I have often speculated as to why my father left me with his disaffected and frankly unhinged young mistress.

His diaries, which I still have, are full of guilt and distraught thoughts about the situation. Entries like this:

‘I’m so worried about Mandy. Dorothy is so nasty to her. I don’t know what to do’.

‘How can I protect Mandy from Dorothy’.

But you could see his dilemma. He had two wives – one an ex ( my mother), and a more recent one, who both -flatly- didn’t want to have anything to do with me. They had absolutely no intention of having a kid to raise.

He, also, had to work to make enough money to fund us, and the new wife.

Finally, it was quite convenient for him to have access to Dorothy, by keeping her there, and giving her a reason to stay there. Me.

What is far worse than the general physical neglect that so many children suffer is the verbal and mental abuse. Bruises heal, but , if you are constantly told – on a daily basis, as I was, that you are ‘Stupid’, ‘Useless’, ‘A waste of space’, ‘Good for nothing’, ‘Ugly’, those words last a lifetime. One thing I’ve learned is that the people who belittle one the most are usually without any talent, ability or skill of their own whatsoever.

My mother had a good line in put-downs, too. Apart from her early mantra of ‘Go away, leave me alone’. Much later in life she once said to me:

‘You’ll never get married’. And I answered ‘Why is that’. Her retort:

‘Only pretty girls get married’.

Astonishingly, I managed to pass the 11+ exam, and I gained a place at Brentwood County High School for Girls. Along with my friend, Gail Bracken. Only two of us had passed out of our class of 30-odd kids.

Fortunately, for my father, there was a boarding house attached ( for 50 boarders), and I gained a place. So I arrived there, with a complete trunk of school clothes a few days before my 11th birthday. I was scared, but safe at last. Never homesick. I had no home to miss.

My father and Dorothy more or less ‘threw away the key’. I rarely, if ever, saw them, or went to their new house. I stayed with school friends for the holidays.

By then, my father had divorced the second wife, and was now living full-time with Dorothy in a swish new build on an exclusive estate called Hutton Mount, near Shenfield. A very short distance from my school.

But things were no better there.

Only in my last two years in the Sixth Form did I live with them.

And in great fear. I kept my bedroom door locked at night, as I was terrified that she would attack me. She frequently went for my father, trying to garotte and kill him. I’d have to pull her off.

I kept a diary during those two years, and was astonished at the amount of housework I had to do, as they were both working in London.

I’d have to wash and seal the kitchen floor before going to school.

I used to hoover, wash the living room curtains, de-frost the fridge, and prepare evening meals for them. I even painted the bathroom!.

Reminiscent of my Cinderella status at our 17th century cottage, with its large , open fireplace. It was my job to clean out the coals, and lay the fire. As well as feed, groom and generally look after Windsor, which I loved to do. And clean out drawers and cupboards, for a weekly inspection by Dot. Another one of her sadistic past-times. God forbid if my bedroom was untidy. I’d get such a tongue lashing.

One day my father vanished. In fear of his life. He went to London, met a woman whose home was in Australia, married her, and fled the country,leaving his house, belongings, paintings, antiques and beloved Sunbeam Alpine behind.

He and Dorothy never met again.

But , on her death-bed ,she lost her mind, and kept talking about how much she wanted to be with him.

She also apologised to me about the way she had treated me as a child, saying:

‘When you were young, you were vulnerable and terrified, as I am now@

She was screaming in agony with rapidly aggressive cancer. I begged the doctors to give her more pain relief. She died, mercifully of a cerebral thrombosis.

And she left all her property to me, as recompense.