“Romance fraud, financial fraud and propaganda may wear different disguises, but they follow the same playbook: overwhelm your emotions, manufacture your trust - and then turn that trust against you.”
- Paula Slier
That experience changed me. It taught me that not all trauma comes from bombs or bullets. Some of the deepest wounds are inflicted by lies, betrayal and the collapse of everything you believed to be true.
It deepened my understanding of resilience, of manipulation, and of how powerful stories can be – not only the stories we are told, but the stories we tell ourselves. It was the hardest story I have ever had to tell, because this time, I was the subject.
Some journeys don’t just take you to new places. They introduce you to yourself.
For most of my career, I believed conflict happened somewhere else. I reported on war, deception, propaganda, and manipulation, but I always thought I would recognise those things if they ever entered my own life.
I was wrong.
The greatest deception I have ever experienced didn’t happen in a warzone. It happened in my home.
With the man I chose to marry. He turned out not to be who he claimed he was. The future I believed I was building never existed.
How could someone who had spent decades reporting on deception and manipulation fail to recognise it in her own life?