Mia Freedman: THIS. This is what fierce looks like.

Next time you’re feeling beaten down, watch this video of Nigella Lawson walking into court.

And then watch it again. It is the absolute definition of fierce.

Despite what she has endured – the tragic deaths of her mother, sister and husband to cancer, an abusive second marriage to Charles Saatchi, the distress of having photographs of him grabbing her by the throat at a restaurant become global news, discovering her personal assistants had allegedly stolen $1.1m from her and now their grubby accusations that she’s a drug addict – just watch Nigella walk into the courtroom on Wednesday.

Her head held high, Lawson was surrounded by seven police officers as she walked into the court building past the media. I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone take on the world in quite that way.

To me, she looks like someone who has emerged from years of being silenced, belittled and denigrated. Someone who has reached her limit and then been pushed past it before finally saying enough. Someone who is fierce.

While Nigella testified in court this week that her ex-husband told everyone he was grabbing her by the throat to remove cocaine out of her nose, she insists the reality was very different:

“What actually happened was that somebody walked by with a very cute baby in a stroller and I said ‘I am so looking forward to having grandchildren’, and he grabbed me by the throat and said ‘I am the only person you should be concerned with. I am the only person who should be giving you pleasure.’ That is what happened.”

It makes chilling – and familiar – reading for any woman who has been in an abusive relationship.

Thank God she got away.