Broadcaster Kim Ju-ha revealed for the first time the full story of her marriage to her ex-husband, which was marked by lies, infidelity and violence that began before their wedding.
On the 20th episode of MBN Kim Ju-ha's Day & Night, psychiatrist Oh Eun-young appeared, and they discussed the marriage and divorce that left the deepest scars in Kim Ju-ha's life. Kim Ju-ha said, "There have been too many speculative articles. Today I thought I should speak for myself," and she said she wanted to appear because "I wanted to be with Dr. Oh, who knows me better than anyone."
Recalling the time she decided to marry, Kim Ju-ha said, "At that time there was no one else. I was moved by how he packed a lunch and brought it to me despite his busy schedule," and added, "I had been closer to being anti-marriage, but I thought I could marry someone who cared for me like that."
However, after marriage she said she began to feel an inexplicable anxiety. Kim Ju-ha confessed, "I felt like neither my mother-in-law nor my husband told me everything," and "I thought not prying into what the other person didn't want to say was consideration, but that was an illusion."
The decisive truth came out during a move after childbirth. Kim Ju-ha said, "While organizing my mother-in-law's closet I found a box of documents, and an original marriage certificate issued in the U.S. was marked 'divorce,'" and added, "The document she showed me was a copy altered to say 'single.'" She went on, "Underneath that was a document showing he divorced another woman one month before marrying me," revealing the shocking fact that her ex-husband had legally been married at the time of their wedding.
She said, "The person my mother-in-law introduced as 'a grown son who is single' before the marriage was that married man," and "Telling people to say they met at church was also a setup to hide lies."
Kim Ju-ha said that even after learning the truth she chose silence to protect the family. "There was a child, and I tried to fix things somehow. But even if you mend a broken vase, you can't put anything in it once it's cracked," she said calmly.
After that, her ex-husband's infidelity continued openly. Kim Ju-ha said, "He began seeing another woman, and that woman lived on the 16th floor directly across from the house we lived in," and "I could see everything the two of them were doing there." In response to Moon Se-yoon's question she answered, "I saw it with my own eyes," leaving the studio solemn.
Evidence of the affair was also confirmed in credit card statements. Kim Ju-ha said, "Messages kept coming for payments at hair salons, nail shops and women-only saunas, and my husband dismissed them lightly," and "I found the places where the payments were made and, through real estate, eventually learned which unit they lived in."
The violence worsened as she raised the issue of infidelity. Kim Ju-ha confessed, "When I confronted him with evidence of the affair, fists came instead of words," and "My eardrum ruptured from two assaults so I can't hear well in one ear, and once I fell and suffered a traumatic intracranial hemorrhage." She recalled, "An hour before a news broadcast I was taken to the hospital, and the doctor asked, 'Shall I report this?'"
The violence was directed at the child as well. Kim Ju-ha said, "He grabbed my child by the throat and slapped him several times because the child came out late while playing hide-and-seek," and "People tried to stop him." She also recounted the harrowing memory that "he once took the child to the home of his affair partner."
Oh Eun-young said firmly, "Taking a child to a place where a parent meets an affair partner is clear child abuse," and "Parents should instinctively never do such a thing." She also made clear that "the responsibility for all these incidents lies with the person who started the marriage with concealment and lies."
Kim Ju-ha said she tried to endure the violence done to her, but once he laid hands on the child she could no longer bear it, which prompted her decision to divorce. Her ex-husband wrote an apology and expression of remorse, and Kim Ju-ha said she gave him another chance to protect the family, but the infidelity and violence repeated.
Meanwhile, Kim Ju-ha is a former anchor and broadcaster who represents Korea; she was born in 1973. She filed for divorce in 2013 citing her husband's assault, and in 2014 she legally divorced after 11 years of marriage.
[Photo] OSEN DB, broadcast capture
[OSEN]