Lhakpa Sherpa: Everest record holder shares her domestic abuse turmoil

This article contains descriptions of domestic violence which some readers may find distressing.

Lhakpa Sherpa has a startling life story – to the outside world she holds the record for climbing Mount Everest a staggering 10 times, the most of any woman.

But behind the scenes, her personal life has been dangerous and fearful.

While conquering the world’s highest mountain, she says she was enduring domestic abuse from her husband – including during their 2004 descent from Everest.

Now based in America, she has raised three children, supporting them by working in a grocery store and as a cleaner.

Her life – on and off the mountain – has been made into a Netflix documentary, Mountain Queen: The Summits of Lhakpa Sherpa, directed by Lucy Walker.

Sherpa is proud of the film.

Eyes blazing, she tells the BBC: “I want to show people women can do it.”

What is perhaps surprising about her record-breaking climbs is that she does so with little training.

Climbing Everest can be fatal – there have been more than 300 deaths in the region since records of mountain climbing there began a century ago.

So it’s vital to be in peak condition.

In the film, we see Sherpa keep fit by walking in the Connecticut mountains. But she also carries on with her normal working life, out of necessity.

“You’re an exceptional athlete,” Walker tells Sherpa during our interview. “Very tall. Very strong.

“People underestimate it. It’s an unbelievable accomplishment that you can climb Everest from doing your day job.”

Sherpa responds: “I’m not good with being educated, but I’m very good with the mountains.”

Born in 1973 to yak farmers in the Nepalese Himalayas, she was one of 11 children.

Crucially, she was raised in an area where education for girls wasn’t a priority – she carried her brother to school for hours through the hills, but wasn’t allowed inside.

Things are now improving in Nepal – women’s literacy rocketed from 10% in 1981 to 70% by 2021.

But Sherpa’s lack of education left lasting consequences – she’s still unable to read.

Things people take for granted, like using a TV remote control, are difficult for her.

Her son Nima, born in the late 90s, and daughters Sunny, 22, and Shiny, 17, help bridge the gaps.

With no schooling, by the time she was 15, Sherpa was working as a porter on mountain expeditions – often as the only girl.

Through her climbing work she was able to avoid a traditional arranged marriage.

But life got difficult when she became pregnant after a brief relationship in Kathmandu.

An unmarried mother, she was too ashamed to return home.

Still climbing when she could, she met and fell for Romanian-US mountaineer and home-renovation contractor, George Dijmărescu.

He’d escaped Romania, under dictator Nicolae Ceaușescu, by swimming across the Danube river.

Dijmărescu had already forged a new life in the US when he and Sherpa married in 2002, settling in Connecticut, where they went on to have Sunny and Shiny.

But the couple’s relationship fractured when Dijmărescu became violent, Sherpa says.

In 2004, this became apparent when they ascended Everest with a New England climbing group.

After reaching the summit they encountered bad weather.

Dijmărescu’s behaviour “took a turn almost immediately”, according to journalist Michael Kodas, who reported on the climb for a local paper.

Recalling it in the documentary, he says things around Dijmărescu got “hostile”.

Sherpa, who was in a tent with him, says on camera: “He look like thunder, look like bullet… George was yelling and he punch me.”

We then see multiple photographs taken by Kodas, of her lying unconscious afterwards.

The journalist says he witnessed Dijmărescu say “get this garbage out of here”, as he dragged his wife from the tent.

In the film, Sherpa describes being unconscious as an out-of-body experience.

“People’s voices turned to lots of birds. I saw my whole life. I fly near my mom’s house. I saw through everything… I felt ashamed of myself. I want to go die.”

Then she remembered her children, and says: “I’m not ready to die.”

Kodas included the violent incident in his 2008 book, High Crimes: The Fate of Everest in the Age of Greed.

Walker later persuaded him to release his film footage to her, including the raw tapes, calling it a “huge act of trust”.

“It’s such a difficult subject and people don’t sort of want to get involved, because it’s controversial… but I didn’t take no for an answer,” she tells the BBC.

Despite their relationship being damaged, they stayed together for several more years.

But she says she was admitted to hospital when Dijmărescu assaulted her again in 2012.

This was a turning point.

With the help of a social worker, Sherpa moved with the girls to a women’s refuge, where she started to rebuild her life.

The couple divorced in 2015, and in 2016 a court awarded Sherpa “sole legal custody of the girls”.

A report at the time, in OutsideOnline, said Dijmărescu received a six-month suspended sentence and a year of probation, after a conviction for breach of the peace.

He was found not guilty of second-degree assault because court documents stated she did not have a visible head injury.

Dijmărescu died in 2020 of cancer, but the trauma he left behind is tangible.

Sherpa found it really hard discussing their relationship for the documentary.

“I wish all the turmoil keep secret, I don’t want in my life it’s everybody know[ing],” she says.

But her son advised her to make the film with Walker, after researching her previous work.

The director says to Sherpa: “When you tell your story, you skipped bits, saying, ‘We’re not talking about these years’.

“And slowly, slowly, we go to the difficult things.

“It is very traumatic for you. You get very upset, you don’t sleep. It’s very intense.

“But actually, if you can share it, people love you more. Because when you let people know you have difficult times, other people, I think, connect much more now.”

Sunny and Shiny echo this.

They appear in the film, and found it “a bit overwhelming to watch at first, because of how vulnerable we were to have our whole life put on display”.

They agreed to take part because “the struggle we have been through as a family, and how we have used it to strengthen not weaken us, is such a crucial part of our mother’s story”.

Not surprisingly, Sherpa says life was tough after the trauma of her marriage.

“Oh my God, yeah, crying. I carry so much in my life. I work hard, I courage hard,” she says.

“Sometimes I say, ‘Why am I alive, why am I not dead, so many danger. Almost I’ve been in heaven, and come back. So difficult. But somehow I did it…

“Hurt woman is very tough. Does not give up easily. And I keep doing.”

Climbing is not only her passion – it’s also a healing process.

“My darkness I leave behind [on the mountain],” she says.

We see her begin her record-breaking 10th Everest ascent in 2022.

Whispering goodbye to Shiny, sleeping in a nearby tent in base camp, the climb begins at night, by torchlight.

This means her descent from the summit can take place in daylight.

It’s clear her daughters are proud of their mum.

Sherpa says she is creating a “better life” for her children in the US, including giving them an education.

“I really want changing my life, my daughters – I work hard,” she says.

She wants to earn her living with her own guiding company, and to find more sponsorship.

“I know the mountains, I wish I can share my expertise and experience with other people,” she says.

Sunny and Shiny add: “Women have started climbing big peaks and following our mom’s footsteps.”

If you or someone you know are affected by the issues in this story, support is available via BBC Action Line.

Mountain Queen: The Summits of Lhakpa Sherpa is on Netflix on 31 July.