I t was a few months after the BBC showed my episode of Dragons’ Den that I got the call that changed my life. I’d been working through the night as I usually do, and I was doing a final check of my emails at 4am when I saw it. It was a message from a woman I didn’t know.
“I know this is going to sound really weird,” Jess* wrote, “but I’ve seen your story, and I think our children have the same dad.” Immediately I wondered, “Am I delusional? Am I really tired right now?”, I couldn’t believe my eyes. She said the name of my child’s father and that’s when I knew.
It was true. But still I thought, how has she come to this conclusion? Could it be real? Is it a trick? The woman told me she had a three-year-old daughter. My son is 12 and had always wanted a sister.
I was in shock, but I replied saying, “Thank you very much”. We arranged to meet. I was 27 when I got pregnant with a man I’d known for years.
We’d been friends since we were teenagers, but I’d been in a very difficult and abusive relationship with someone else. Some years after that ended, we spent more time together. It felt like it was meant to be.
It happened very quickly and just felt right for the first time in my life. I’d never been in a relationship where I was treated properly. But he started to show signs of being too domineering.
He became obsessive, always needing to know where I was. I was working in nightclubs at the time, and he would get very jealous. He covered up h.