Susie remembers the exact moment she realised her marriage was over — on her birthday

Susie Taaffe had been married to her husband for seven years when everything fell apart in one heartbreaking moment — on her birthday.

The Brisbane mum was juggling three young children when her husband left the house the night before she turned 35.

Thinking he just needed some space, Susie, now 41, left him alone and hoped he'd come around the next day.

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"The next day, which was my birthday, I asked if he was coming to my birthday dinner with our children and my parents," Susie tells 9Honey.

"He said 'I wasn't going to, but I can if you want'. In that instant, I knew it was over forever."

Susie says her marriage had started to "die a slow death" after her husband went on a boy's trip to Las Vegas the year prior.

When he arrived home, the mother-of-three realised something was really wrong.

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"When he got back off the plane, something had changed in him… something had flipped," she remembers.

"He was literally a different person."

Fast forward 12 months, on the night of Susie's birthday, her relationship came crumbling down in an instant.

Susie says in the months before that painful moment on her 35th birthday, she had fought hard for her marriage. This, she says, made the transition into single motherhood a little easier.

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"I had a peace within myself because I literally couldn't have done anything more," she recalls.

"That year was so tough, but it did make it easier for me… it actually was a relief to not have to cope with the stress and strain of it all."

Between divorcing her husband of seven years and raising three kids as a single mum, Susie found an outlet for her pain.

An engineer by trade, she wanted to empower other women with her own design for female underwear.

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As a new divorcee and mother of two young girls, she knew how easy it was to fall into a trap of negative body image.

This is how Susie's business Missy Massy was born, the parent company of her underwear brand Petti-pants.

Susie's dream was to create underwear that understood a woman's body and its needs.

"I wanted to support myself and my family, so I rolled the dice and it paid off," she says.

"I love the whole body confidence movement at the moment, with changing all the language and that's what I promote, changing how we talk about ourselves and normalising normal bodies.

"Basically, that having lumps and cellulite and stretch marks — it's all just being a normal human."

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After surviving divorce and building her own business, Susie has some sage words of advice for other women going through a marriage breakdown.

"Remember what brings you joy and happiness, and use that to create your new life," Susie says.

"It won't happen all at once though, it's taken me six years to get here."