Emily Atack reveals she got pregnant ‘very young’ while in abusive relationship

Emily Atack has spoken about becoming pregnant as a teenager, after developing ‘really unhealthy relationships with men’ in her adolescence following an assault aged 10.

The 36-year-old Rivals actress, who shot to fame after her role in The Inbetweeners, has reflected on her ‘troubled’ teenage years in a new interview.

Atack said when she got pregnant, she had been in an ‘awful, abusive and horrible relationship’ and that her parents, actress Kate Robbins and musician Keith Atack, ‘didn’t know what to do with her’ much of the time.

Appearing on the How To Fail podcast, she recalled how the pregnancy coincided with her parents’ divorce when she was 16, saying: ‘I was sexually active with older boys and men, and that was very difficult for my parents. 

‘I remember when my dad left, and I’ve never actually told anybody this, but I was pregnant and I was very young. I was in this awful, abusive, horrible relationship, and I fell pregnant.’

She added: ‘I’ve never spoken openly about how or what happened and I don’t know if I’m ready to yet, but obviously that pregnancy didn’t continue.’

Elsewhere in the interview, Atack said she was sexually assaulted as a 10-year-old and recalled being ‘treated appallingly by older men’. 

The mother-of-one said: ‘I was keeping so much from my parents when I was young. Again, it’s going a little bit dark, but I was sexually assaulted, first of all, when I was ten.

‘That was when I was first ever sexually assaulted and I remember being ten years old and from that moment I was treated appallingly by older men from that age, throughout my life. 

‘I think the loneliness came a lot from that and lots of things happened that my parents to this day still don’t know the detail of how men have treated me and touched me and whispered things to me in my ear when people aren’t in earshot.’

After her parents got divorced, Atack left school and moved to London with her sister Martha. Speaking to Elizabeth Day, the actress said she didn’t want listeners to think the worst of her parents, who she described as ‘amazing people’.

‘I don’t berate them in any way for this,’ Atack said. ‘Everybody makes mistakes, and this was just a period of time where lots of mistakes were being made, but now as a mother, I understand.’

She continued: ‘Also, those mistakes, I think they’ve led me to be where I am now because I think a lot of people think that I had it all handed to me on a plate because of who my parents were and because my mum was an actress, but I did it by myself.

‘I really did, and in the middle of being in these abusive, horrible relationships, I wanted to be with somebody. I wanted to be looked after and so I was going out with all these awful guys and doing all that. 

‘I was trying to make a life for me and Martha and as I’m saying it out loud, I really don’t want people to think my parents are terrible, terrible people. They really aren’t and I love them so much, and we have the most amazing relationship. I do think it made us all stronger as a family.’

Atack is now engaged to her partner Dr Alistair Garner, who is a materials scientist specialising in aerospace and nuclear applications. The couple are set to tie the knot later this year, having gone public with their relationship in 2023.

In 2024, the couple welcomed their first child, a baby boy named Barney James.

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