RTE star Jennifer Zamparelli opens up about domestic violence relationship one year after shock reveal
It has been a year since the Dubliner went public about being in an abusive relationship with her ex-boyfriend when she was younger
by Sandra Mallon · Irish MirrorDancing With The Stars host Jennifer Zamparelli has told of the reason why she decided not to talk about her abusive ex-boyfriend on her former 2FM show – because she was more comfortable discussing it with pal Lottie Ryan.
It has been a year since the Dubliner went public about being in an abusive relationship with her ex-boyfriend when she was younger. And the mother of two – who is now happily married to stuntman Lau Zamparelli – opened up about why she waited to talk about her abusive relationship past on her parenting podcast with Lottie Ryan instead of her former 2FM show.
She said: “It was the right time and the right place to do it because I could have full control over it as well. I would’ve been more wary of doing it on radio because it is live, not that I wanted to censor myself but I wanted to do it right. I was comfortable to do it with Lottie.”
She said her story is there forever and she doesn’t mind that her daughter Florence will hear about it one day. “It’s there forever more," she said.
"It’s there if Florence wants to listen to it, but it opened up conversations with people in the office, in my personal life with people who have been through the same who had never spoken about it before, so that was quite frightening in a way, but quite comforting to know that there are so many women that go through this and never speak about it. And I suppose we need to talk about it, to move forward and teach and learn from it and share these stories with our friends, sisters and daughters so they know when it is not right.”
Last October, Jen shocked fans when she spoke about her abusive ex-boyfriend on her podcast with Lottie Ryan, Lottie and Jen Do Parenting. She said at the time: “I’m going to say something I’ve never really said before in public.
“My name is Jennifer Zamparelli, I’m a businesswoman, I’m a presenter - TV and radio, I’m a mother of two, I have the most amazing husband and I’m very happily married. However, I was in an abusive relationship in my younger years," she said.
She went on: “When I was going through this particular relationship, I was young, my excuse in my head was that I thought I could fix him, I thought he would get better, he would always apologise. But it was a very, very toxic, frightening relationship at times.
“It was a couple of years - and it was hard to talk about it because you don’t want to be judged. You don’t want people to go, ‘why didn’t you leave him?’ And even now it’s hard to talk about because I know some people will be thinking 'why didn’t you leave if it was so bad?’"
Jennifer continued: “But the thing about it is, when it was good it was really good, the relationship, but when it was bad it was worse than sh*t. And I convinced myself and I told myself that he would change and that it would get better. I was kind of infatuated with him a little bit. I was young but that’s not an excuse.”
The mother-of-two spoke about the shame she felt as the relationship escalated into physical abuse.
“The first time there was physical contact and physical abuse, I was so afraid to tell anybody because I felt so ashamed of letting it get to that stage. I kind of nearly blamed myself in a way. When I look back at that time and think of what I went through, it’s like looking at a different person,” she said.
Jennifer told the Irish Mirror how it was a “weird time” for her – and said that despite the podcast going viral when she made the shock revelations, she still never received an apology from her abuser.
“No. They’re such a bloody narcissist they probably didn’t even realise it was them. It was a weird time. It was weird because you put it off for so long because you know you’ll be brought back to that place, even for a moment, that feeling.
“So that was hard. The memories... then you beat yourself up about it thinking 'well why didn’t I do it' and then there is this perception that women – including myself – aren’t strong enough to leave but that is not the case really. It’s simply that you love them, and you think they’ll change and it doesn’t and it’s just this cycle.
“I thought it was important for me to speak out because I was on the telly and people see that I got out of it and I’m successful. It can happen to anyone,” she added.
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