Actress Halle Berry is "damaged" after witnessing domestic violence as a child.

The 48-year-old, who has a six-year-old daughter, Nahla, from a previous relationship and 16-month-old son Maceo with husband Olivier Martinez, was just five years old when she watched her mother "beaten day after day after day" and get "kicked down stairs" by her husband and admits what she witnessed has stayed with her.

"I'm a victim of domestic violence. I wasn't married to a man that beat me up, but my mother was,` femalefirst.co.uk quoted her as saying.

"Knowing that she wanted nothing more then for her little girls to see her be empowered and be a woman of strength, but having no way to make that happen was heartbreaking for me. She stayed for too long and her children, my sister and I, saw far too much and I've suffered the damage of being a child of domestic violence,` she added.

Berry also worked for 15 years with the Jenesse Centre, a Los Angeles domestic violence intervention programme.