The ex-wife of former Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce has revealed her new look as she opens up about life as a single mom following her husband’s affair along with his ex-staffer.
Natalie Abberfield ended her 24-year marriage to Mr Joyce after it was revealed he was anticipating a baby along with his former media advisor Vikki Campion.
Since the top of her marriage, Ms Abberfield has labored exhausting to guard her 4 daughters she shares with Mr Joyce and has discovered a brand new ardour in bodybuilding.
In a brand new tell-all interview, she reveals how she took up the game as a approach to “eascape” the chaos in her post-divorce life.
“I had always wanted to enter a bodybuilding competition, but there was simply never the right time,” Ms Abberfield informed SBS Insight on Tuesday.
“When you’re a mother with a young family, your priorities change, and the things that you once desired often go on the back burner.
“Then the time came. In 2019 my daughters had grown up and were away at university.
“My marriage had ended and I was consumed with this overwhelming feeling of grief and the burning question, ‘Well, what now? I’m not needed anymore’.”
After the preliminary shock response from her daughters, Ms Abberfield labored exhausting to realize her targets to take the stage in a bodybuilding competitors.
“When I told my daughters that I was going to compete, they laughed and said, ‘Oh mum, you’re not’,” she mentioned.
“When they realised I was serious, they supported my training and dietary choices and would make sure that I stayed on track.
“My friends thought I was mad, but were also very supportive. They noticed a change in me. They saw I was happy.”
Ms Abberfield credit bodybuilding for her creating a brand new lifestyle for herself.
“Bodybuilding became my escape and my way of refocusing on my life,” she mentioned.
“I suppose it gave me a purpose to get up in the morning. It also gave me a new lease on life.
“I was enjoying everything in my life again and was meeting new people.
“Not only did my body change, but so did my mind. I found that I was happy again, and I wasn’t feeling sad and overwhelmed anymore.
“It was an amazing journey, both physically and mentally.”
After the affair with Ms Campion first turned public, then Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull described Mr Joyce’s behaviour as a “a shocking error of judgment”.
“I think we know that the real issue is the terrible hurt and humiliation that Barnaby by his conduct, has visited on his wife, Natalie and their daughters and indeed, his new partner,” he mentioned on the time.
But, regardless of Ms Abberfield mentioned her objective at competing was by no means about acquiring a “revenge body” following her break-up.
“I didn’t see my bodybuilding as a tool to get a ‘revenge body’ like the media suggested,” she mentioned.
“It allowed me to find my identity again. To become me, Natalie, the person I had been before I became a wife and mother.
“I know it sounds weird but bodybuilding gave me the strength and confidence to start a new life, and I know now that I can do this on my own.
“If people want to call it a revenge body, then go ahead.
“But I think it is such a narrow-minded view. To me, bodybuilding means that a strong body reflects a strong mind.
“The only revenge I see is that you become mentally stronger and you can take on whatever life throws at you.
“Why would you want to waste precious time on a ‘revenge body’ for someone else?”
Mr Joyce, 54, was stood down from his high-profile function because the Deputy Prime Minister and chief of The National Party in early 2018 after news of his affair broke.
But he was then re-elected in 2021, after a management spill ousted Michael McCormack from the function.
He has since misplaced the management when David Littleproud defeated him in 2022.
Mr Joyce shares two sons with Ms Campion.
Source: www.perthnow.com.au
