Forgiveness IS MY REVENGE
Tortured and raped at 13, driven into a suicidal spiral ...but mum reveals how she conquered hate in her heart to be a survivor, not a victim
RAPED at the age of 13 by two American teenagers, Madeleine Black spent most of her life hating her attackers and wishing them a slow, painful death.
But when her own daughter reached that same age, it proved the catalyst for an incredible journey that would end with her forgiving her rapists – both sons of diplomats – almost 30 years after their brutal assault.
Her account of the traumatic experience and how she slowly rebuilt her life featured on BBC Radio Four’s One to One series, with Sir Trevor McDonald exploring the meaning of ‘redemption’.
Now she has written a book, Unbroken, and is hoping it will inspire other sexual assault victims to also turn their lives around.
Speaking yesterday at her home in Glasgow, which she shares with her husband Steven and three daughters – Anna, now 23, Mimi, 21, and Leila, 15 – she said: ‘I never intended to forgive the men who raped me. I wanted to hate them for ever. As far as I was concerned they were evil, sadistic animals.
‘I wanted someone to kidnap them, tie them up, beat, rape and torture them just like they had done to me for hours on end.’
But she added: ‘I can honestly say I have no fear, hate or revenge in my heart towards them any more.
‘For these men to live with the guilt of what they did must be so much harder than for me to live with the harm they inflicted.
‘My best revenge was when I made the decision to become a mum and not let them ruin my life. I have a beautiful family and feel so grateful to be alive.’
Mrs Black, now 51, was lucky to survive that night in the late 1970s. From a strict, middle-class home and still a virgin, she and a school friend met two 17-year-old boys in a café after drinking alcohol for the first time. They went to a flat belonging to her friend’s mother, who was away for the weekend.
The girls were put in separate rooms and, despite being sick from the alcohol, she was raped, beaten and tortured for five hours.
Mrs Black said: ‘I begged them to stop – they kicked me and laughed at me. I remember wishing they would kill me to make it stop.
‘Near the end, one of my attackers urinated on me. It was one of the images that haunted me for years.
‘Before leaving, the most violent of the pair punched me in the chest, tried to strangle me and held a knife to my throat and said if I told anyone he would find me and kill me. I believed him.’
Ashamed, she kept silent about the attack, which took place near her north London home. A day later, she went back to school – believing she had brought it on herself by being drunk and lying to her parents about her whereabouts.
In the following months, feeling worthless and degraded, she started drinking and taking drugs, and developed an eating disorder. Eventually, she tried to kill herself by overdosing on pills.
She said: ‘I felt dirty and contaminated. I became promiscuous as I had no self-respect. I would let a boy do whatever he wanted – I thought if I resisted he would hurt me. I stopped eating as that was the only thing I felt I could control. It became so painful to be alive.’
After two months in a children’s psychiatric unit following her failed suicide bid, she was sent by her parents at the age of 17 to work in a kibbutz in Israel.
Mrs Black said: ‘I met Steven and he saved my life. He loved me and made me feel worthwhile again.’
Three years after they married, she decided the best form of revenge against her attackers would be to become a mother, adding: ‘I wanted to have a good life. I didn’t want it to be dominated by bitterness and anger.’
But as her eldest daughter neared her 13th birthday, she suddenly began having violent flashbacks. When her daughter asked if she could travel to school on the public bus, her mother agreed, but only after secretly slipping a rape alarm into her child’s pocket and covertly following in the family car.
She said: ‘Most of my life, I hated the men who raped me and wished them a painful death.
‘The only way to stop driving myself insane with all the memories was to come to terms with the rape. After all, I had survived.’
She has no idea where her rapists are but she said: ‘Working with my therapist, something happened I never set out to do – I chose to forgive them. I realised they wouldn’t know if I felt hate towards them or not and the only person it was hurting was me.’
‘They were evil, sadistic animals’ ‘Became so painful to be alive’