Rebekah Vardy
DancingonIce star Rebekah Vardy has penned a devastating message to her younger self.…
Rebekah Vardy turned 39 recently and took the opportunity to pen an explosive and heartwrenching letter to her teenage self – including advice like ‘don’t take those pills’ and ‘don’t let that man terrify you, or break you’.
The mum-of-five, currently appearing on skating show Dancing on Ice with pro partner Andy Buchanan, opened up about her tough childhood – and the abuse she suffered – in the ‘therapeutic’ letter.
Sharing a snap of herself aged 15, the Norwich-born star – who is married to professional footballer Jamie Vardy, 34 – revealed it was taken ‘just a few weeks before I was thrown out of home with a few of my belongings in a bin bag’, and had to live alone in a B&B while working in a pub.
Rebekah was forced to leave her home in Witney, Oxfordshire, at 15, after a breakdown in her relationship with her mother.
She has previously spoken of how, aged 12, she was sexually assaulted by a family friend, in her own home, on a regular basis for three years, later admitting that her mum ‘didn’t believe’ it had happened – causing their rift.
Rebekah wrote: ‘Dear Bex, I’m sorry that I kept you hidden away for a very long time. I did it because I wanted to protect you. So much bad stuff happened that hurt you early on… I put up big walls.’
But in the past 12 months, she revealed, ‘something has changed’ – she admitted she was finally letting down her guard and allowing people to ‘see the real her’.
Amongst the list of things that she tells her younger self, were not withdrawing a statement from the police ‘for fear of not being believed’.
And, in what seemed like a reference to when she tried to take her own life aged 15, she wrote, ‘Don’t take those pills, don’t drink that vodka…’
Rebekah also wrote, without naming the man in question, that ‘having things thrown at her is unacceptable’ and ‘just because he isn’t hitting you doesn’t mean it isn’t abuse.’
She continued, ‘Every destructive choice you made in your teens and twenties sprung from what that adult did to you. You were a child. You unravelled but you can stop unravelling. Please stop punishing yourself and allow yourself to be happy.’
Talking about her marriage to Leicester City striker Jamie, she wrote, ‘I swear to you that a man who you aren’t scared of and who doesn’t treat you badly will love you one day.’
Yes, after so much darkness and tragedy, Rebekah finally got her happy ending.
‘Don’t take those pills, don’t drink that vodka’