Someone To Watch Over Me: The True Tale of a Survivor Haunted by the Demons of Abuse

Izzy Hammond · Robert Potter

Dec 2012 · Random House

About this eBook

'It is my dearest hope that this book will allow me to reach out to others in pain and give them hope, for they too can choose to be a survivor.'

Izzy Hammond's deaf and partially blind parents attracted sympathy from the outside world, but no one knew of the horrific abuse their daughter was subjected to inside the family home.

In Someone To Watch Over Me, Izzy is now able to reveal how the vicious childhood abuse she suffered, first at the hands of her father and then by subsequent predators, cast a shadow over three generations of her family and led to a violent assault upon Izzy by her eldest daughter. Finally able to break the cycle, she has at last reclaimed a life free from the demons that have haunted her for so long.

Ratings and reviews

I was very moved by this book as I saw similarities to my own life and things that happened to me. Somethings that happened to me I am not sure what happened yet. I am still sorting it out. I was not believed either at the time and age of eight but I can draw parallels to some of the experiences. I want to talk about it at the time but I did not have the words in my vocabulary. It is still hard to mention but I did get the courage to mention it to my mother before she died that my dad had raped me. She said he was notorious like that. I could not believe my ears and I never brought up the subject again. At the time I remember her telling me nothing had happened and I tried to tell myself that. The more I repressed it the more it has tried to resurface. My father died in 1995 and my mother died in 2005. Your doctors sound wonderful. I got a degree in Social Work trying to resolve some of my own issues and comparing them to other experiences I have read about and are still reading about. I think your book was very informative and it is amazing how well you describe your experiences. I felt as I was there and it makes it easier to understand how I felt. I tried not to tell anything and was not able to feel much or think much about it all till lately.

Couldn't put this book down.. It is so Heartbreaking to know how a Parent could DESTROY there own child like he has done & his poor wife. Such an AMAZING SPIRIT that she fault & Came out the other side... Enjoy your Family as it's all we have..

Izzy's story was heartbreaking and inspiring. I was most impressed with the sheer honesty of it all. She did not hesitate to portray her own mistakes and shortcomings. She didnt sugar coat anything. There was no pretense of happily ever after. And because of that, her story gave me courage to admit things to myself. Thank you, Izzy.

About the author

Prior to retirement, Izzy Hammond was a qualified communicator and guide for the deaf and blind. She now undertakes voluntary work for an elderly people's club in her community. Robert Potter has been a first-person human-interest features writer for 17 years and has written for various publications, including the Sunday Post and the Weekly News.