Bipolar Mum Journey

I’ve kept quiet throughout this inquiry because I didn’t want to jeopardise my place in it. I’ve been hounded by the press for comments, and I’ve declined every time.

Now the conversation is popping off again because Open Justice has published court transcripts. Suddenly everyone is shocked that the groomers or let’s call them what they are, child rapists were seen as “pillars of the community,” as if that somehow makes them incapable of committing such atrocities.

Why is that surprising? Have these journalists never sat through any other case involving violence against women and children, or even family court? This is the excuse men get over and over again:

“He’s got a good job.”

“He’s a family man.”

“He volunteers.”

“He’s such a good neighbour”.

Someone wrote a nice character reference.

And just like that, men are excused for violence and sexual violence against women and children. Wrapped up neatly as a “misunderstanding” because they look respectable on paper.

Yes, grooming gangs have been covered up but so has most violence, rape, trafficking, and exploitation of women and children. It’s always covered up. The system is nearly always complicit or just doesn’t give a shit.

Even when I was sent to prison, a male officer sexually coerced me, knowing full well he had power over whether I stayed on the mother and baby unit. I genuinely believed that if I didn’t play along, he’d get me kicked off and I’d lose my baby. That’s the kind of coercion and oppression nobody talks about.

And when I took it to court after my release? He got a slap on the wrist. Why? Because he was considered an “upstanding member of society” who did talks in schools around young girls, by the way. And the narrative somehow became that I must have seduced him into thinking we were soulmates. The whole thing was treated like some pattern on my part.

It’s the same story, again and again.

At 17, I went to court for a previous rape case. There was substantial evidence, they absconded, there was multiple DNA, and still the perpetrators were found not guilty. It was labelled “consensual,” and they had powerful family ties back home therefore must be “upstanding members of society.”

Today the law finally changed, previous allegations of rape made by the victim can no longer be used in favour of the accused unless they’re genuinely relevant. Hallelujah for that tiny scrap of progress.

But now, because people who claim to be survivor allies are throwing around phrases like “survivors on the panel questionable,” I’ve been pushed into requesting my own Freedom of Information from the police, everything about my grooming, trafficking, and gang rape case from 2003–2005. A 106-page forensic document I never wanted to read unless the inquiry needed it. And now I’ve had to sit with all of it again. Re-traumatised because big mouths on the internet want exposure.

I’m honestly disgusted at how quickly this has turned into a media circus, with zero thought for victims or survivors. I used to not understand why people behave like this but now I realise it’s about money. IICSA cost around £200 million. So people assume this inquiry could mean the same, and everyone wants their organisation involved so they can get a cut.

And who ends up worst off? Survivors. Left with nothing but trauma. Reporters aren’t any better they just want your story to use as trauma porn for clicks.

It’s disgusting how much money people make from child rape and violence against women and children, YET NOTHING CHANGES. Honestly, it makes you wonder if they even want to fix it, or if they just like the headlines it makes.