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There\u2019s a line down the middle of Jelena Dokic\u2019s life, cleaving it cleanly in two. On one side, the \u201cbefore\u201d, is the childhood violence at the hands of her father<\/a>, the brutal years of an elite tennis career<\/a>, a life observed through the eyes of the public, and the depression, anxiety, PTSD and eating disorder that followed.<\/p>\n Nine years ago, on November 13, 2017, she stepped into the \u201cafter\u201d. That was the release day for her debut book, a memoir called Unbreakable<\/a> that\u2019s since been adapted into a Logie-winning documentary.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve said this every single day since \u2013 and it\u2019s a huge statement, a massive statement \u2013 that was the best day of my life,\u201d Dokic, now 43, says with a smile. \u201cAnd I don\u2019t say that lightly. I\u2019ve gone through some hard stuff, but ultimately I also had a lot of highlights \u2013 professionally and personally \u2013 up until that point. But nothing compared to this.\u201d Finding the voice to tell her story, she says, was \u201cliterally when freedom started for me\u201d.<\/p>\n Related Article We\u2019re sitting across from each other at the low tables of The Waiting Room, a bar in the lobby of Melbourne\u2019s Crown Towers hotel. Dokic has come straight from a day spent in front of the camera launching the 2027 Australian Open calendar. She looks stately, almost regal, dressed in a vivid red pantsuit with matching crimson lipstick, her hair slicked back and a monogrammed white Louis Vuitton purse placed between us.<\/p>\n Before she\u2019s even had time to order her piccolo and orange juice, Dokic has already been spotted. A man in a fedora and sport coat ambles up to thank her for the work she does. He lowers his volume to share something private, before expressing gratitude again and moving along. Dokic\u2019s smile doesn\u2019t drop as she nods along with him, but once he\u2019s out of earshot, she confesses she couldn\u2019t make out what he was saying. The sentiment was clear, though.<\/p>\n Seconds later, a tennis fan approaches, camera at the ready. \u201cCan I be one of those people?\u201d she asks, already slipping off her bag and jacket to take a selfie with the one-time World No. 4. Her mum will be so proud, she tells Dokic. \u201cWe love everything about you. Thank you for what you stand for,\u201d she says as she leaves.<\/p>\n This is the reality of life on the other side for Dokic. Being embraced for saying the quiet, scary, dark stuff out loud. Building a new life and career from the wreckage of the old one. The young Dokic could never have hoped for a skerrick of the joy that is her new normal today. Life these days is built around her determination not to take that opportunity for granted.<\/p>\n She takes more than 100 flights a year and does about 70 speaking engagements on top of her broadcasting work, she tells me. \u201cMy life is very different and hectic,\u201d she says. \u201cI don\u2019t have a set week, ever. [When] we do grand slams and I do 18-hour days, I have to be up at 2am.\u201d Her schedule after returning from a recent holiday with her partner, Yane Veselinov, was typical: \u201cIn the first 35 days after coming back from Europe, I had two days off.\u201d<\/p>\n But no matter how busy it gets, she always makes time for the people who want to thank her or share their stories. \u201cI will try and really, really stop for every single picture or autograph, whether I\u2019m at the airport or wherever I am,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n Often, Dokic will ask the organisers of her speaking events if she can kick off proceedings 15 minutes early. Having a bit of slack in the day\u2019s program allows for the moments she knows will come after sharing her story of hardship and resilience.<\/p>\n \u201cI have a lot of people that come up to me and say that they feel like they know me and that they can really resonate with me,\u201d she says. \u201cAnd that, I think, comes from how honest and open and vulnerable and raw I\u2019ve been about my story and about my life.<\/p>\n \u201cA lot of people come to me with stories of family violence or mental-health struggles and feeling like they can\u2019t maybe be open and honest about that because there is still a lot of judgment and shame and stigma around things,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n It\u2019s a feeling she knows too well. A decade ago, she takes great pains to remind me, the culture was not as accepting of stories like hers. \u201cIf you talked about mental health, people would use labels like \u2018crazy\u2019, right?\u201d She flashes air quotes, the colourful gemstones on her ring catching the light. \u201cIf you talked about family violence, partner violence, child abuse or anything similar to that, [you] would be victim-blamed.\u201d<\/p>\n But staring down her past and laying it all out for the public to consume either needed to be done honestly or not at all. \u201cLook, I\u2019m not going to lie. I had fear around releasing that book. I can\u2019t tell you it was easy.\u201d<\/p>\n Helping to hone her purpose and push through the fear was the image in her head of the 13-year-old Jelena, who so desperately needed to hear that she was worth something beyond her stats and sponsors and trophies. Who needed to see that a life without her father\u2019s control and cruelty was possible.<\/p>\n The other source of her strength is one she couldn\u2019t possibly have imagined at the time, but one that has revealed itself over the past decade: the people who send her DMs, queue at book signings and see something of themselves in her story. It\u2019s those people she had in mind while planning her third and latest book, Live Free.<\/p>\n While Unbreakable was a memoir of her early years and career and 2023\u2019s \u200cFearless: Finding the Power to Thrive focused on the personal development that drove the past decade, Live Free is something of an offering, a guide to taking a piece of Dokic\u2019s strength and instilling it in your own life. Among stories of shame, perfectionism, self-worth and body image are tools and worksheets to shift harmful thought patterns and find useful perspective. \u201cIt\u2019s something that I wish I had when I was struggling,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n They\u2019re more than hypothetical; Dokic says she calls upon the lessons in the book when she hits a block or feels the familiar creep of low self-worth. That\u2019s where it all begins and ends for her. \u201cI grew up in that very tough, brutal world of an individual sport, in the public eye since the age of 12.\u201d<\/p>\n Coupled with the constant demoralisation that comes with being a child of family violence, Dokic\u2019s only metric of success was external \u2013 whether she won, what people thought of her, how she looked and was being perceived. \u201cI realised, when I retired from tennis and I had to go into all of these other fields, that I actually didn\u2019t have any self-worth.\u201d<\/p>\n Related Article She picked up a notebook and asked herself what it would take to feel like she was finally \u201cenough\u201d. By turning inward and eliminating external validation, she ended up with a list of 10 things. \u201cAnd that\u2019s really where my mindset shifted.\u201d The items were things she could control: \u201cI feel like I\u2019m really, really worthy if I\u2019m disciplined, if I\u2019m on time, if I work hard. Then: if I\u2019m kind. If I\u2019m kind to myself, if I\u2019m kind to others.\u201d Finding the keys to self-esteem can feel like an endless quest, but it can also be that simple.<\/p>\n![\"Jelena](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/518d45d975cdedff681de6f3cdc8e2f8eb9e400f.jpeg\")
<\/a><\/p>\n![\"Jelena](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/fff177adecc1ea60bb147ddac968e2b2d6ce3168.jpeg\")
Jelena Dokic (pictured playing in 2009 at the Australian Open) experienced intense scrutiny throughout her playing career.Vince Caligiuri<\/p>\n![\"Former](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/b4e12d58f749d5521867f79f028e3ac040ca91ad.jpeg\")
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