Collette has revealed to a UK newspaper the living hell of growing up as a slave and being subjected to severe psychological abuse at the hands of mother Maureen Batchelor.
After being put into foster care three times, Collette was given back to her prostitute mother when she was four-years-old and told, ‘You’re only here for your child benefits.”
Collette said: “Mum had got married so she had a more settled home, but I have no idea why she wanted me back. She said later it was for the child benefit.”
Even after she had gotten her daughter back, Maureen still neglected her. She was still working as a prostitute and saw clients in the evenings and spent the days in bed.
According to Collette, neighbours tried to complain to social services but Maureen always managed to convince them nothing was wrong.
Maureen remarried when Collette was five and had two more children. The new children were treated well by Maureen, but Collette was tragically pushed out of the family.
“I was given all the chores. I’d have to check on the babies before school – sometimes I couldn’t go if they wouldn’t settle,” she said. “As they got older, I had to get them up and tidy their rooms. I knew that if anything was out of place, I’d get the slipper. Mum sometimes grabbed my hair and bit me.”
Heartbreakingly, the abuse and insults Maureen regularly screamed at her oldest daughter quickly rubbed off on the younger children.
Collette said: “Mum called me ‘little slut’ and soon they did too. She even said she didn’t love me, and that she didn’t know why I’d been born and they’d repeat it.”
Shockingly, Maureen doted on her two younger children and forced Collette to watch as they were loved and lavished with gifts.
“She was affectionate with them,” Collette recalled. “They got cuddles and birthday parties. For a long time I didn’t even know when my birthday was. At Christmas I’d get a colouring book and they’d get bikes and toys. They’d sit on the bed to open them with mum and my step-dad. I’d be in the corner.”
Perhaps the worst thing is that Maureen seemed to enjoy the abuse she was inflicting on her daughter, as Collette said: “She’d send me to eat my dinner outside if it was raining, and they’d all be looking at me, laughing.”
Collette left home when she was 16, and at 18 she had moved in with a boyfriend and become pregnant. Because of the abuse she’d been subjected to, she was terrified she’d turn out the same.
She said: “I was scared of turning out like Maureen. But when I held baby Siannie Louise, I knew I loved her. It made me question again how mum could have treated me like that.” She is now married with four children.
Maureen passed away last year, but before this Collette tried to bring charges against her for the abuse she’d suffered as a child. However, shockingly psychological abuse towards children isn’t yet illegal, only towards adults.
“Even at the end I just wanted mum to love me,” Collette said. “I even made contact until three years ago, despite her never cuddling me, never celebrating my birthday.”
Speaking about receiving the news of Maureen’s death, Collette said: “My first was to feel cheated. I wanted to confront her but she’d got out of it. What upsets me most is despite everything I still want to grieve because she’s my mum – but I can’t.”