“For the end of this chapter, I choose to focus on a good memory like this picture,” Jelena Dokic wrote movingly beside a rare shot of her father Damir Dokic hugging her as a child.
It’s a memory that the tennis superstar is holding close in the wake of her estranged father’s death from cancer, aged 67, on May 16, 2025.
The 42-year-old had a famously troubled relationship with her father and coach Damir who was known as the “tennis dad from hell” and shockingly made her sign over millions of dollars to him when she was just 19.
Regarded as a tennis prodigy who could’ve made it to world No. 1, Jelena’s sporting career was derailed by years of violence and abuse, on and off the tennis court, at the hands of her father.
GOODBYE TO A MONSTER
In her autobiographies Fearless and Unbreakable, Jelena reveals her father’s abuse began when she was just six years old and starting to learn tennis, and often left her feeling suicidal.
Damir’s tyrannical regime, that included denying Jelena food and water for days as a punishment for her not playing well enough, left her with a severe binge eating disorder. He once even knocked her unconscious after a match in Canada.
“I am not fully healed. I have not fully recovered. I am a work in progress. But I am a fighter,” she says in Fearless, in which she also reveals that she has been diagnosed with borderline personality disorder, depression, anxiety and PTSD.
The scars are still there – and now with her father’s passing, survivor and thriver Jelena says it’s “complicated”.
In a brave post to Instagram, the former world No. 4 shares how she’s feeling since his death, “As you know, my relationship with my father has been difficult and painful with a lot of history.
“Despite everything and no matter how hard, difficult and in the last 10 years even non-existent our relationship and communication was, it is never easy losing a parent and a father, even one you are estranged from.
“The loss of an estranged parent comes with a difficult and complicated grief. It’s an end of a chapter and life as I know it.”
A friend tells Woman’s Day that Jelena is “resolute” over her father’s death, and is choosing kindness over bitterness.
“Despite all the complexities of losing her abusive dad, who she was so terribly estranged from for years, Jelena has bravely chosen not to be angry and bitter. She made a decision a long time ago when she said she didn’t hate her dad and that when he finally went she would only have peace, kindness and empathy in her heart,” the friend says of Jelena, who has channelled her trauma into a career as a motivational speaker, writing two bestselling books, and also launching a successful career as a sports commentator.
“The best way to describe her feelings right now would be that she is resolute – he’s gone, it’s the end of that part of her life, but now she’s ready to begin a whole new chapter, and perhaps get to have the loving family she has longed for since she was a little girl.”
REBUILDING HER FAMILY
While she has previously battled with forgiving her mother Ljiljana Dokic, who was divorced from her father, for what Jelena felt was turning a blind eye to the abuse that was happening to the tennis star, she finally has a good relationship with her and her younger brother, Savo.
“Her mum Ljiljana and her little brother Savo are both in Croatia and are believed to have been in the country when Damir passed. Jelena’s relationship with her mum and Savo is best described as amicable over these past few years, and the aim now is to reunite in the next few months and begin the process of healing without any more pain and suffering.
“Damir had been battling cancer for months so Jelena, according to friends, has had plenty of time to process the inevitable, knowing that there was a rapid decline in his health. Jelena is incredibly strong, and it’s now hoped that the years of unimaginable abuse can be put to rest as she, her mum and brother find their happy place again as a family. The priority now is that all the broken pieces can finally be put back together again,” the friend adds.
“Whether she makes the journey back to Croatia remains to be seen – a warm hug from her mum right now might just be the best medicine for the healing to begin – that’s enough pain for anyone to have to endure, it’s time for Jelena to finally get her happy ending.”
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