DH threatened to throw a spider in my face

No it's not common and it's not a joke from an abusive man. Watch your toes. Your bar is low!

.

So, to sum up, you've prioritised your preference for no screaming and a 'polite' phobia response over your DD's terror of spiders. (And it's also fine to kill a spider, apparently.)

And a threat of abuse from the partner of someone phobic, for behaving in a way triggered by said phobia, is trivialised as 'laying out a consequence'.

And you think a natural phobic response is on a par with actual abuse.

Just wow.

When ever I read comments like this I'm really glad I'm nothing like this person.
I just think how sad and pathetic their life must be to spend their lives on AIBU having a pop at a woman who is trying to leave an abusive relationship.

Yanbu. Ignore the arseholes on here.
They're not worth wasting any of your time on energy on.
Hope you manage to get away soon.
If you want support try relationships. There's lots of people on there who can talk you through what to do.

My DC at 10 would know this is unacceptable behaviour. What an arsehole.

Nah, I don't live on a planet where it's OK to minimise, invalidate and trivialise a phobic person's fear responses. Nor one where it's OK to minimise emotional abuse.

Soon to be ex husband

What does those acronyms mean someone pl?

She's trying to come to terms with the fact she's in an abusive relationship, and write down everything abusive he has done in order to help her leave.

It's hard to know what's abuse and what isn't when you've been worn down so much that you're a completely different person.

So yes, she is 'banging on' about it. People quite often do while they are getting their head around years of suffering at the hands of an abuser.

This happened a year ago and you're still banging on about it ?

It's not funny

And if her husband is abusive he would have said it and followed through

Decent human beings don't threaten to throw spiders in somebody's face when they clearly have a phobia. Decent human beings, regardless of whether they're in a relationship or not, deal with the problem kindly and understand that people aren't always very sensible when they suffer from a phobia - those with phobias act irrationally, when they look back at the situation they know they're being irrational, but in that single moment, they're terrified. Acting imperfectly is doing something silly by mistake not threatening somebody with the very thing they're terrified of.

One of my DC has a debilitating phobia (not spiders). To use their phobia against them would be worse than seriously physically assaulting them, and believe me, I do not say that lightly.

OP, people who do not understand phobias won't get where you are coming from, but I totally understand how deeply distressing this must have been for you and I can see why it has played on your mind since.

Just because there's abuse in a relationship doesn't mean every imperfect moment is abuse.

It doesn't help op to recover and have healthy relationships in the future if people fill her head with the nonsense that imperfect = abuse and that she has no responsibility for her own behaviour. You can't build future healthy relationships based on those beliefs.

Decent human beings behave imperfectly too.

Tbh, OP, if my DH refused to remove a spider & leave me in a panicked state I would consider there to be something deeply wrong with our relationship. And that's without all the other things you've had to endure with this man.

I've no idea why so many have come on here to be all 'just deal with, I did!' all smug as shit, but were phobias so easy to get over then we all would be, wouldn't we. Cos they are crap, no one likes being terrified to their core of something that's often harmless & I feel like an idiot when it happens, I hate it!

A partner who refused to understand that wouldn't be one for me - but this incident really is at the bottom of the list for reasons to gtfo ASAP.

Fuck me I wish we could downvote things

Wtf? No it's not, not even in the slightest if you're genuinely phobic.

I'm the spider catcher in our family, and I work very hard at not being irritated by the scardy cats. But I do work hard at it and wouldn't dream of doing this as a threat or a joke. That's just awful.

I hope you're joking. If not, you're a nasty person. Seriously, who does this?! You clearly don't understand what it's like to be so frightened of something. Just because you don't have the phobia don't be so bloody nasty to those who do.

"I have a phobia too, not of spiders" Can't you read?

I work in mental health. Phobias are irrational and reactions can be extreme. I don’t have a spider phobia but I am able to understand the terror. Not all people can stay calm and control their reactions.

Nothing about the OP screaming warrants the abusive nasty comment from this man. If you think otherwise, you need to raise your expectations of your partner.

I avoid all images, discussions, everything related to that phobia

Yet you and other arachnophobes who are criticising the OP for using a spider emoji, clicked on a thread about spiders and engaged in a discussion here 🤷🏼‍♀️

I’m so sorry for these awful responses. It’s not a joke at all and it’s abuse. You were obviously terrified and he used that to punish you.

I think you are as bad as each other. Screaming at your partner to get a spider while standing on the couch is OTT. He didn’t threaten to throw it into your face just because. He said stop screaming or…and laid out a consequence that is harmless except for your phobia which is as bad as your screaming at him.

My adult DD is extremely phobic of spiders and she has learned not to scream or demand. She quietly removes herself from the presence of the spider and then asks politely for one of us to go in and evict or smash it.

A spider phobia is not an excuse to scream demands at a partner and your screaming is not an excuse for him to say stop or I will throw it in your face.

Neither of you behaved well.