Childhood for sale

Jade Critchlow, 28, Liverpool

Wandering through the shoe shop, my eyes were wide.

‘Pick any pair you want,’ my dad’s friend Billy Adams, then 38, said, grinning.

It was May 2005 and I was 11. Billy had just moved to the area and had met my dad at a mutual friend’s house.

Since my parents had split, I only saw Dad at weekends.

Billy would usually be there, too, and he’d begun showering me with gifts – new clothes, trendy trainers...

My parents never had much money, so it was a real thrill to be lavished with so many treats.

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