Agi Gallacher - Photographer/Survivor

I was born and raised in Poland, and for five long years I lived inside a cage no one could see from the outside. An abusive relationship drained the light from my days and bruised the edges of who I believed I was. Pain became routine. Fear became familiar. Every day I felt myself getting smaller.

But in 2006, something inside me refused to die. I packed my courage, my hope and £200 - everything I had - and ran. I crossed a border into England with nothing but the certainty that going back was not an option.

Life didn’t welcome me gently. I stepped onto British soil unable to speak the language, unable to ask for help, unable to explain the storms I had escaped. So I did the only thing I knew: I fought to survive. I took the first job I could find in a factory. I worked with my hands until my muscles ached and studied English until the words finally became mine.

Little by little, I rebuilt myself. I learned new skills, found new strengths, and discovered passions I didn’t even know were waiting inside me. Photography opened its door like a beam of light - letting me see the world not through fear, but through beauty, emotion, and truth. I worked, practiced, trained, failed, tried again, and rose higher than I ever thought possible.

Life eventually brought me love - real love. The kind that heals. I married an amazing man, built a life filled with laughter, and now I’m a mother to three beautiful children (and two dogs who believe they run the house). I run my own photography business, not just as a career, but as proof that I survived, I rebuilt, and I became more than what tried to break me.

I am no longer the woman who fled with £200 in her pocket.

I am the woman who fought for her life - and won.

MY WARCRY:

“From nothing, I rose - and no one will ever silence me again.”