In her recently published autobiography “Unbreakable” Jelena Dokic reveals new details about the traumatic mistreatment by her father Damir.
It is shocking lines that make the reader run a cold shiver down his back. Former Australian prodigy Jelena Dokic describes in “Unbreakable”how she has been tortured, beaten and mentally humiliated by her violent father since childhood.
“He has cruelly abused me. It wasn’t just the physical pain he did to my soul that hurt me the most,”says Dokic in a TV interview with The Sunday Telegraph.
After sensationally reaching the semi-finals in Wimbledon at the age of 17, Dokic’s sporting successes in teenage age came to the fore more and more. It was father Damir who made his daughter’s life miserable for years.
“It all started with my first day on the tennis court,”recalls the 34-year-old,”When I didn’t exercise or lose a match, he spit in my face, hit me with a belt and called me a whore.”
The martyrdom became so extreme that Dokic separated from her father in 2003. According to media reports, she is said to have paid her torturer one million US dollars in order to finally have peace of mind. Because the self-proclaimed Serb war veteran later threatened to blow up the Australian ambassador in Belgrade with a hand grenade, Damir Dokic was sentenced to 15 months in 2009. During searches in his house, police found two bombs and other illegal ammunition.
If she could turn back the clock, Dokic would like to undo the change of nations from Australia to the former Yugoslavia in addition to the violence. Her father had forced her to do so in 2001 because he was convinced that the Australian Open organizers had manipulated the draw to the detriment of his daughter.
I tried to improve our relationship, but it’s not easy,”but I don’t think he understands what he did to me. Nor does he take responsibility for this,”explains Dokic, who is said to have already reconciled with her father in September 2011.