IN the latest of our looks at LIFE, we focus on Julie Dyment, who turned her back on the world at 16 after she was sexually assaulted. She became a nun, vowing never to marry and have children. But LIFE didn't turn out that way for Julie... TELOR IWAN finds out more.

SIXTEEN-year-old Julie smiles widely for the annual school photograph. Julie, then Julie Mitchell, looks like any other teenager, with her whole life ahead of her. But her classmates, teachers and her family are unaware that her smile hides a terrible secret - that she had been indecently assaulted at the age of eight.

"I suppose I was emotionally scarred, I was such a shy and timid girl," she said at the Durham Road, Newport, home she shares with husband John and lively four-year-old Rebekah.

" Looking back, my childhood was taken away from me. I used to be so angry at what had happened."

Such a settled life was the last thing on Julie's mind when she decided to join the Benedictine order of nuns, an order which shunned society.

She was in torment, blaming herself for what had happened to her. Julie said: "I went to a Catholic school so the idea of becoming a nun was not that out of the ordinary, but I was the only one I knew who wanted that life.

"Some thought it slightly odd but I couldn't wait. I was not a happy child so when the day came I was smiling while my mother wept as the convent's doors were closed." But cloistered in Tyburn Convent, near London's Hyde Park, and miles away from her Hastings home, Julie could not escape her pain.

She said: "I still wanted to be a nun but I began to realise that I had used London as an escape."

Julie moved to a more open atmosphere in Stroud, Gloucestershire, and the Holy Cross Priory, which she enjoyed.

And yet Julie was still not at peace - she had not dealt with the aftermath of the sexual assault.

She said: "I was having difficulties in accepting the teachings of the convent. I was beginning to question their beliefs and eventually they tired of this.

"It was decided that I should work outside the convent. Looking back on that time I see myself as a bit lost, searching for myself and still trying to come to terms with my past. "There was some feeling inside me about having a baby which just got stronger and stronger.

"It was not the only reason, I felt I wanted more from religion but I was also desperate for a family."

And Julie thanks fate for showing her the way forward: "If it wasn't for a chance meeting with a woman from Newport I wouldn't be the woman I am today."

Julie was 26 and visiting a care home in Stroud as part of her work when she started chatting to a woman who mentioned Newport's Kings Church.

It was a meeting that would change her life. She said: "I went with her to Newport and the Kings Church and after just one sermon I was baptised. "That day is by far the greatest day of my life and religion started to make sense to me for the first time - I began to find some peace.

"It wasn't until I came to Newport that I was able to love again - I learned to accept men again and with the church's help, trying for a baby was not a problem." Julie moved to Newport. She made it her spiritual home and went about rebuilding her life, which began with coming to terms with her past.

She said: "I learned to forgive, to trust men again - and to love myself. I was happy again."

The pieces of her shattered life were coming together and Julie fell in love with a man who became her first husband. They were married in June 1997. Her life seemed complete when daughter Rebekah was born nine months later. But underneath the surface, there were problems with the relationship and the marriage came to a sudden end.

Said Julie: "It was not working, we were both unhappy and I felt I had to leave home and go back to Hastings.

"The only good thing was that I was able to face up to my demons and deal with my past." She began to deal with the sexual assault years before which had haunted her. "I realised that it was not my fault, the problem was all on the side of the man who had attacked me and that, most importantly, not every man was the same."

While longing to live in her 'spiritual home' of Newport, Julie met and fell in love with John Dyment in a church in Hastings.

Julie said: "We were married last May by my father - who is a lay preacher - and I knew that I had, at last, found the right man.

"But I just couldn't stop thinking about Newport. "This is where I truly believe we are meant to be."

Now Julie has enrolled on an Open University course to study music and she is hopeful for the future. And she has even found the strength to confront and forgive the man who sexually assaulted her.

" He has got the problem. I feel sorry for him. I just wish that he could come to Kings Church and deal with his problems," she said.

"I've told my story not only to share my love for Kings Church and the good they have given me, but also to tell other women who have been assaulted that it is possible to overcome your past and find happiness."

*PICTURED: Julie Dyment with daughter Rebekah.