AUSTRALIA
The Courier
THE stories coming out of the Royal Commission into Institutionalised Responses to Child Sexual Abuse are horrific.
They are tragic stories of lost childhoods and damaged adulthoods.
But what tends to be forgotten are the secondary victims – the partners, the children, the parents … family members of those who were abused.
Today, Clare Linane bravely – and very honestly – tells what it’s like to be the wife of not only a survivor but a man who has made it his life mission to help other victims.
Clare is the wife of Peter Blenkiron, who has been leading the charge to not only stop the Ballarat victim suicides but to ensure the horrors of the past are never repeated.
She tells us of eight years of hell, during which the stress of dealing with her husband’s post-traumatic stress disorder nearly all became too much.
“It was like having eight years walking around next to someone neck high in mud. I was trying to keep him moving, keep him living but trying not to drown in the mud myself,” she said.
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