Why I divorced my dwarf husband
Elmarie (1,83 m) was married to Hennie (1,1m) for 24 years, but says she can’t take his abuse any longer
TO THE rest of the world they always seemed an unlikely couple. Whenever they were out in public Elmarie and Hennie Jacobs would have to put up with the rude stares of strangers – because the willowy 1,83m-tall estate agent towered over her husband, who’s just 1,1m tall.
But Elmarie (52) and Hennie (70) didn’t give a hoot what other people thought about them – despite the vast gap in their heights and ages, for 24 years they got on with their lives as husband and wife. They had a child and built a life together. But sadly now, after all they’ve gone through, their fairytale is in tatters and an acrimonious split has left them both reeling.
It probably doesn’t help matters that even though their divorce was finalised in February they’re still sharing a home in Wesbank, Oudtshoorn, in the Western Cape. For Elmarie this isn’t out of choice. She inherited the property from her parents and would prefer it if her ex was long gone. But Hennie, a lawyer, maintains it’s the only place in the world where he feels at home and which caters to his special needs, so he’s reluctant to leave.
“He’s there in the front,” Elmarie whispers, pointing to a section added to the house that’s been specially fitted with a lower wash basin, bath and toilet and low handles on the doors for Hennie’s convenience.
Although they’re still living under the same roof the door between their separate living areas now stays permanently locked.
Elmarie tells us that from early on there were “serious cracks” in their marriage. “But I glued them every time,” she says.
Being a lawyer Hennie doesn’t struggle to find words to express himself.
“He couldn’t intimidate me in stature, but his words ripped into me like a whip,” Elmarie says.
Later we walk around to Hennie’s part of the house. “Yes, I’m hard-arsed,” he admits. “She liked me being so strong. It’s so absurd – her reason for divorcing. In the court papers she says she’s lost all love, respect and affection for me.”
He can’t believe that after all they’d gone through together it would come to this. In 1997 they were over the moon when their daughter was born. Although there was a 50% chance that, like Hennie, she’d also be born with achondroplasia, a genetic disorder that leads to dwarfism, she beat the odds and at 1,76m she’s just slightly shorter than her mom.
Hennie wipes tears from his eyes as he reflects on his marriage.
“I loved her so much. I was madly in love,” he says.
Elmarie gets tearful easily too and keeps a box of tissues handy as she tell us how she came to the turning point
that made her decide she had to walk away. As an adopted child she’d often wondered about her roots. It was in August last year that she got the news that rocked her world – she discovered her biological mom was still alive and that she had a half-sister too.
Six days later she and her mother hugged each other at OR Tambo International Airport in Johannesburg.
“My darling little flower. Oh God, thankfully she’s safe,” were the first words her mom uttered to her during the emotional reunion. She was a 22-yearold single mom when she decided to put her newborn baby up for adoption.
For Elmarie, their meeting changed everything. She says in that moment she realised she was entitled to more in life – and could ask for it.
“My deepest wounding happened in the womb, when I felt I shouldn’t be seen or heard – because she (her biological mom) hated it every time I kicked her.”
Her pre-birth experience was something Elmarie intuitively sensed and was later confirmed when she underwent hypnotherapy, she tells us.
“Every time Hennie verbally abused me I’d become physically paralysed with fear. I couldn’t give voice to how much I was hurt by it.”
But after her biological mom held her close Elmarie experienced “something radical” inside her – a metamorphosis – that changed her forever. “Because now I belong.”
ELMARIE and Hennie’s paths crossed when, as an insurance saleswoman, Elmarie sold him a policy. Just 50 days after their first date on 31 March 1994 they got married. She says despite 72cm difference in their heights there was an instant connection when they first met. It broke her heart when he asked her, “May I take you to dinner on your 28th birthday or will you be too embarrassed to be seen in public with me?”
“I found it terrible that people could judge him because of his appearance,” Elmarie says. “I’d been married for five years to a man who was 5cm taller than me and it meant nothing. It’s not about a person’s looks but what’s in their heart.” That was also her frank response to Hennie. “I was hooked from that first date.” But over the years the endless conflict in the relationship took its toll. Elmarie says meeting her mom freed her.
“I no longer needed anyone else to tell me who I am or give me permission to be that person.”
Her advice to women in similar relationships? “Heal on the inside. Change because you love yourself. And because you’re good enough.
“I changed so radically that I couldn’t accept continuing with this marriage. Only now will the blueprint of my life be coming to fruition,” she adds optimistically.
Hennie, on the other hand, is far less upbeat as he receives us in his part of the house.
“Sorry, I’m looking like a forest god,” he says. His grey beard and hair are long. The walls around him are adorned with family photos of him, Elmarie, their daughter and Elmarie’s 27-year-old son from her previous marriage, who grew up with them.
His ex-wife started changing after she’d tracked down her biological mom, he says. “Then she wasn’t selling houses anymore but busy loving her mom.”
He claims he’d been a partner in her estate agency business until October last year, which Elmarie denies.
“Through me she got confident and became the brilliant estate agent she was,” Hennie says. “Now that I need money I’m not getting it.’’
At 70 he’s been forced to return to his legal practice after giving it up in 2000 due to health problems, Hennie says. He and his legal team are now seeking an interim order for maintenance and financial support from Elmarie.
In addition he’s also hoping a court will grant him the right to spend the rest of his life in the house where in happier times everything had been made convenient for him. But it’s now painfully evident those days are long gone.
With the door between the two areas of the house having been locked for the past two months, he doesn’t have access to the kitchen. “I just buy bread, cheese, apricot jam and sometimes a bit of sausage. I’ve lost 10kg,” Hennie says.
Later Elmarie explains to us that she decided to lock the door because she felt Hennie wasn’t respecting her boundaries. But Hennie insists she’s doing it to bully him.
“I’m still the same Hennie she’s known all these years,” he says. “I can’t change now. I’m at my best when I’m stubborn and tough, and she knows that.”