Sex assault victim struggled to cope & wanted to die after abuse
A young woman who was repeatedly sexually assaulted while working as a babysitter revealed she struggled to cope and wanted to die for years after the abuse.Aine McHugh said her self-worth 'totally vanished' when twisted brute Martin O'Brien, who was jailed for six years in December, began assaulting her in 2012 while she was a teen.The Galway native revealed counselling and therapy were what helped her to find the strength to report what she went through. She told how she had begun working as a music teacher before becoming the family's babysitter in the summer of 2012.
Aine said things were never 'normal,' and she was emotionally abused by O'Brien before he began sexually assaulting her. The young woman revealed the sicko used to tell her that she would be 'so pretty' if she lost 'a bit of weight.'
Aine said she was already insecure, and hearing these comments from a grown man 'chipped' away at her confidence. She said that while babysitting, she didn't have a bed and would sleep on the sofa in the sitting room once he and his wife returned from a night out.
Describing how the abuse escalated from emotional to physical, Aine said after he came back one evening, he forced himself onto her as if she was an 'animal' in the sitting room. Speaking on 'Breaking the Silence', a Newstalk original podcast in conjunction with Dublin Rape Crisis Centre, Aine added: 'From that very first assault all my feelings of any value or worth, totally, any feelings that I had as a 16 year old girl, totally vanished.
'So, like I'm from a very normal rural community and he would have been friendly with extended family and other neighbours and it just wasn't an option for me to tell someone because I thought I was wrong.'
The abuse then "multiplied" and was accompanied by the 'most degrading, demeaning comments' about Aine's body. Aine said she made a number of attempts to stop babysitting for O'Brien but he then began to contact her mum asking if she could speak to her daughter.She said her mum knew O'Brien and encouraged her to go because she considered it a 'safe space' to make some pocket money. Aine eventually put her foot down and didn't return, but things escalated again when O'Brien began following her to public spaces where he would also assault her.
She explained that she never thought the abuse would end, and it took hold of her life. Aine said she wasn't able to get out of bed, go to her Debs, her graduation, or focus on her Leaving Cert as a result. To cope, Aine turned to alcohol 'to escape,' which led to her becoming an alcoholic.
She continued: 'You know, I look now at my little cousins or friends' children that I know who are doing their exams and it's like an exciting, like, it's an exciting time. You're looking forward to your future. You're thinking about the CAO. It just, like, I put more effort into thinking how am I going to end my life."
The abuse also had a ripple effect on Aine's home life, she explained: 'People were probably looking in at our house and saying, like, 'what's going on with that girl', you know? Could she not just settle?' And 'her poor mother' and 'her poor father'. And the only person who knew the cause of all my problems, was Martin O'Brien.
'And while he was out in our local community, building relationships and forming friendships and being a great community man - My home, myself, my body, my mind, and my family, we were totally disrupted, disorientated.
'He thrived off that and he showed up at places like funerals and to my front door with a local politician canvassing all in the space of time, I was just trying to go from morning to night.'
Aine said the turning point was during the Covid-19 pandemic but was kickstarted in 2018 when she got sober.
She added: 'I wanted to live. And I knew I was going to die if I continued on the way I lived. And I knew that maybe some people hoped I would, that I would never be able to report what had happened to me."
Aine said she initially feared she wouldn't be 'believed' but praised the Gardai from the Protective Services Unit for their professionalism. She said that she has learned that 'there are people who are going to support you and there are people who won't and there will be people who will not believe you and they will look and turn the blind eye.'
Aine added: 'And they, at times, can reinforce that self-doubt. And that lack of self-worth. But, for me today now, being at the other side of it, they really don't matter. They really. Yeah, they really don't matter.'
Last year, O'Brien of Gurrane, Belclare, Tuam, Co Galway pleaded guilty to four charges of sexual assault on dates between June 1, 2012, and February 2014.
In December, Mr Justice Naidoo imposed a six-and-a-half-year term. He suspended the final six months of the term on strict conditions including that he engage with the Probation Service for 12 months – 'in the hope that it will help him gain insight into the impact on the victim."
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