage aside twenty thousand pounds twenty thousand pounds, So it was all just coming down,

falling down around me. I could no longer make excuses for this man. The moment that I snapped was I went to London for a couple of days with Emily in December twenty twenty one, and he was coming over in a couple of days to join me, and we had plans with friends over there, and I messaged him and I said, one of my best friends lives in Paris and some friends from Australia are going to be there between Christmas in years how would you feel about having Emily for a night of two on your own

so I can go? And he said, I was waiting for this. You didn't come here to spend time with me. You came here because you wanted to party with your friends. And I snapped. I said, yeah right, Phil, I've just spent six weeks in your shithole of a house in Belfast, just for two nights off. It's not babysitking, she is your child. And I snapped and I told him to

go fuck himself. My flight had been booked to stay there till February the next year, and I changed it to Christmas Day and I said, you've got two weeks to come to London if you'd like to say goodbye to Emily, but I'm going back to Australia. You can go fuck yourself. And he didn't come. He said good safe flight. He didn't care I get back now, I mean business. I'm done with him. I'm furious. I found out what he did to his wife. I found out that the guy that I was with does not exist.

He just read me. He read me like a book. He just sort of married me and tried to be everything that I wanted, and he did a very good job of it. I mean abuse aside. But yeah, I was done, and I applied for child support. So far, I'd just been doing everything myself. I was made redundant to by the way, during all this, I didn't have a job.

no need. He just kept viewing my LinkedIn profile. Finally, one night I just got fed up. I'd had a few drinks and open it up and it was just like he wanted me to see that he's got this fancy new job, and I felt rage. I felt rage beyond belief. I went and he worked for a rather large company, an American company. I just went and on every post where someone had written congratulations mate, la da da da da. I commented on any colleague, neural company,

and any friend that I knew his friends. Yeah, isn't it great? Hopefully now he'll start paying child support hopefully now, Yeah, great work Phil. Hopefully now you might start contributing to your daughter, who's now two or three at the time. Good to see you advancing in your career. Now can you start paying child support? I commented on every post, and he emailed me and he said you better stop that or I'll get a restraining order. And I wrote back and I said, mate, you've been asking for this

for three weeks. Go ahead, go ahead. So time goes on, and I'm feeling good. I've moved on. He doesn't consume my thoughts at all. I don't even check my spam folder anymore. And I hear about this page on Facebook called are We Dating the same guy? And it's by location. There's a Melbourne one, there's a Sydney one. There is a London, Belfast and Dublin one. I posted him on all three London, Belfast and Dublin pictures of his dating profile.

I posted him because I wanted to warn women about him, for one, but secondly, I was curious, what else has he done because Imagen said to me he'd been on tender on and off for two years. He always swore to me she was the only one. There was just never anyone else, So I was still a bit curious. Plus I wanted to warn women because he's charming, he's a good liar. So I post him on this and oh my god, I could never have been prepared for the stories that have come forward. It is unbelievable. He

cheated on me several times I know of now. He cheated on his wife NonStop. There's just so many, so many stories. Girls go, oh my god, shook that this guy is still doing this fifteen years ago, twenty years ago. He lied about his name, he lied about his age. He's just the talented mister. Really, he just keeps creating these fake lives and lying to women. And I connected with his ex girlfriend before me, who he had told me about her, not that they were in a relationship.

He talked about her and said I dated this lovely girl. But she had a lot of problems, so I couldn't take it seriously when they went on a few dates and then I more was her friend and taking care of her. I thought he was such a nice guy because she had anorexia and some mental health problems. Well, Olivia reaches out to me. It turns out that they were together on and off for a year and a half. They tried to have a baby together, she actually did.

He wanted a little girl that actually got pregnant, but she had a miscarriage. He tormented her so badly she ended up in a mental health institution for a month. So the stress. She sent me screenshots. He harassed her, he stalked her, he abused her. The way he spoke to her was scary and disgusting, and I was just an absolute shock seeing it all in black and white, from his phone number, from his email address. It was

just another person again. You know, there was the disgusting guy that had the foul affair with a young girl, but then there's this absolutely psychotic, threatening, scary guy, and both of them. I still couldn't compute with the guy I knew so on the pages, particularly the Dublin and Belfast one, there's a lot of activity. There's a lot of women commenting. Women that he's promised the world and ghosted,

women that he's mormented. One girl that he started dating when Emily was her newborn babut and we were doing skype counseling sessions because he was trying to convince me to come back to Belfast. He had another girlfriend, you know, when he blew up at me one of the first times, just before we moved into our apartment together. Well, that week he also had slept with another woman, so she reached out to me. He had said. I went back

and I checked the messages. He had said to me, I'm so sorry, baby, I need to get back to Belfast early this week. I'm going back tomorrow and I went no problems. I didn't even ask why. I just assumed it was something for his children. He went back to have sex with her. He was on fab Swingers, sugar Daddy dot Com, Hinge, Bumble, Tinder, you name it. I first posted on that site eighteen months ago, and

I'm still getting women come forward. I've had at least forty women come forward with their own stories about him. In the beginning, it was shock, it was still painful, still hurtful, because this man pretended that he loved me, so that you know, that's hard. It's also a lot of disgust, and it sickens me that I didn't make a better choice for my daughter Emily, because she doesn't have a father in her life, and she definitely lacks it.

When I say lacks it, she wants for nothing. But she compares herself to her friends and asks me why. I don't know what to say to her, so I just say, well, you do have a father. His name's Phil. Here's a picture of him holding you when you're a baby. He lives in another country. So the rest of it I'll work out down the track. But that's enough for

her for now. Now. When I still hear from new women, which I do, I find myself telling them what they need to know, warning them, you know, having a private conversation, but also counseling them kind of because I'm so far down the road of healing where I'm okay and it doesn't hurt me anymore. It did in the beginning, but it does not hurt me at all, and helping them through that process of disbelief, I will believe it here's the evidence. And in a weird way, I've made some

friends out of it. Two of the girls in particular, they're just so great and we kind of chat from time to time, even about other things going on. Bizarrely, it's become sort of a safe space for me. I'm great now. Life is fantastic. My daughter Emily is amazing. I think everyone's a little bit biased about their own child, but in my case, she is amazing. Everybody tells me. So we have a very happy little life together. I'm very settled in Melbourne. I've got all my old friends,

I've got new friends. I've met a great group of mums I've met through her daycare center. And yeah, life is really really good. I have no desire whatsoever to date. I think having an almost four year old takes enough energy as it is, and I know enough about it, and I a realist enough to know that it's just recovering from narcissism abuse. I now realize very much struggled to believe because I thought, no, he has empathy, he's got all these things, but he just he's faking it.

He is a textbook narcissist, and I now recognize that I'm just recovering from that narcissistic abuse. Even though I'm fine, I don't want to date and that's why. So actually, one of the girls I've connected with that he dated one of my friends. She's recommended a fantastic book I'm reading at the moment on healing from that, so we'll see where that goes. I couldn't change anything because then I wouldn't have Emily and she wouldn't be her. So it killed me how much she looked like him as

a baby, But now she doesn't. She just looks like her, so it's okay. So yeah, I wouldn't change the thing because I wouldn't have her.