"I did the right thing and I was punished": Leah Mouatt. Credit:Wolter Peeters Hidden far back in the search results was a public profile on a pornography website advertised as a "motherless" and "moral free" space for user-generated content. He had uploaded photos of clothed pre-pubescent girls, including a family friend, along with graphic and disturbing sexual comments. He listed his favourite porn as "teens" and his sexual preference as "nothing is taboo". "All I remember next is a lot of screaming and crying and being on the floor," says Mouatt, 34. Barely able to speak, she called a friend who picked her up and told her to pack a bag. Police were called and were at the home within hours, seizing seven devices belonging to her partner Phillip John Vellio, an IT worker at the University of NSW.

Phillip John Vellio, convicted of two counts of possessing child abuse material, with former partner Leah Mouatt. In July, Vellio, 33, was convicted of two counts of possessing child abuse material after police examined more than 32,000 images and 854 videos on his laptops, finding many that depicted babies, toddlers and teenagers in various sexual acts with other children and adults. But the worst was yet to come for Mouatt. "My world imploded," she says. "Everything was destroyed. I lost my friends, I was taken to [court] by [some members of his family] who didn't want me to get a cent. I lost my home, my car. I've lost my trust in other people. I've had to rebuild a whole life." Forgotten in the aftermath

Australia is in the midst of what some have described as an explosion in online child sex exploitation. Investigations by the Australian Federal Police jumped by almost 250 per cent in a year to 11,000 in 2015. Of particular concern has been a growing trend of Australians streaming live videos of child sex abuse made overseas, like those of former Melbourne businessman Peter Scully, whose depraved home-made videos have led the Philippines to consider reviving the death penalty. Yet not much is known about the wives and partners of those who access child abuse material online. Their voices are rarely heard. They are not considered "victims" and are often forgotten in the aftermath. Many are assumed to have known about their partner's offending but a world-first study by Melbourne's RMIT University, published last year, found that most of the small number of women surveyed first found out when police knocked on the door.

"The women were just in so much pain," study author Dr Marg Liddell says. "Most participants reported mental health issues, with many seeming to experience post-traumatic stress disorder. The fact the pain was still extraordinarily raw years later indicated to me that the system didn't work for them." Women reported being stigmatised and ostracised by friends and family. Relatives often tried to minimise the offending and close ranks around the offender. Shame, guilt, anger, hurt, disbelief and feelings of responsibility often infiltrated every area of their lives. Half of the women interviewed had children, about half stayed with their partner. Others were left without a home, a breadwinner or a social circle. Analysis of NSW convictions shows offenders are mostly male (99 per cent) with an average age of 42 and three-quarters have no criminal record. With a knowledge-base slowly emerging, advocates are pushing for non-offending partners to be classified as secondary victims of crime and for support services to be funded.

"Because partners don't exist in the research, they don't exist in policy. Because they don't exist in policy, they don't exist in funding," says Natalie Walker, founder of PartnerSPEAK, the country's only support group for affected partners of online child abuse offenders. "I think that often confounds the trauma; you're feeling stigmatised and there's nowhere to go because no one recognises your trauma." She is at the forefront of a global push to understand and recognise the trauma suffered by non-offending partners.

Walker, from the Dandenong Ranges, discovered child abuse material on her then-husband's computer 15 years ago and was fobbed off by police in South Australia who she says treated her like a vengeful ex-wife. Great strides have been made in prosecuting people who access material online – maximum penalties have been increased to 10 years in NSW and Victoria and resources for child abuse squads have been bolstered. But she believes society, particularly the judicial system, still tends to see possession offences as "just looking at pictures". Data compiled for Fairfax Media by the NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics shows that the average prison sentence for offenders last year was 11 months. Vellio received a 12-month good behaviour bond on the condition he see a psychiatrist monthly. "If everyone's minimising it, saying 'what's the big deal?', you're made to look hysterical," Walker says.

Criminologists, academics and police have backed changing the commonly-used terminology from "child pornography" to "child abuse material", reflecting the fact that a child was abused in order to make the pictures. "Every image of child sexual abuse is a crime scene," the acting Children's eSafety Commissioner Andree Wright said recently when releasing the agency's 2015-16 report showing that 7456 sites containing child abuse were removed in a year. The terminology was changed in NSW legislation in 2010 and Victoria indicated in July that it would follow suit. "It may seem like a small thing but that's how we gradually change the thinking," Walker says. 'I felt like I should have known earlier'

There is one thing that saved Mouatt from giving up: a counsellor provided to her for free under Victims Services and Support. NSW is the only state to allow non-offending partners to apply for therapeutic help. "I wouldn't be here without it," she says. After the police raid, Vellio admitted himself to a psychiatric hospital for two months. In a haze of shock and anger, compounded by chronic fatigue, Mouatt endured financial battles with her in-laws and was eventually forced to go to the Salvation Army for food and petrol vouchers. She moved in with her parents in a small town near Bathurst and despaired as friends slowly dropped off, either unable or unwilling to provide support. Her partner's family and friends were not interested in knowing what he'd done, she says. "Their motivation throughout has been reputation and I got scapegoated," she says. "I felt like it was my fault. I felt like I had betrayed him. I felt like I should have known earlier."

Two years on, she finally feels strong enough to speak publicly in order to empower herself and other victims. Increasingly, the suffering of women like Mouatt is being considered part of the continuum of domestic violence. Julie Oberin, chair of the Australian Women Against Violence Alliance, said abusive men share the same sense of entitlement as those involved in child abuse material. Coercion, control and manipulation is often at the heart of the behaviour. "Many women we support in refuge tell us similar things. The betrayal, the shame, the reactions from others, the blame," she says. Mouatt is rebuilding her life, studying psychology and volunteering at Lifeline with a view to counselling other victims of crime.

"What hurts the most is that I went through so much and very, very few people thanked me," she says. "I did the right thing and I was punished. There was no good that came from it. My life blew apart from that phone call and the only thing that got me through was hanging on to knowing that I'd done the right thing."