Tim's personal story
Ten years ago I met a Vietnamese woman while on holiday in Vietnam, we corresponded for much of a year, meeting in Thailand briefly, until she told me, “My parents say we have to get married or we cannot see each other any more.”
We were married in Vietnam in a big production wedding to satisfy the family. Thinking back on the wedding, it had started to rain heavily. While exiting the cars on arrival at her parents house, her brother made a joke about the rain shower being bad luck and she screamed at him. The reception in a plush banquet hall, I was sent off to have shot glasses with each of the friends & relatives on ten big circular tables on my empty stomach . After getting through this epic I got back to the table and was told all the food was gone and there wasn't going to be any more. I was told go downstairs and pay the bill.
I was looking forward to the buddhist temple wedding in the evening. She told me the Buddhist Ladies would wait for us but on arrival I found I had missed the ceremony of Nuns parading corridors, chanting in candlelight. We went to a nightclub, she declined to dance with me but arranged a hostess dancer. I happily fooled around on the dance floor and was abused for making a scene. I later thought of this as a metaphor for the meaness and contempt that was to come.
She had always been warm and gone out of her way to please me. She always wanted to spend recklessly, buying all the trappings, to essentially show-off. We had many fights about this. Always her making me feel I was at fault, but when I thought about what exactly I had done to cause these vicious fights, I realized it was about non-compliance. She would say, “You've changed.”
Fast forward 4 years and we own a house together and have a gorgeous little boy who is 3 months old. The immigration officers were on my case to finish up the paperwork for final marriage visa application. By then I had taken so many vicious bashings that I really no longer wanted to complete this. We had conceived a child because I thought she might calm down and settle into motherhood. She even screamed abuse in maternity while delivering the baby boy.
When he was just 3 weeks old, I arrived home from a long day where I hadn't even stopped for lunch, to be greeted with, “Tim come in here and look after our boy” – “Just give me five minutes to have a cup of tea then I will” – “No, now! ( angrily).” She stole out the door of the bedroom, grabbing a meat cleaver and chasing me into the bedroom . She got over the top of me gritting her teeth waving the weapon near my face, screaming hysterically and murderously angry. Our new child was screaming in his bassinette in the corner. I said, “What about him?” She carried on without appearing to hear.
When she got the Permenant Visa for her and her older son, it all got worse. Her older son treated me like a servant and chauffeur, never speaking to me unless he wanted something. I had actually stood at the postbox baulking about posting the final stage of the Visa. The reason I did it was I thought, “what happens to my gorgeous little boy?” She had begun to walk around the neighbourhood telling everyone, “I am not happy with my husband” and “I only came here for a future for my older son.” Later I began to think, “Well, most people have a love child but he really is a Visa Insurance child.”
The violence and abuse gained frequency and intensity. One turning event was when she arranged a trip up to Coffs Harbour to visit a fellow Marriage Visa recipient. She wanted to leave my much loved Chihuaha in the back yard for 4 days on a heatwave weekend because the older kid doesn't like dogs. I fought her, compromising with putting him in the back of the 4 door ute. She was angry the whole journey. She had only recently got her car driving license and had never driven on a country highway, but she proceeded to drive at 130 kilometres an hour, her anger escalating, her talking about crashing and killing us all, shrieking at me and punching into my head viciously. She refused to stop which left me with a stand-off: try to wrestle the wheel from her and we would certainly be killed, she and I, the older son and baby. I made a resolution during the terror of that trip that I had to get away from her, if I survived .
She began to work crappy jobs, cash no benefits, there was always a party on and she would sneak away even if I asked her not to. I would then get a call to collect this paryletically drunk woman who would vomit all over the car, house, bedroom. She must have done this 20 times. So my son grew up with me for his first 4 1/2 years. During this time the Police were called to our house 10 times for her violence and abuse, Many of the fights were nothing to do with me, they were with neighbours and I didn't make the police call, she just wanted to fight anyone who defied her. Our son became terrified of his mother: “I very scared of Mummy”... “I want to live with you, please fight mummy for me.”
She left the house for one of her own countrymen and a criminal drug gang. Indeed my son and I didn't know where she was for some 9 months, she just vanished on a drug and alcohol binge. My son gave up asking where she was. Now 2 1/2 years later we are both seeking opposing custody orders for our son. I'd had a media career, much fought for but my original paper, and myself, was bought out from underneath me by a famous old man, who recently married the ex-wife of a famous rock musician. constantly bullied and overworked, my family nightmare and job scenario and doing the main work of looking after my little boy was burning me out.
I was sleepless and consumed by all this and rapidly losing the plot. I found myself made redundant. Well I no longer cared for the career I had once been so proud of. I have not worked for nearly a year and a half, I have now sold the house I paid out my ex-wife for, for danger of losing it to the bank. The refinance deal was too much for me to cope with. I have been to court five times and we haven't been able to start the hearing yet, with her 4 adjournments. I have really just sat around getting depressed for over a year.
I am living in a nightmare, I have felt suicidal and feel like I have really melted down, I have become isolated as friends drop off, sick of my problems. Still living in the area where all this nightmare happened. I explained to a psychologist, “I can’t go to the lake for a run because it used to be my dog running place, and she dumped my dogs.” “Every time I drive down Railway Parade, I see the rows of trees lining the road and think of her punching me in the face whilst I am driving the car, no thought that we could smash into a tree.”
My psychologist said, “So this whole area has become toxic to you?.” I am not doing well here. I have considered disappearing overseas to save myself, but am overridden with guilt at the mere thought of abandoning the fight. But like last night when his mother arrives to pick him up after 3 days with me, my son runs away, he ran 200 meters down the street crying, saying, “I hate going back to her” then sat in the back of her SUV sobbing. It hasn't changed for 2 1/2 years, happens every week and just destroys me.... I deeply fear the court system and am amazed at the bias.
I was overjoyed at the appointment of an independent childrens lawyer. That is until I got messages, “You have interfered with the caseworker, interfered with the school, if the child speaks out against his mother then it will be considered coaching on your part.” Not to mention 3 assault charges, drunk driving, no child seat, 10 police visits to our home all being treated as “not relevant”. It seems that I am being punished for daring to fight the mother. I feel like the captain of a sinking ship, like I am about to lose my what remains of my sanity, money and happiness.
Thanks for hearing me out.