Alison Daddo opens up about being raped aged 17

Alison Brahe Daddo has opened up about being raped as a teenager, revealing that she kept it secret for years due to feelings of ‘shame’.

The 52-year-old former model revealed details about the attack in her new book, Queen Menopause: Finding Your Majesty in the Mayhem.

Speaking about the book – and the attack – for the first time on The Big Talk Show with Jess Rowe, the mother-of-three explained she was only 17 when she was raped by a male model after a party in Japan.

Explaining the harrowing account, she said she’d been invited to a party by a ‘lovely English girl’ who she lived with in Japan.   

‘It’s a it’s a very odd scene over there. Actually. It’s kind of like the Wild, Wild Wild West of modelling in a way because there’s no parents, there’s no adults, keeping track of anything that’s going on over there.

‘I had just turned 17. Again, I was very, very young and very lonely over there first time out of home, and was invited to this party by a girl and my model block… It’s like a boarding house for models,’ she continued. 

Alison was working as a model in Japan at the time of the attack, which took place when she was just 17. She is pictured above aged 23 on the cover of Dolly magazine

‘She was an English girl, a lovely English girl, and we’d sort of been continuously booked together for some reason.’

Alison went on to explain that she ‘didn’t even know’ the party hosts but went along anyway because she was expecting a fun evening – but it quickly took a dark turn.

‘I’m sitting on the couch talking to her. When completely out of the blue these two other male models come rushing towards us, physically pick me up, shove me into the cupboard, which happened to kind of actually be in the middle of the party and proceeded to grope, my breasts, my vagina. 

Speaking about the book – and the attack – for the first time on The Big Talk Show with Jess Rowe, the mother-of-three explained she was only 17 when she was raped by a male model after a party in Japan

‘They were sticking their tongue down my throat or holding me, both of them were doing it’.

She added that she was wearing a ‘long sleeve T-shirt and pair of jeans’ and was told she was ‘asking for it’ because of what she was wearing. 

 ‘It sounds so cliché because you hear it all the time, but I actually had the words said to me, “You deserved it. Look at what you’re wearing.”

‘So while I was screaming and the music is going outside of the cupboard, I’m screaming, I’m screaming and moving around. 

‘This guy comes to get off her and pulls the two guys off, and I come out and I’m completely bewildered, completely in shock. 

Alison revealed details about the attack in her new book, Queen Menopause: Finding Your Majesty in the Mayhem. Pictured with Cameron on their wedding day

‘I don’t know anyone else in the room. And he was like, “Do you want to get out of here?” And I said, “yeah, yeah, I do”. I just want to go home. 

‘It was quite a long way home. We had to take a train and then we had to walk and so he was chatting to me and it was really lovely.’

Alison explained she believed the man was ‘delivering her safely’ into her apartment – before telling her he was going to ‘come in for a bit’. 

‘That was my mistake. So he came in and then proceeded to rape me,’ she continued.

‘He was actually a boxer, a professional boxer as well. So for a long time, I didn’t actually think it was right because I sort of just let it happen. I just didn’t fight back because I’d already been in shock from what had happened and he kind of saved me so it was massively confusing experience of he saved me from a horrible situation. 

In heartbreaking passages in her book, Alison describes being at a party when she was grabbed, shoved into a closet and groped by a man, before later enduring a second assault

‘And now he’s delivered me home. How do I say no? And I was like, “No, I don’t want to I don’t want to I don’t want to”, and then I just shut up. I didn’t say anything. 

‘So I just packed it away, had that away, but under the bed had locked it. Just didn’t revisit that for many, many, many years.’

The model added it affected her and she had ‘attempted to compartmentalise it’. 

‘I never wanted to come across as sexy. I changed the way I dressed. I became very much don’t look men in the eyes very much that way. 

‘I still struggle with that actually. So if I meet someone and I’m introduced, it’s okay. But my eyes are down and I don’t look because I don’t want to invite something.’

She added that she didn’t tell her husband Cameron Daddo until she was 28.   

‘I finally revealed it in therapy. I met him when I was 20. 

‘So eight years later, and yeah, so I talked about in therapy and then the two of us had very big cry together.’

The model added it took her ‘a long time’ to tell her parents and that she only told he children after the book was written.

Alison recently said she gained weight and feared that her husband Cameron, no longer found her changing body attractive. Pictured together in 2019

The heartbreaking disclosure comes after Alison shared how going through menopause led to body insecurities.

The teacher recently told Body+Soul she gained some weight and feared that her 57-year-old husband no longer found her changing body attractive.

‘I know, for instance, that Cam’s love language is physical. It’s what he wants and needs and how he feels secure with me,’ she said.

‘A lot of the dislike of my body shape had to do with what I thought Cam wanted, or what Cam liked. Once he told me he didn’t give a crap if I put on weight and that he loved me as a person, the more I addressed my own judgement of myself.’

‘Once he told me he didn’t give a crap if I put on weight and that he loved me as a person, the more I addressed my own judgement of myself’ Alison continued. Pictured in 2021

Over time, Alison came to accept her new shape, but says she still has difficult periods where she feels less than confident.

‘There are days where I go, “You’re just a cute little 52-year-old with a tubby tummy,” and then I’ll put on a pair of jeans and think, “Oh, God, I look six months pregnant, I can’t stand it.” I still go back and forwards with it,’ she said.

‘I’m so aware now of what women have been taught about their body shapes. They’re constantly described by how they look. You’ve just got to love the shape you are.’

Alison was an It girl in the 1990s, gracing the covers of dozens of magazines during her successful modelling career.

She and Cameron wed in 1991 and have three children together, daughters Lotus, 24, and Bodhi, 14, and a son, River, 20.

The couple celebrated their 30th wedding anniversary last year.

Insecure: ‘A lot of the dislike of my body shape had to do with what I thought Cam wanted, or what Cam liked’ she said

Alison was an ‘It-girl’ in the 1990s, gracing the covers of dozens of magazines during her successful modelling career