Janet Street Porter was almost shaken to the point of tears on Loose Women
as she timidly opened up about her experience with domestic abuse.
The TV personality was back on the ITV daytime show this Tuesday along with Coleen Nolan, Judi Love
and Christine Lampard as the panel were moved by Celine Dion’s new documentary, I Am Celine Dion, in which she discussed her voice
and mobility loss, caused by her battle with Stiff Person syndrome.
This left the panel questioning if showing vulnerability was a wise option for stars, as the hitmaker has been praised for her honesty.
But for Janet, 77, speaking up about her own ordeals is a difficult task.
“Personally, I was brought up to not really display emotions and coming on this show, I was very reluctant to talk about things that upset me or things that were quite personal,” she first said, reminding her co-stars she’d previously spoken about a member of the public verbally abusing her on the street as well as her domestic abuse torment, which she branded “a very, very, very bad experience.”
“I’ve got a fear of being labelled weak and I’ve made my entire career on not displaying any weakness”, she said. Her declarations led co-host Judi Love to respond that vulnerability was an important part of life.
Janet previously alleged she had been in an abusive relationship in the past but she always made it clear she was not comfortable with disclosing all the details.
“When I was in an abusive relationship I did not discuss it with anyone, because I realised I had made a complete fool of myself, you are paralysed”, she notably said back in 2020.
At the time, Janet was reacting to supermarkets introducing a code word that a victim can use when encountering a member of staff. The code word then alerts the staff member to take the individuals into a back room, where the police can be called and appropriate action can be taken – a system which has already been introduced to pubs and bars through the code word “Angela.”
Janet wasn’t convinced this could help domestic abuse victims as she said: “You might have the number on your supermarket till but then it’s like telling more people what a mess you’ve made of things, you do blame yourself.”
She’d then added, remembering her own experience: “I used to go and stay with somebody else… In the end, I was getting divorced but my husband was in my house, and I don’t want to go into too much detail because to this day I’m slightly fearful of him, which is an incredible thing to say.”
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