Didn’t they tell you that I was a ####er? It’s always ‘I’ve been ####ing about you,’ ‘I ####ed so hard,’ ‘I ####ed him off’. I just #### in the sh$t. I think even my little brother thinks I’m a massive ar$eh. My girlfriend, he met me once, and he said, ‘You’re just a big arse.’ What does that mean? I don’t think he even knows. Does that mean I look like an arse? Am I a massive arse? Don’t know what it means. It doesn’t mean anything. I’m trying to be sensitive and say, ‘Sorry, I shouldn’t have done it, but I really love you.’ You don’t want to be in the wrong position when the girl calls her dad and says, ‘We need to talk,’ and he comes out and is all about me being a massive arse. My girlfriend didn’t say I was a massive arse; I came out in front of everyone and just said, ‘I was drunk and disrespectful. There’s nothing wrong with being drunk. We shouldn’t make too much of it. You don’t have to feel threatened. It’s a learning experience for me.’ I’m not that daft – I know people were going to think it was a funny thing. I feel sorry for everybody. It’s an extremely serious matter. It was a major thing. It’s been the focus of the wedding, and it’s something I’ve had to reflect on in depth. ‘I thought the best course of action would be to try and tell her in person’: Will. Photo: Michael Crook for the Guardian There’s two weddings. I was trying to make sure she was OK, make sure she knew she was in good hands. But [my parents] both were there at the moment it happened. At the moment, I put it down to experience. That’s my best answer. I don’t think it was really a massive, massive issue, it just seemed like it. I was at work, and I was drunk. I don’t know what happened next. I was drunk and didn’t know how bad it was, and I went out the back. I’m still trying to look at the positives – there were plenty of positives that came out of it. My family was there for her, and they know the story. That’s the one good thing out of this – me going out the back, just because I’m embarrassed and embarrassed for my family, that’s what makes the family more united. I thought the best course of action would be to try and tell her in person – like what he did – but just not make it public knowledge. We don’t need people to know what happened. There’s a reason I didn’t want to do it publicly. I’m a pretty easygoing person; I wouldn’t have made it public if I wasn’t 100 per cent sure I was in the right. For the moment, there’s not a lot of emotion – as much as you can feel emotion about something that’s completely normal. I’ve been thinking about it so much, I’m thinking I must be a massive arsehole, but I don’t know. At the moment, it was more about the respect and love for her. She knew it wasn’t directed at her, and I felt really bad that it came across that way. I just want to say sorry. I want to say sorry to the people around me who felt hurt, so sorry to the people around me, my family, my fiancee and friends. And to myself, because I didn’t want to hurt them. ‘I would never, ever do anything like this ever again. I was stupid. I didn’t know what I was doing’: Will. Photo: Michael Crook for the Guardian My family have been really open about the whole situation. There’s been no animosity in the family. They have accepted everything. The way my dad put it was, ‘We could tell it from his tone of voice that something serious happened.’ A lot of people, if there was an argument or there was a drunk one, we’re like, ‘Oh, you just lost it for a minute, give me a call tomorrow,’ or, ‘You know you shouldn’t have done that.’ It doesn’t look good. My family knows that my character is not that. You have to take things a lot more seriously when you’re drunk. I just wouldn’t have done it with this. For the past three years, I’ve been working with a charity to stop people hurting themselves, stop people being drunk and not taking things seriously. All this stuff has come about since I was doing the awareness work. I’m really proud of myself for that. I don’t want anyone to believe I’m a massive arse, or am arrogant or any of those things. I don’t want to tell a lie to the people who I love and care about. I don’t want them thinking, ‘This guy’s a massive arse.’ It’s the biggest thing in my life – and it was one of the biggest things in my life. Everyone makes mistakes. What you do after, what you feel is a big issue. If it was me drinking myself into a coma, I’d probably have got a black eye, or lost a tooth or something, but it wasn’t. I don’t think I would have ever have done it again. I could have got a slap, but I don’t know what I would have done. I can’t answer that. It’s the biggest regret of my life so far. The biggest mistake I’ve ever done. I felt really bad when it happened. I was crying to my fiancee when I told her. I didn’t know what else to do. She was crying. I said, ‘You’ve got to know that I’m really sorry.’ That’s all I can say. I didn’t want to tell her. All the family saw it as a learning experience and had a good laugh about it – it was a good story to tell each other. I wouldn’t have said, ‘I hit your girlfriend,’ because it’s not my style to do that, but it was the same – I don’t know how to explain it, but it was just the same thing – just a bit of a row. I’m not looking for sympathy, or anything like that. I’m just hoping that people can accept that. I know there are consequences. I’m really sorry for being drunk. I’m just a big dope. I’m just someone who has a lot of respect for myself, and I never expected myself to be in this position. I just wanted to let people know. The only thing I can say is I’m really sorry. • Name has been changed • Comments on this piece are premoderated to ensure the discussion remains on the topics raised by the article. Please be aware there may be a short delay in comments appearing on the site.