My abusive girlfriend wouldn't even let me go to the toilet

A man who was abused by his girlfriend has told how she wouldn't let him go to the toilet - forcing him to run down to the local supermarket. 

Gareth Jones, 40, an NHS project manager, was kicked, punched, made to sleep on the floor and forced to eat toothpaste by his ex, 41-year-old Sarah Rigby. 

Mr Jones was also denied access to the toilet after meeting Rigby online in July 2021 and entering into a relationship with her. 

Earlier this year, Rigby, of Winsford in Cheshire, was given a 20-month prison sentence suspended for two years after pleading guilty to coercive and controlling behaviour. 

Talking to the BBC about the horrific campaign of abuse, Mr Jones said: 'I wasn't allowed to shower or shave, or use the toilet.

'I had to hold it in and try to make it down to the local supermarket or a pub or a restaurant.' 

Rigby would also go through her partner's phone, ordering him not to associate with family and friends, adding: 'You are with me now.' 

Mr Jones previously said he feels that had the perpetrator been a man, the sentence would have been 'completely different'. 

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'I feel that if it was a man, then it probably would be a completely different outcome. I think it shows that if you are a female abuser and you do commit such atrocities, [...], especially what I experienced, that you can still in essence get away with things,' he told ITV News.

'I think it's very important that we turn the narrative around.'

He added: 'I think it is important to note that it is not always the male that is the perpetrator, and that these things can and do happen out there.'

Speaking about how Rigby's campaign of abuse started, Mr Jones said: 'It was a lot of love, and love bombing as they call it, it was very overpowering and then obviously gradually the abuse and things set in.

'I became so nervous about eating anything on fear that if I went back, I was told that I either have a smell of onion or garlic on my breath. I became so scared that I didn't actually eat anything when I was with my parents.

'I was still forced to drink mouthwash and eat toothpaste.'

Mr Jones said he spent as much as £40,000 on gifts and rent for Rigby, despite not being given a key to the property or being allowed to stay there alone.

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'We were on a weekend away in London, and basically I was told to go into Harrods, and I [...] had my arm grabbed, and clawed so deep that I actually started bleeding underneath my sweater,' he said.

'I was told: ''We are not leaving this shop until you buy me something expensive.''

'I think it was probably close into the region of between £30,000 and £40,000, between everything I had to pay for including to pay rent for a property although I was never provided with a key, or allowed to stay in the property on my own.'

Mr Jones added: 'I thought probably that if I'd stayed in [the relationship] any longer, that things would have ended up a lot worse for me.'

When asked why he stayed in the relationship, he said: 'It does become the normal for you.'

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