00:00It started off with yelling, breaking items and slamming doors.
00:08Whilst pregnant, he would shove me into walls, push me and back me into corners, yelling in my face.
00:14My earliest memory dates back to when I was around four years old,
00:19during which I was lifted by the neck and pinned against the wall, my feet dangling in the air.
00:25When I first experienced domestic violence, I wasn't able to tell anyone. I was small.
00:31He thought he had the right to control me sexually, but I felt obliged and scared if I said not.
00:36He went through my phone while I was asleep, contacted my work colleagues and spread malicious rumours about me.
00:42He would regularly hit walls with his fists or head, drive very dangerously with myself and the children in the car
00:48to force me into doing whatever he wanted me to do.
00:51When I lived in a world built around keeping secrets.
00:56I can't help but feel like the system has failed me at every turn.
01:02These are the words of South Australians who've experienced domestic, family and sexual violence.
01:10Their de-identified submissions helped the Royal Commission uncover horrors happening behind closed doors.
01:19It's really painful to speak about this again.
01:23I feel if I don't talk about it, then it's just that missed opportunity and then we will keep continue as we are.
01:32Domestic violence survivor Rabia Aftab was one of more than 360 people who wrote submissions.
01:39I was scared to tell anyone what's happening and I was feeling that no one would believe me.
01:47She says when she first tried to ring the domestic violence crisis line for help, no one answered.
01:53I felt it would have been easier dying with him than fighting with this big system.
02:02Like Ms Aftab, sexual violence survivor Amanda Brownlee shared her story.
02:08I went into the city for a night out at the fringe and ended up in a position where I was sexually assaulted at the end of the night.
02:16Ms Brownlee reported the assault to police but says she was left further traumatised by the legal process.
02:23I was told that I was credible and not reliable because I was drunk.
02:28I was told that I didn't push the perpetrator off me when I woke up therefore he may have considered that to be consent.
02:36The legal system and the justice system needs a complete overhaul in relation to sexual violence and how we deal with victims.
02:43Victim survivors are hopeful the Royal Commission will result in lasting change.
02:49Victim survivors have generously shared their stories and that is not an easy thing to do and for it to be for nothing would be absolutely devastating.
03:00They deserve to live, they deserve to be safe and people deserve to feel empowered.
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