Advice please - coercive control?

[rosesarentred3]

I'll start by saying if anyone recognises me from other threads I've created under a different name, please do not put those links on this post as all the info added together would make me easily identifiable to friends and family.

After being in my marriage for 10 years, I can see now that I believe my partner is controlling. I see a therapist who feel strongly that this is happening.

There are too many examples to list but I'll list a few:

Starting random arguments about my family out of nowhere, it literally could be anything. Then DP says to me 'see, look, we're arguing because of them, look at what they're doing to us! We shouldn't have contact with them'. This is about various family members and friends. DP has fallen out with many members of my family so it's awkward to see them.

If I leave a wrapper on the side, DP will be annoyed at me, tell me off, go on and on at me about it. But then does the same herself. If I said something she'd go mad.
The other week I said one night that I was going for a shower abr her response was 'does this kitchen look clean to you? Can you honestly say this is clean? Clean the kitchen before you have a shower'.

Saying what clothes to wear and not wear. I put on some summer pants and DP says 'you really look big in them. Honestly, if you're conscious about your weight I wouldn't wear those, they make you look massive'. I'm a size 10. Not that that matters.

My work is extremely confidential. DP will ask me for confidential information about my work saying 'if you don't tell me then you don't trust me' and will badger me about it and eventually not speak to me for long periods of time because I haven't divulged information.

Tells me regularly I wouldn't survive without her. What would I do without her? How did I manage before? etc.

My confidence is so low. I rarely see my friends. I've lost loads of friends since is being together.
DP told me when we first got together that some of my friends who I saw all the time had been speaking about me behind my back saying awful things and made sure we broke ties with them so I don't see any of them anymore.

Will get really mad at my family and say it's just because she's trying to protect me. Even though there's nothing to protect me from.

We have a child. When I was pregnant she insisted that she take the shared parental leave because I'd had enough time to bond with the baby while I was pregnant so it was now her turn. So I returned to work after having the baby. I cried to dp and said I really wanted to be with the baby and couldn't bear the thought of leaving her. But this just turned into an arguments where DP would cry saying she wanted time off with the baby.
A part of me felt like it was the right thing to do because DP continuously told me I wouldn't manage on my own, that I'd probably forget to do what I needed to do with the baby etc. and I really started to worry that would be true and agreed for her to take the leave instead.

Anyway - what I wonder is, what do I do now? I feel like I can't be in this relationship. I don't feel loved. I haven't ever felt loved in this relationship. Do I just leave? In which case this means selling the house and sorting shared custody etc.

Do I try to spend some time building my confidence first? Making friends? Going out more? Meeting people?
I'm always at home. I work at home. Then when I'm not working, I'm always with DP to the point where I now feel extreme anxiety whenever I go somewhere without DP.

Today I was planning a day with DC. DP then started a big argument with me, slagging of my family again etc.
however, I came out.
Is it completely pathetic that I feel chuffed with myself for coming out? I wasn't as anxious as I usually am. Years ago, I wouldn't have batted an eye at coming out on my own.

It all feels such a mess.

I think I would approach it as asking there advice. I would want them to know exactly when I was going to leave for example, and would ask there advice about leaving.

I would also talk to your GP about it all and the effect on your health.

OP - come on! You can do this.

So many of your posts are looking backwards. About the mat leave especially. Yes it was a terrible situation but you don't have to let it define your future. You're actually only a TINY way into parenthood right now. So much more to come. You sound like you could be financially secure after a divorce - you could have a 6 month sabbatical or work PT to get loads of time with your child as they grow up. If you promised yourself that as a reward for leaving would that help?

The child won't remember the mat leave but they will remember the atmosphere they grow up in.

Get your financial paperwork sorted, house on the market, file for divorce. She will be an absolute nightmare so best to lawyer up from the beginning. Go for 70:30 custody on the basis that you are the BIOLOGICAL MUM. Only a year ago this baby was inside your body. You body is powerful, you need to channel that strength now. Yes DP has legal rights but they do not override yours, particularly when you would say to court that the mat leave was part of coercive control.

You need to be brave. The longer this goes on the more ammo she has and potential to twist the parenting narrative.

@boomtickhouse
The solicitor said it doesn't matter who is the biological mother and that it would likely be 50/50 as it's purely based on the best interest of the child and unless the child is being seriously abused by one parent, and proof would need to be provided, it would likely be 50/50.

And if you're honest with yourself OP, do you actually have 50/50 today?
She doesn't let you feed her, bathe her, comfort her....
From what you've said, a divorce and formal 50/50 arrangement would be a significant increase in quality contact time with your DD vs today

@Bitterballen
It is different now to how it was when DC was first born. I bath her and feed her and spend lots of time with her. The solicitor asked how much time do we each spend with DC now and I said it is equal. We both have just as much time with her as each other. So she said it would likely be 50/50 split then.

The last couple of weeks she's been really nice. Really nice to the point where I have felt so guilty for typing this and for saying all what I have said.
However tonight, she was stressed about something work related. When I was going to sleep she suddenly became very upset. She was saying no one cares about her and that she should just die.
She kept saying I don't love her and she knows that I'm planning to leave and if I do she will kill herself.

She has been going on and on and on for the last few hours saying 'I won't let you sleep until you tell me that you want to end the relationship!' And then saying 'if you leave and I don't have full custody, I will kill myself!'

She has now gone into the other room and I think she may have gone to sleep.
I am worried now about what the future holds and what tomorrow will be like.

OP I am glad you have come back here. Please keep coming back. As quick as things seem okay they will turn again, just as to why have. And this cycle will continue.

This is pure manipulation. Classic.

Tell me X or you won't sleep.

But if you say the wrong thing, I'll kill myself.

This is poisonous.

Deep breaths. Remember all you have learnt and realised here.

It's a process. A slow one, but one step at a time you will move on and be free of this.

Even when if feels like one day you are strong and go 5 steps forward and the next day you feel weak, depressed and guilty and like you've taken 2 steps back again.

Keep pushing forward. In the long run, you will make progress, you will move forward and move on.

Have you got any further with women's aid/solicitor or even just speaking to friends:"/family?

@scoobysnaxx
I have spoken with a close friend who is helping me.

She was pushing me and pushing me mentally and kept saying she wouldn't let me sleep unless I told her I was ending it and I ended up saying 'I don't think our relationship is in a good place or should continue'.

It was after hours and hours of going on and on and on at me. I was exhausted. And now I wonder if that was the worst thing I could have done. She's gone into the spare room and I think she's gone to sleep.

She is torturing you with sleep deprivation and manipulation, you did incredibly well only to say what you did, tomorrow tell her that you were completely forced to respond as you did by her questioning, you didn’t know what to say. I’d tell her that her behaviour was completely out of line, and that you cannot discuss things when she is being like this.

Keep going op.

The reason why she has been hammering at you for so long is because she can sense your strength and wants to thwart it. The reason why she implies she is the real parent is because she is jealous that you are the biological mother. She is insecure, jealous, needy, inadequate and tries to control you because deep down she knows you're too good for her. Keep plodding on. See your attempts to leave as a long game, a project. Keep chipping away. I can see your true strength emerging in this thread more and more.

Keep going. You can do this.

She is incredibly manipulative.

All the more reason to get out, OP. This is such an unhealthy relationship.

Threatening suicide is a classic abuser move. Your daughter needs protection from her.

She's following the classic abuser script.

She won't kill herself.

And if she did, that would not be your fault. She's saying it to manipulate you into staying.

Stay strong.

I'll say it again to.

If she doesn't anything to herself IT. WILL. NOT. BE. YOUR. FAULT.

Not under any circumstances on any planet.

This is fact.

She is utterly toxic, manipulative, abusive.

More coercive control.

She sounds possibly Narcissistic.

This is all deliberate.

She keeps saying 'I wouldn't be killing myself because of you or if you leave me. But I'll kill myself if I don't see DC every day. I can't have 50-50 custody. If I don't have her every day I'll kill myself'.

Which makes me wonder if she's saying that hoping I'll just say she can have DC full time?? I'm not sure.
But she does keep saying 'I wouldn't kill myself over you. But I would over DC'.

Everyone is saying the same thing as to what and who this woman is and you continue to analyse her abusive controlling manipulative words as if they have value and meaning.

Go to the police.

@billy1966
I'm purely updating on the situation and wanting some kind of support. I am leaving. I am ending this relationship. I think it's clear that it is over. I just don't know what to do next.

What I mean is that there is no reasoning with her.
No understanding her.

This is a very very dangerous woman.

You are still focusing on HER instead of focusing on YOU.

Getting YOU away from her safely.

You are in complete denial of how manipulative and dangerous this woman is.

She doesn't care for you or your child.

It is all about her and her control.

For years and years.

She is so so far ahead of you.

By going to the police you can access protection from her.

You need to be protected from her and how she will manipulate your leaving.

You are NO match for her.

She is so far ahead of you.

What you do next is clear.

You go to the police.

You tell them EVERYTHING.

You tell them that clearly she senses you want to leave and then tell them what happened last night.

Threatening to kill herself.

Tell them you are terrified of what she is capable of.

This is the type of person that could harm a child to prevent you "winning".

Your refusal to take things very seriously is making you even more vulnerable.

This is a police matter.

I would try to record what she is saying, if you think you can do so safely without her noticing.

At the least, keep a diary. Speak to your GP. Speak to the police.

Create evidence so it isn't your word against hers.

Leave WITH your DD to a refuge, do not warn her.

Now today speak to a solicitor about an emergency "lives with" order.

Please read this again OP, you need to go to the police now.

This is the type of person that could harm a child to prevent you "winning".

She already has done this.

She's prevented your baby from being comforted by her birth mother in the 4th trimester. She's prevented your baby from having the opportunity to be breastfed. She's actively tried to prevent your baby bonding with her birth mother.

This is all harm to your baby. If she really cared about your baby, she wouldn't have done those things.

And, having formed a bond with your baby, she's now saying she'd break that bond by killing herself (complete rubbish) if she can't spend ALL of her time with your baby, without any thought as to how the sudden disappearance of one of her primary caregivers would affect her.

Please read it and think about it. She is completely selfish and only really cares about the baby when she can centre herself. She's not prepared to make ANY sacrifices at all, in the interests of your baby.

She's already actively shown she will harm your baby if it gets her what she wants.

You need to seriously think about this. Contact the police and go to a refuge, WITH your baby.

@Bitterballen of course you are 100% correct.

Absolutely.

By coercively forcing OP to return to work during mat leave and preventing her from breastfeeding, the baby has already been harmed and is completely collateral damage to this womans controlling abuse.

This is probably one of the very worst, if not THE worst threads of abuse I have ever read.

Both mother and baby being simultaneously abused.

This is a police matter.

Oh FFS, she's just being abusive and manipulative with her emotional blackmail. She won't get full custody of your DC and she won't kill herself. She's basically trying to guilt-trip into handing over your child to her - the child that you gave birth to - which is also exactly what she was doing when she bullied you into going back to work so she could take parental leave instead of you. She's been subjecting you to emotional abuse and coercive control for a very long time and this is all just part of that pattern.

She is, to be brutally honest, a complete cunt who needs to fuck off into next week. If she did kill herself (which she won't) it would be nobody's fault but hers.

I had an ex who threatened suicide in a similar situation (not child-related, but relationship-related) and eventually I just started saying 'Obviously I hope you don't do that, but the choices you make about your own welfare will not have any influence on my decision.'