The first year after she walked out on her marriage was the lowest point in her life, says Madam Lim.
We are not using her full name to protect her identity.
She recalls "the agony and the trauma" of having to start life afresh, which included trying to find a job to make ends meet.
Madam Lim was a victim of abuse. Her exhusband routinely forced her to have sex.
It was years before she finally left him. Not least because many were incredulous when she said that he raped her. They simply didn't understand that a married woman can refuse to have sex.
"Friends, even my own mother, told me that there was no such thing as a husband raping his wife.
Some even asked me why I bothered to get married if I hated to have sex," she tells The New Paper on Sunday.
"But even though living with a monster who raped me was a life of hell, for a while, I thought it was better than living without any financial stability.
"I was lucky that I had a few good friends and counsellors who supported me. Had it not been for them, I don't think I could have walked out of this low point in my life."
Madam Lim, 36, and her son, who turns six next month, now live with her mother.
"It took me so long before I could accept my little baby and start to love him," she says of the child, who is sitting quietly in a corner of the four-room HDB flat, playing with his handheld game.
She looks in his direction, then says: "I struggled for so long, trying to decide if I wanted to keep a child, who was conceived in rape, with me."
During her first interview with this newspaper in 2007, Madam Lim did not behave like the typical mum. The chilly distance she set up between her and the then five-month-old baby was apparent. She hardly looked at him and did not pick him up, not even when he cried.
The baby was the result of one of those forced trysts, where her then husband of six years would force himself on her.
They had courted for two years before marrying.
Read the full story here.
Are you an abuser?
Abuse need not be physical. Promoting Alternatives to Violence (Pave), an agency which helps victims of domestic violence, defines violence as the act or the threat of violence.
What are some signs of an abuser and how can you help them and their victims?
Click on the thumbnails to find out.
(Source: Pave, Aware; Photos: TNP)
In a marriage, the CPF money contributed (husband & wife) should be 50%-50% shared,
this is to protect a spouse (who give up working after marriage to take care of children), if she give up to do fulltime housewife job.
If/Under the divoice at least the woman are financely ''protected''
The only way to get out of this 'contract' called marriage - is a divorce or alternatively, for the women to agree to 'alter the terms and conditions' e.g. allow the husband to seek other outlets.
Unfortunately the Singapore Charbor Charter overly protects the women including unreasonable ones like the Mdm Lim in this story.
Some men are really forceful and like monsters not able to control their urges.
This woman needs psychiatric help. She is the issue not the husband.
I am no marriage counsellor but do know that this is a tragedy.
It seems that the lady is now ok with the child as the child is innocent and has no control over whatever happened between this lady and her ex-husband.
It is true that a husband cannot force his wife to have sex. The laws say so.
At the same time, when a marriage has all the love but no 'making love', something is missing.
Hopefully such cases get the attention of both the husband and wife and they get to talk about it between themselves or with some qualified competent counsellors to resolve it.
The natural consequence of such situation may be:
1. the hubby or the wife will seek out other outlets .....