Hubby’s ex slashed me
I knew she hated me, but I never dreamed she’d do this...
The moment I laid eyes on Peter Laylor, I knew he was the one for me.
It was New Year’s Eve 2011 and the chemistry crackled between us as we started chatting in a nightclub.
‘So, can I have your number?’ Peter, then 42, smiled. Definitely!
Within six months, we were married. My children – Jahsiah, then 18, and Savannah, then 13, adored Peter.
But one person didn’t share our happiness.
Suzette Samuels, Peter’s ex.
They’d split months before we’d met, but she seemed determined to make our lives difficult.
She was unfriendly whenever Peter saw their two young kids, and would even hurl abuse at us. ‘Ignore her,’ Peter said. So I did. I refused to let that bitter woman intrude on our happiness.
Then, in June 2015, I found a lump in my left breast.
It protruded angrily under my skin.
‘Go to the doctor’s,’ Peter urged me, concerned.
And, two weeks later, he clutched my hand as we were told I had an aggressive
grade-three tumour. Breast cancer.
‘Your best chance is to have a mastectomy,’ the consultant told me.
Terrified, I had my left breast removed, followed by endless rounds of chemotherapy and radiotherapy.
Some days, I was too weak to get out of bed. I had agonising blisters in my throat, my hair fell out and I was so sick, I could barely eat.
But, through it all, I counted my blessings, as I had my kids and Peter to lean on.
In May 2016, I had reconstructive surgery on my left breast.
‘I feel like a woman again,’ I smiled to Peter afterwards.
Still, it wasn’t plain sailing. I wasn’t cancer free yet.
I suffered shooting pains in my chest, needed medication, relied on a walking stick.
Time passed, and I’ll admit it got me down.
‘Come on, let’s go out’ Peter said in April 2017, desperate to cheer me up.
He suggested that we visit a friend.
‘What about Suzette?’ I sighed.
She lived on the same street as the friend, and I couldn’t face any trouble.
‘Hopefully she won’t spot us,’ Peter said.
Savannah came, too – and as we pulled up, Peter spotted one of his kids playing footy outside.
Savannah and I sat in the car while Peter had a quick kick-around.
But, within minutes, Suzette appeared and ordered their child back in the house. ‘Here we go,’ I sighed. Peter got back in the car and we tried to drive off, but Suzette came marching up the street.
She swung open the car door on the passenger side, where Peter was sitting. Then started yelling, screaming threats.
Her eyes were black with fury as she ranted and raved – she was furious Peter had been playing with their kid. What’s her problem? I thought, stunned.
By now, Peter and I had been married for five years! You’d have thought she’d have moved on by now... I ignored her. Suddenly, Suzette turned and disappeared back inside her house – but, before we could go anywhere, she reappeared.
She wrenched open Peter’s door again.
Fed up, I started to get out of the car.
But, in a furious rage, Suzette grabbed my walking stick and began bashing the bonnet and windscreen. ‘Stop it!’ I yelled. Suzette squared up to me, still shouting.
‘We need to go, Mum,’
She started screaming threats, her eyes black with fury
Savannah said as Suzette pounded the car paintwork.
Then, suddenly, Suzette ran at me.
I spotted the shiny, silver glint of a blade.
‘She’s got a knife!’ Peter cried, horrified.
My heart pounded as Suzette lunged at me.
A burning sensation exploded in my chest.
The next thing I knew, Peter was pushing Suzette away.
She was still waving the knife – now stained with my blood. In shock, I opened my jacket. My top was soaked red – and there was blood gushing from my reconstructed breast.
‘She’s stabbed me!’ I cried, pain soaring through me.
Horrified, Peter grabbed me, sat me down on the pavement. But Suzette wasn’t done. Creeping up on Peter, she walloped him over the head, before running off.
Savannah immediately called an ambulance, as I tried to stem the bleeding.
‘You’ll be OK, M Mum,’ she said.
Frantic, Peter decided de to drive me to St James’s Hospital himself.
The police met us there, and Savannah spoke to the officers while doctors rushed me into A&E.
Medics cut open my top. Muscle and fatty tissue hung out of my breast.
‘We need to push it back in,’ a doctor said.
I winced with pain as they worked, blood spilling from the slash wound under my left arm. Four hours later, the doctors had glued the wound back together.
They sent me home but blood continued to ooze from the injury.
So I had to go back to the hospital again.
In the end, I was taken into theatre to repair the damage.
Back and forth to the hospital over the next few days, it was exhausting.
Finally back home, with the blood flow stemmed, I barely slept from the agony.
Suzette Samuels, 35, was arrested – and, this January, she appeared at Leeds Crown Court.
She pleaded guilty to unlawful wounding, assault occasioning actual bodily harm and possession of a bladed article.
The court heard she’d tucked a knife into her leggings, fearing we’d attack her.
Nonsense – she was the one looking for trouble!
But she was only given a two-year prison sentence, suspended for two years.
She was also told to do 100 hours unpaid work and to attend a 30-day rehabilitation programme. ‘Pathetic!’ I scoffed. I was stunned she’d be allowed to walk the streets, after what she’d done to me.
As if having cancer wasn’t bad enough, I’d had to endure another painful op and a long recovery.
My breast is now badly scarred and I have terrible flashbacks, too.
After all I’d been through, surely Samuels deserved more than a slap on the wrist? Has she learnt her lesson..? I believe only some cold, hard jail time would have done that.